O plague right well prevented!

What about the one where the CPM guy reckoned that 64K was enough ;). Actually I did some thinking about the CPM program problem back in the period, or how to make an shell GUI program that transformed text based CPM programs into full GUI programs, amazing what you can do with chucks of 64k (as Intel 8086 did).

Adam: I have no idea what you're saying

Let's get back on topic!

Never mind the increased resolution of sensors - what kind of optics are going to be needed to clearly resolve that detail. I realise people will say film lenses, but surely the light sensitivity of such a hi resolution sensor will require much faster optics due to the relative lack of light per pixel ?

Don't assume that sensor-manufacturing technology won't improve. It won't do to have to use a very large imager to counter decrease sensitivity due to extreme pixel density -- the lenses would get unmanageably large and heavy, and depth of field unmanageably shallow. I think it's pretty certain that if the technology is ever to move outside the lab and into the mainstream, it has to be made more practical. And that means using more-light-sensitive materials.

My gravity warp lens (another thread in joke). Seriously, you ever notice that ion Star Trek that the very fast ships the Enterprises chases at huge distances look close and slow (bi-planes) that must be the warp field going telephoto ;)

The sensitivity of pixels have taken an enormous artificial boost of thousands of times, over recent years sensors latitude has been increased by thousands as well. SN ratio has taken an improvement recently too, but how much?

Jeffrey BRown of Molly's Pilgrim
 

If you are connected with Molly's Pilgrim let me know I have fun info for you.
LydiaDotRobertsonAtMacDotCom

Actually it was Ken Olsen who said something like that.

In 1977, Ken Olsen, the founder and CEO of Digital Equipment Corporation, said, "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home."

These Japanese companies kind of piss me off in doing this. If they want to do this crazy stuff, they should design hard drives capable of handling that amount of video data. They should design processors capable of editing the amount of data necessary for that resolution. They should do both of those things first before they bother coming up with this stuff.

When you can fit more than a few hours of completely uncompressed HD on a hard drive or even a home video disc, then it might be time to talk about increasing resolution.

Plus, the upgrade from NTSC to High Definition has been hard and expensive enough already on the TV and Video industry.