Some of the more conspiratorially minded would say that this is all about "conditioning" us to accept a more intrusive government. I think you'd only think that way if you lived in a border region and had to drive through that stuff every day. Budzos hit the nail on the head, this guy was obviously the talk of the doughnut counter. Which makes it all the more brutish and wrong.

Good lesson for this cat, 'cause I push my luck with TSA all the time. I recently told a security officer on a Segway that if he wanted to talk to me, "he should dismount that piece of two-wheeled faggotry".

>> ^Raaagh:
Id like to see how it performs taking a corner. Obviously wherever this is there arent corners, but we have them in Australia.


Is that why you Aussies are always ahead of the curve?

Agreed, I would have much rather watched Rushdie and Hitchens debate drug policy. How did nukes get on the table again? I'd have to re-watch the video to see how Mos Def segway'ed onto that tangent.

It's everything the segway aspired to be, only better.

OK, i know what i want.

I want one of these, only with an ornate throne rather than standing up.
then when it lands i want it to unfold Theo Jansen legs so it crawls around like an insect.

Then I'm gonna fly to a remote place and rule the locals as their flying insect god!

flying segway

hey, Thanks for the promote!

In reply to this comment by arvana:
This needs to be higher up in the Top 15. *promote.

Yeah, each of these machines will feature two housewives underneath, and one extra as a spare...

>> ^Memorare:
ah naive mechanical engineering students, soon to be wiser but unemployed mechanical engineers, displaced by illiterate Malaysian housewives willing to work for $0.10/hr.

Your video, Bastard offspring of a Segway and a Theo Jansen Sculpture, has made it into the Top 30 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Your video, Chimpanzee Ridin on a Segway - Bam BaBaBam Bam Bam, has made it into your personal Highest Rated Videos listing. Congratulations on a job well done. For you contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Pogo segways. Coming to a sharper image near you.

the difrence with segway analgy and this is that segway would activly require people to change there actoins and way of life inorder to acomidate it and benofit from it. where as this could happen without your avrage user evan bing aware that thay are using it.

you do have items that have required users to have knowlage of it ore change there way of life for it to work. but most comonly big tech change happens when something is cheep, easy to adopt or anabels something that was imposable without it, segway has non of those advantages

Good points lucky -- let me address them:

1) The possibility of cheap, massively dense, solid state static memory is cool. But HDD storage is ridiculously cheap already. I can buy 1TB for $100 (or less). How many people do you know that can really use 1TB. The point is, why can't I buy a 100GB drive for $10-$20? Marketing. Have you noticed that price points for HDD space have remained fairly stable over the last 10-15 years, while density and capacity has increased?

2) Boot time? Seriously, instant boot and application/data loading is cool, but it hardly represents a major percentage of computing time. Hell, I reboot my computer maybe once or twice a week.

I get what you're saying about the segway - but it is an example worth remembering. There were some exceptionally smart people involved with that who were convinced it would radically change urban transport. Lack of perspective. So, while I agree this is a very cool tech, and will almost certainly make computers smaller and faster, one has to be very careful when making "change the world" claims. Seriously, how many computing technologies really have? IP of course. OO programming? not so much. GUIs and the mouse? lmfahs.

The chairs have been sold around the world since 2006 and no major problems. They aren't for everyone, as many people can cruise around and get on with everything they need to with a small, relatively affordable, convenient Jazzy (or other powered chair) or human powered chair if they're able.

Being able to be eye-level, going up stairs, up curbs, over grass and sand, through shallow water... I personally say the pros outway the cons (price, potentially break down) but you make a good point.
In reply to this comment by hawkinson:
an amazing device, but I have to wonder at the reliability. its a lot more complicated than a segway, think early generation Asimov's, those would fail during demos.

One thing about an unpowered chair, it won't fail and leave you stranded half way up a staircase.

Not that I don't support a mass market roll out, if MS has taught us anything, its to let the people do your beta testing!

There are a few reasons this thing will revolutionize computer memory. For one thing, thanks to the size of the "circuitry" (measured in atoms) an enormous amount of memory can be stored with very minimal size. For another thing, these things "remember" things (like hard drives) without any power being supplied to them (like RAM requires). This means all your static data (e.g., boot drive, archived data, etc.) and your dynamic data (e.g., operating system, all running programs, etc.) can all be stored in memristors. And that means your computer will boot immediately because there will be no "load time" because it'll be like your entire operating system is always loaded and ready to execute commands.

Pardon my passionate reply above, but I just read an article about how awesome this shit will be for computers, and the Segway comparison is just disrespectful to all future technology in general. As if it's impossible that there'll ever be an advancement in computing that will revolutionize it. Pshaw.