Wright brothers first airplane or the Commodore 64?

SteveStrummerUK
 
 
It depends...
 
 
I shouldn't imagine The Flyer would be much use if you needed to work out the cubed root of 57,918.

But you could certainly get "high" with it.
 
It's multi functional.

 
 
One time I cubed rooted so hard I couldn't sit down for 9 days and 5 hours 

I don't know if the C64 would be the best example but I would say the computer has been responsible for a larger intrinsic societal shift than the airplane. To extend it out, the first powered flight gives us Fedex and the Space Age. The first commercially available computer gives us the smartphone and the Information Age.
 
The grid is much deeper than the runway.

ampfixer
+1 The computer has ruined things way more than the airplane.

"It's a shame they didn't use their powers for niceness, instead of evil"
 

jamesg1213

bapu
Shouldn't Straummy be chuggin' on a geeter right now?
 

I felt the residual wind of NagBap as it blew on by there...phew...

Prolly smelt it too?

Its an apples to oranges comparison. The Commodore 64 revolutionized computing and opened up vast new markets for the thing known as computing. But the thing known as computing already existed with many profitable businesses supporting it by the time the Commodore came along. The C64 took an existing technology and resized it thereby creating an entirely new market for something that already existed elsewhere. The C64 was also a landslide commercial success.

Aviation in a practical sense, did not really exist before that morning in December near Kill Devil Hills. We had hot air balloons and some blimps, but neither ever gained much of a foothold in terms of revolutionary sustainable practical application. Orville and Wilbur changed all that with the invention of the Wright Flyer. However, the Wright Flyer itself was never much of a commercial success. 

Mooch4056
 
 
Good analysis! 

Thanks. But as usual I think I left out the most important bit. The Wright Flyer wasn't a commercial success, but it did serve to show several very important things. 

Yes they showed that heavier than air powered flight was possible. But far more important was that they showed that nearly anyone could invent it or innovate for it. 

The most educated and well funded minds of the day were working on making powered flight a reality and none of them got it done. But a couple high school dropouts made it happen. And they inspired lots of others to try which in turn spurred a couple of decades of development in that field. Much of which took place in back yards and garages.
 
Because a whole legion of people looked at what they did and said, if they could to that, surely I could do something similar. 

Ever notice that most airplanes look similar? Wings in about the same place, motors in about the same place etc. Ever notice that almost none of them look anything like the Wright Flyer?
 
They did and showed that it could be done. But more importantly, they inspired an entire generation to get out in the garage and start tinkering to see what, if anything, they could add to the collective knowledge of how airplanes are supposed to work.
 
And that's what people did in droves. Which brought about a ton of innovations in a very short period of time. Which is why the airplanes of today look very different than the Wright Flyer but also look very similar to just about any aircraft developed after about 1920. 

Because a whole ton of people looked at they did and said 'if they did it, I can probably do it better' and then got out in their garages and started trying. And this collective effort is what took us from the Wright Flyer to what airplanes essentially still look like today in just under two decades. Normal average people got out and started trying and lots of their discoveries pushed the collective understanding of what worked and what didn't. That is by far the most important thing the Wright brothers did. 

By the time the Commodore 64 came along, the individuals who would go on to define what the machines would look like for ages go come (Gates, Jobs, Allen, Wozniak) had all left their garages far behind and were each already famous millionaires.