Is holographic no longer vaporware? (was: Let's develop an open-source media archive standard

On Thu, 12 Aug 2004, Stan Barr wrote: Not necessarily doubting, but was that "stores", or "can store"? Many years ago, I attended a presentation about a holographic system the "could store" MANY gigabytes per cc. The phrase "can store" was used a lot. When asked about current progress, they were VERY evasive. After about a dozen questions, they admitted that they had not yet achieved the multi-gigabyte capacity. After many more questions, they finally admitted that the current capacity was 27 bits. It is a good proof of concept, but the differentiation between projection and accomplishment is significant. 'course by now, they very well might have reached the capacity goals. Similarly there is a proponent of alternate fuel vehicles who is constantly quoting specs that include impressive results. He is very evasive about timeframe of availability. But it turns out that his vehicle is NOT in production. There isn't even a prototype! His "data" is all results of "simulations", and many of his "can do" numbers require a complete restructure of society. Even when explicity challenged, he adamently refuses to acknowledge a difference between possibilities and existence.