Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Laboratory >

"It"/"Ginger" revealed at last!

02:39 / 03.12.01

And it's a fucking scooter, albeit a really cool one...
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,186660,00.html

World-changing? I dunno... I think Dean Kamen severely underestimates the American public's love affair with the automobile.

tom-karika nukes it from orbit

02:39 / 03.12.01

What! £3000 for a scooter?!

ummm.. actually...

I want one!

no.

actually

I want TWO!

The Sinister Haiku Bureau

12:12 / 03.12.01

nice. i want one too! how fast do they go though?
Also- how will this affect the oil industry? Will people move to these from cars? I, for one have no intention of ever buying a car, for environmental and safety reasons, but maybe one of these... Could that make the situation in the middle east slightly less fucked up? Or will this go the same way as that weird buggy-thing Clive Sinclair knocked up in the early eighties (if memory serves me correctly?)

13:15 / 03.12.01

quote:Originally posted by Johnny Haiku:
how fast do they go though?

17 mph
quote:Also- how will this affect the oil industry? Will people move to these from cars?
no

16:07 / 03.12.01

These will become extremely popular in the urban areas. Here in New York it takes 20 minutes to get thorugh four blocks (streets).

16:36 / 03.12.01

So, why haven't any of the electrics that have been out for a number of years at a 1 fifth to 1 tenth of the cost caught on in any meaningful way?

01:42 / 04.12.01

Until its technologies can be used in Battle-Bots..I'm still bored with it. I was more impressed with the guys wheelchair that could climb stairs and tip-toe on two of its wheels..but this? And I thought Harry Potter was over-hyped.

07:54 / 04.12.01

The nasty PR hype for this has been appalling but I like the idea. If it was really, really successfull then it could have an environmental impact which is pretty far fetched but would be great.
I personally would quite like it, but not as a replacement for a bicycle which seems to be the main competition. In fact maybe it is aimed at people too lazy to bother with a bike. Having said that the compact, vertical frame would be less obtrusive on a pavement than the horizontal frame of a bike.

tom-karika nukes it from orbit

08:34 / 04.12.01

It would be much more welcome on a pavement on a bike, simply because you can see the face of the rider at eye level. The pedestrians feel confident that they have been noticed, and they feel safe. On a bike, the rider tends to be below eye level, facing the floor, and although the bike rider has confidence to stop and know where he is going, the pedestrians don't beleive him.

This is pretty much the only form of efficient transport that has the user in a natural, standing position, rather than sitting down or bunched over a frame. That's why it will catch on.

08:34 / 04.12.01

Have you seen the footage on the news of the guys zipping about the assualt course, I want one

So they're going to give them to the postal service (in the states I think) - how weird is that going to look

08:34 / 04.12.01

I wonder if people would walk and bike less if this becomes popular. Other than that it seems cool.

15:28 / 04.12.01

quote:Originally posted by MJ-12:
So, why haven't any of the electrics that have been out for a number of years at a 1 fifth to 1 tenth of the cost caught on in any meaningful way?
What electrics?

15:35 / 04.12.01

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/zappy

or check ebay for any number of sub $150 machines

00:15 / 05.12.01

Can it go through the snow? Cause if it cant go through the snow its useless in Canada.

01:57 / 05.12.01

27 kph top speed, 60 lbs., with a range of about 27 klicks before the battery dies (which takes 6hours to recharge). I love everything about it but the price (and the weight's a little much for the general fat and lazy population)... which brings me nicely to my rant.

What an amazing vehicle wasted on such a backward, spoiled population. Canadians are debating the legalities of this vehicle, as it's means of propulsion makes it a "motor vehicle"; it would currently require both a license and insurance to drive. not that it doesn't need some rules (like helmets), but doesn't this seem like a waste of empowerment technology? insurance???

Here in Toronto, the traffic is beyond congested(even in the suburbs). It would cost far less to install more bicycle lanes (personal transport lanes) than to widen all of our roads, and take a lot less time too. everyone I work with has about a 5 -10 km journey to work: those that drive (me) travel about 5 minutes. Those that bus/walk take about half an hour. Give us these things now, man. install lockers with electrical outlets next to the bike racks, charge 2 bucks to use them for 6 hours, and watch your Art Deco Sci-Fi Buck Rogers world come to life. Or slap a psycho price tag and retarded legalities (fucking insurance??) on them and watch another great idea turn into pop-culture kitsch.

16:41 / 05.12.01

MJ-12: Have you actually looked at the wheels on those scooters? They're tiny! They hit a bump in the road and you go over! And it's hard to keep your balance when going slow. Other than that there aren't that many problems with them.

20:21 / 05.12.01

true, but for $2800 I can handle a little inconvenience, and I make a pretty nice living. For mass appeal the cost has got to come waaaay the fuck down. And if you've got to go slow, you can walk. I think there is some pretty sweet tech in this, and some amazing things may come of it down the line, but right now it's nowhere near revolutionary.

02:04 / 06.12.01

From what I understand, the cost will go Waay down but only after the investors are paid off. i'm waititng for about a year or two before I'll be considering about buying myself some Ginger.

The problem with normal electric scooters is that their wheels are so small that if they hit anything taller than 2 inches it will cause the rider to flip over the handle bars or come crashing into the ground.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

10:26 / 06.12.01

Yes indeedy. Visions of the Sinclair C5 dance in my head, too. Infact, I think these are actually stupider than the C5- which is really quite an acheivement.

16:02 / 06.12.01

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/338/nation/After_mystery_hype_scooter_rolls_out+.shtml

I'm especially interested in the last part:
quote:Robert Metcalfe, founder of 3Com and a friend of Kamen's who is familiar with the project, said those who are disappointed that the scooter doesn't live up to the hype might be jumping the gun. The scooter announced yesterday, he said in an e-mail, is not ''It.''

''Dean Kamen still has a few more tricks up his sleeve,'' Metcalf wrote, ''and you ain't seen nothing yet.''

16:41 / 06.12.01

Anyone been to the website yet? www.segway.com
Reminds me of a cross between 'The Onion' and what I would imagine the Church of Scientology's website looks like.

00:12 / 07.12.01

Feh, it doesn't even come with a lawnmower attachment. How else is anybody gonna be able to use the things if cities ban them from the streets?

03:16 / 07.12.01

What I want to know is do the have a Monster Truck version? If the don't good luck getting around most city streets. That thing would be devoured by most potholes where I live!

12:10 / 19.12.01

I've just been talking to the PR people for the company who provide the electrics for these things. What they say is that it's kind of impossible to fall off, even if you try- still, I suppose they would say that.

But it seems to be marketed as an alternative to walking- and for the people I know who have problems in that dept, I imagine it'll be a godsend.
I'm pretty excited about these little beasties

16:13 / 24.04.02

Segway scoots into Atlanta

City’s police department borrows six scooters for
two-month trial
"A special turbo key can send the Segway zooming off at 15 mph "
think of the chase scences!

01:13 / 25.04.02

i vow to run over the first person i see riding one of these. run them over with my car, my 1/2 ton wad of us shit. if i have to drive up on a sidewalk to get one of these sharper image pricks, so be it.

[making up for unadulterated hippie-isms in last post]