Sorry, Jim, but that didn't quite happen. Instead, you got a cell phone with more tech than a Moon rocket and inbuilt obsolescence.

(For those who don't get the joke, it's about wonderful new life-changing technology, purportedly promised by a Baby Boomer generation but which did not eventuate).

But hang on a sec: how about a Chinese-made electrically-powered vertical take off or landing (eVTOL) aircraft instead?

From a company which has cut its teeth, in an aviation sense, on building large payload logistic and autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) with over 10,000 hours in flight-time, Chinese company Autoflight has now progressed from those payloads to developing its first passenger eVTOL.

The V1500M made its world premiere at the China airshow this week and it's not a flight of fancy.

This time last year the Chinese drone company - which has established some serious cred in the aviation space - developed the ultra-large payload smart firefighting aircraft F240.

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The F240 is a high capacity payload drone which uses artificial intelligence to seek out hot spots in fires and drop suppression "bombs" to snuff them out before they turn into raging firefronts, which would have been a handy addition to fire-fighting efforts during last year's Black Summer.

The V1500M is the company's first venture into passenger-carrying VOTLs, with the company planning for full flight certification by 2024.

It's 10 metres long, 13 metres wide, weights just 1500kg (most of the weight is in the batteries as the construction uses a lot of lightweight composites and carbon fibre) and has has eight lifting motors to take off and land vertically like a drone.

The flying range is 250km when carrying up to four passengers because it has a "fixed wing" mode with two propellors for forward flying that engage when at altitude. This increases its flying efficiency and speed (up to 200km/h).

And being a VTOL, it can take off and land almost anywhere, like a helicopter (but much quieter).

Redundant power systems mean the aircraft can hover safely if two of the eight rotors malfunction. The V1500M also has a whole-aircraft parachute, designed to deploy as a last-ditch safety feature.

And best of all, the V1500M has been developed from scratch as an autonomous aircraft. You basically climb in and tell it where you want to go.

That element to the technology has some years to go before approval so in the interim, you'll need a pilot - or fly it yourself.