It would, frankly, be disappointing if at this time of swirling global uncertainty, tech evangelists had not seized the moment to cheer that crisis is the mother of opportunity. As if on cue, they have delivered.

The irrepressible human bullhorn that is Marc Andreessen has been the loudest voice in the chatroom. The entrepreneur and co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz, the venture capital firm, asked how it could be that in the US in 2020 hospital staff had to use rain ponchos for protection while the federal government lacked the means of quickly transferring money to the many millions of newly jobless.

His answer, in an essay entitled “It’s Time to Build”, was for a new spirit of innovation and aggressive investment in building new products, industries, factories and science to reboot the American dream. “Where are the supersonic aircraft? Where are the millions of delivery drones? Where are the high speed trains, the soaring monorails, the hyperloops, and, yes, the flying cars?” he asked.