> While I'm still eager to see where Quantum Computing leads

Agreed. Although I'm no expert in this domain, I've been watching it a long time as a hopeful fan. Recently I've been increasing my (currently small) estimated probability that quantum computing may not ever (or at least not in my lifetime), become a commercially viable replacement for SOTA classical computing to solve valuable real-world problems.

I wish I knew enough to have a detailed argument but I don't. It's more of a concern triggered by reading media reports that seem to just assume "sure it's hard, but there's no doubt we'll get there eventually."

While I agree quantum algorithms can solve valuable real-world problems in theory, it's pretty clear there are still a lot of unknown unknowns in getting all the way to "commercially viable replacement solving valuable real-world problems." It seems at least possible we may still discover some fundamental limit(s) preventing us from engineering a solution that's reliable enough and cost-effective enough to reach commercial viability at scale. I'd actually be interested in hearing counter-arguments that we now know enough to be reasonably confident it's mostly just "really hard engineering" left to solve.