We talk about the sonic boom as something that happens when we travel faster than the speed of sound. We don’t specify “in the same medium you’re traveling in”, and noone reasonable thinks “it’s really hard to travel faster than the sound in carbon”.
You’ve added “speed of light” in your reading and concluded that’s what the OP wanted to imply.
I think that was unfair, and distracted from the rest of your comment.
I, for one, didn’t know what the cherenkov radiation is, and when reading the title thought “oh, so it’s a sonic boom for light? That’s so cool!”
Nothing can travel faster than light through vacuum, so that bit is implied as well.
I disagree with their quibble about the title being intentionally misleading but, meh, I've picked stranger technically correct hills to die on, the rest of their comment is interesting, it's fine.
Arguably there's a lot of people who don't know nothing is faster than light in a vacuum.
Because of science fiction, and lack of education in much of the world (looking at you USA), the title can easily make certain people think we discovered new science that allows us to travel faster than light. Especially for folks who only look at headlines.
The whole thing is a silly quibble. But sensationalized headlines get better engagement, which we can all see here.
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I don't think the title is that misleading.
We talk about the sonic boom as something that happens when we travel faster than the speed of sound. We don’t specify “in the same medium you’re traveling in”, and noone reasonable thinks “it’s really hard to travel faster than the sound in carbon”.
You’ve added “speed of light” in your reading and concluded that’s what the OP wanted to imply.
I think that was unfair, and distracted from the rest of your comment.
I, for one, didn’t know what the cherenkov radiation is, and when reading the title thought “oh, so it’s a sonic boom for light? That’s so cool!”
One difference is sound can only travel through a medium, so that bit is always implied. Not so with light.
Nothing can travel faster than light through vacuum, so that bit is implied as well.
I disagree with their quibble about the title being intentionally misleading but, meh, I've picked stranger technically correct hills to die on, the rest of their comment is interesting, it's fine.
Arguably there's a lot of people who don't know nothing is faster than light in a vacuum.
Because of science fiction, and lack of education in much of the world (looking at you USA), the title can easily make certain people think we discovered new science that allows us to travel faster than light. Especially for folks who only look at headlines.
The whole thing is a silly quibble. But sensationalized headlines get better engagement, which we can all see here.