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Buy a Segway... Please
aedunn writes "Wired has an article about everyone's favorite Human Transporter - Segway. Seems as though the company is looking at some hard times. Among other things, the article cites Segway's price, low speed and tightened spending in the corporate world as reasons for Segway's slow sales."
A company with an overpriced useless product and no business plan is having trouble surviving. Film at 11.
People don't like wobbling down the sidewalk looking bloody stupid after all.
They might as well give away a big red hat that says "Tool"
Hi, I'm Steve Jobs. Apple bought me a nice plane, and I return the favor by renting it back to them! I hope they buy me a Segway, so I can rent that back to them too! I was hoping those cheapskates would give me one after I said something nice about them, but no dice. Those things look really useful for crowded sidewalks - why, I could take up the room of 3-4 people and be going just as slow!
Hey, I only make $1/year! Gimmie some toys!
I almost bought one and then I realized that I could get a bicycle for a fraction of the cost.
And it is more fun to recharge the power source for the bicycle.
Seriously... How lazy can people be? They should give these things away to people that buy Hummer H2s (read:idiots).
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
"Segway's price, low speed and tightened spending"
Low speed?!?! AFAIAC, doing more than 10mph on one of those things would mean a large number of underpants changes along the way.
And pedals, for when the battery runs down. Hey wait...
In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
Think of the benefits: Less people driving cars! Unless more than one person wants to travel, and unless they want to carry luggage or groceries or anything else for that matter, or if they want to listen to the radio while they travel, or if they want to go more than a dozen or so miles...hmm, lets try this again.
Think of the benefits: Easier personal transport! Unless you run into a flight of stairs, or uneven or wet ground, or want to travel for longer than 45 minutes after which you'll have to lug it around with you like so much dead weight...hmmm, this isn't working either.
How about this: The Segway is amazing! For only $5000 you can get a motorized scooter that allows you to roll where you once walked! That is truly revolutionary, unless you count the bicycle, rollerskates, rollerblades, skateboards, wheelchairs, non-motorized scooters...Aww forget it, I give up!
and of course it wasn't the plain fact that his invention sucked ass. He's going to blame the poor economy as the reason it failed...
I have absolutely no desire to ride around on this thing. The videos I watched were a) scary, made me feel like I was watching a bunch of motorized lemmings, b) stupid as hell, everyone looked like a fucking dork riding on them.
Let's appeal to human laziness! Yah, that doesn't work all the time.
1) Build very expensive motor-scooter with auto-balance
2) Redesign all cities around it
3) Profit!
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
South park. Episode 511 "The Entity". Nuff said.
I saw it yesterday and nearly choked I was laughing so hard! Look here for a still from the episode.
Summed up popular opinion at the time quite well...
Be nice to people on the way up. You will meet them again on your way down!
If they just stuck a seat on it everything would be different.
And then a roof for when it rains. Oh, and side windows. Maybe a windshield.
Damn....now we have to put in some ventilation. Maybe A/C. How bout some heat for the winter?
A stereo.
Damn...now we need a bigger motor to pull all this crap. And the gyros can't handle all this extra weight. Better put on two more wheels for stability.
Crap...it's raining. Need windshield wipers. And a defroster. More batteries to drive all this stuff.
Gotta beef up the frame to handle those extra batteries. And again, more motor to drive it.
Well...this is now too big and heavy to actually carry anywhere. Need a parking space for it. Might as well use the garage.
Oh, and it now costs $8500 instead of $4950. Makes that new Kia look more and more inviting.
Basically, imagine the limited marketshare that scooters/rollerblades/skateboards occupy (as transportation, not as stunt vehicles)
Aw, come on. You know ESPN2 is already planning "Extreme Segway" complete with half pipe and Segway street freestyling.
From a bumper sticker seen in the Edmonton area years ago:
"Jesus saves. Gretzky gets the rebound. He shoots. He scores!"
It's hardly surpising that the laws are for sale. Now that the money machine has sputtered and died, they'll change back quickly enough as soon as the first pedestrian with any pull gets clobbered (they don't all have indoor parking).
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
Like Steve Jobs said in the future cities will be designed around these. Already happening, San Francisco is redesigning thier city by putting up theses 'No Segways allowed.' signs.
Tis a shame that the economy has hit a downturn
No, don't blame the economy. It's much trendier to blame "global geopolitical conditions" for poor product performance.
(BTW, the economy's growing healthily; better to blame the stock market.)
You mean someone came up with a way for the American population to get even fatter and it isn't selling?
You will not drink with us, but you would taste our steel? - Walter Matthau, The Pirates
Perhaps they realized that all the goo-goo gaa-gaa that they generated at launch still doesn't overcome the dork factor; that people riding these look like dorks who are trying to hold in a massive bowel movement, while at the same time, thinking "Look at me! Look at me!"
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Here's a guy that made a cool hack. It's something that has never been done before - a unique view at a problem that could a) change the way a great many people move about or b) fall flat on it's face.
Guess which future the people of Slashdot take the most pleasure in. (Hint: {nelson} HA! HA! {/nelson})
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
I am shocked by the closed minded attitude of slashdotters over the segway.
Yeah. You would think that there would be more slashdotters who are so oblivious to how things work in the real world that they believe that segway is a good idea. I never knew that most slashdotters actually have common sense.
A real war will provide an increased demand for things like wheelchairs, artificial limbs, etc.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
Nooooooo! This thing was going to transform our cities, remember? It was the end all be all to our traffic problems! It was to be the revolution for the pedestrian, quick, mobile, and versitile all while being small and able to fit in with pedestrian traffic. We're talking about a new paradigm in efficiency! A new model for transportation!
Oh how I hate these days where people will gladly pay twenty thousand dollars for a vehicle that will hold them, their family or friends and other stuff like luggage or packages, all the while traveling 50 miles per hour down an open road, but refuse to give even a second thought to paying a quarter of that for a machine that will hold a quarter of the people, if you're lucky a quarter of the stuff, and going a quarter of that speed down the same road. I mean really, the price looks to scale nearly perfectly here.
What a world we live in...
If not now, when?
Segway Human Interactive Transporter
Insert sig here (slashdot) Insert cig here (Lewinsky)
I can imagine trouble just carrying a spare tire, let alone 1/4 the "stuff."
Really, it's silly. There is hardly a niche for this thing. For short distances I'd rather walk than have to worry about where I'm going to put the bluky scooter when I get to where I'm going. For longer distances a bike is more practical for it's greater speed and manuverability. And of course a 1970 Monte Carlo SS is way cooler for any distance. Zoom zoom.
"When it rains, it pours." --Morton's Salt
I thought minivans were bad enough, now I get to get stuck behind an elderly person with their segway's "blinker" on for a mile and a half...
(no offense to your grandmother. I am sure she is an exception to the rule...)
Well, your grandma should just buy a bike, and get cycling. Here in Holland, people of all ages ride bikes every day, it prolongs your health, and keeps you alert. The 80 year old woman next door used to right her bike every day to go shopping, and it never did her any harm.
At least not until she was knocked down a killed by a truck.
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I believe you are infringing upon the mazda trademark. Cease and desist!
You're nothing; like me.
Bitch, bitch, complain. I wouldn't buy a car without renting the same model first. Why should Segways be any different? If there is anyplace to RENT a Segway, I haven't heard about it. How about renting them, for example, at all of the Las Vegas Strip hotels? You rent the thing outside the lobby of Casino A and turn it in at Casino B. When you are ready to return to your hotel, you get another one from the pickup line at Casino B and return it to Casino A. The Segway is the perfect vehicle for Vegas Strip transportation: The casinos are all within 1/2 to 2 miles of each other, and few tourists carry any baggage except for their (dwindling) bankrolls. Only problem, it would put the Vegas taxicab mafia out of business.