RE: MythBusters Airplane Takeoff Myth
The heads on "full scale" storage devices have "floated on air" for years and years. The early drum devices were the first. On startup, they would spin up speed before the heads were released. Almost everything that moves fast enough has an attached boundary layer of air. When the drums were at speed, the heads were released and actually (not literally, actually) floated on the boundary layer. When the industry developed disc mass storage devices, the design worked there too.
BTW, that's been since the 50s-60s. Some of the drums were actually the size of barrels you'd have on your farm or factory. Some were smaller of course. The drum was on it's side in the cabinet. A gravity consideration of course.
The industry moved to discs with their platter shape to benefit from the more easily manufactured surface accuracy. And platters are easier to spin up to speed. Less mass.