A commenter to Ann Althouse's recent iPhone post had this to say:

Independent George said...

I'd like to take a moment and thank all you early adopters out there who make it possible for me to buy superior products for less money later on. You're the best!

Like George, I tend to be a late adopter. I find that my very cheap second-hand laptop, PDA, and disposable-priced cell phone get the job done for me. Of course these things wouldn't be cheap had there not been people a few years ago willing to pay high prices for this technology.

Text is a poor medium for communicating sarcasm. "Independent George" may have been completely sincere, entirely snarky, or (probably) some combination of the two. I, however, am being completely sincere. The Ann Althouse's who pay a little more for gadgets today benefit all us gadget-loving geeks tomorrow.

Aubrey de Grey has a related theory about the development of life extension therapy. When asked if these treatments would only be available to the rich, Aubrey has responded that, yes, initially only the rich will be able to afford life extension treatments. But these early expensive therapies wouldn't be very effective anyway.

Later, de Grey argues, the price of these therapies will go down as their effectiveness goes up. There will be some mid-point where moderate money will buy moderately effectively treatments. Ultimately we'll have very inexpensive treatments that everyone can afford that will also be very effective.

I think Dr. de Grey is right. We've seen this before. The first CD and DVD players were huge black boxes that cost more than $1000. Now they're tiny and cost less than $50. There was a time when only the rich had cell phones – think of Gordon Gekko in 1987's Wall Street. Now we all have cell phones much better than that clunker Gekko was hauling around the beach.

I think this movement from "expensive/relatively ineffective" to "cheap/effective" will happen fast with life extension. Once the world sees these therapies as something more than fantasy, we'll pour incredible resources into their development and dissemination. And since technological development is accelerating, progress will be faster by then.

I have been an early adopter several times in the past. Being human (and subject to temptation) I'll probably be first-in-line to buy some cool, marginally-useful gadget again. It might even happen that I'll feel compelled by the risks of age or diminished capacity to shell out big money for life extension version 1.0.

If so, the whipper-snappers who'll benefit later can toast me.