What's up with @richardbranson, the tie-loathing arch-millionaire (as per his own words) when he claims that “ @virginhyperloop has been included in the EU Commission's Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy”? https://twitter.com/richardbranson/status/1337425408677924867?s=20

Let's go to the actual source to see for ourselves what's he referring to… https://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites/transport/files/legislation/com20200789.pdf

25 pages of document for a single #hyperloop mention:

First things first: that pseudo-technologies (implausible technologies) such as #hyperloop and “personal electric airborne vehicles” get any amount of air time in an @EU_Commission strategy document seems serious enough to me.

Both @TimmermansEU and @AdinaValean throwing their political weight behind a @Transport_EU strategy where,
even so slightly, EU's transport policy is tarnished by the mention of products of well-known smoke vendors seems serious enough to me.

Of course companies like @virginhyperloop will take advantage of this as a megaphone for their real business: peddling “feasibility studies” for #hyperloop that assume the existence of the technology and shamelessly contrive cost and demand numbers.

But, in any case, @Transport_EU has not quoted @virginhyperloop in the least. @richardbranson should be aware of this.

But going back to the gist of the matter, the enshrining of #hyperloop into EU strategy is just a consequence of precedents already out in the open. https://twitter.com/brucknerite/status/1336629909213622272?s=20

The great European R&D&I machinery wasn't showing a healthy scepticism on #hyperloop hype. It was just slow to react.

(Una versión en español de este hilo: https://twitter.com/brucknerite/status/1337702563068719104?s=20).