I suppose this is a decent enough story. Not much new here, but interesting to the uninformed. There is one error of omission that I think needs to be corrected. Its true that NiCd batteries are now rare. This is because they were replaced by NiMH batteries, which avoid the use of toxic cadmium. NiMH batteries are still pretty common because they are available in AAA and AA sizes and can be used to replace non-rechargeable alkaline batteries in small electronic devices. NiMH suffer from the same type of "memory effect" as NiCd batteries, however.

This intro to this piece is terrible. You say that "Batteries are an old-school technology" and "What we know about batteries today is pretty much what we knew about batteries back when ENIAC was invented." This is not true. Those lithium-ion batteries you spend most of the article discussing are relatively new technology. If we were all using lead-acid batteries to power our laptops, then I would agree with you. Battery technology is the subject of much high tech research and constant improvements are being made.

Its true that battery development hasn't followed Moore's Law. But, I don't know what that is supposed to mean. Moore's law only applies to digital electronics, not everything on the planet. Automotive development and the treatment of cancer haven't followed Moore's Law either. So, what's your point? The link you give to explain why batteries don't follow this law is misleading. It says: "This is because battery technology is a prisoner of physics, the periodic table, manufacturing technology and economics." What technology isn't a prisoner of all three of these things?

How about some more research before writing an article?

Re Moore's Law: Since batteries power electronics, they pose a limit to Moore's law in a way that cancer treatment hasn't. Thanks to Moore's Law, modern cell phones have enough power to play 3D games, hi-def movies, etc. But because they rely on a technology that doesn't follow Moore's Law -- batteries -- they can't really do any of that stuff for very long, if at all. That is the point.

I get your point. A good anology would be that elevators limit the height of skyscrapers. Unless we can make elevator shafts smaller (not really possible), buildings have reached a practical limit of height.

However, I disagree with your point. New battery technolgies are in development and even Li-ion batteries have improved since their debut. Of course, they aren't improving as fast as computers, but nothing other than digital electronics is improving at that exponential rate.

Thanks! This is what I was getting at in my first post. I called the statement "offensive" but I think misleading is a much better word. I'll say again though, by Mr. Manjoo's definition of lack of progress, one could argue that airplanes, cars, or even the computer haven't made progress- they use the same basic technology they always have. You know, wheels, wings, transistors.