Dean Kamen, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos and the Segway

Have you seen the really hot chick eat it on a Segway? That was pretty funny. What about the German chicks “Sexy auf dem Segway“? Pure sex, dude.

Have you seen the Segway tours here in Redding, California? They can be found  at Turtle Bay Exploration Park.

 

Pink Floyd is rumored to be working on a new album called Segway, Segway, Segway…..Um, What Was I Saying?  

There were also rumors that the Segway was going to be “what the car was to the horse and buggy.” It’s an interesting story; a story starring an illustrious cast of characters and investors. Meet the engineer behind the idea, Dean Kamen ; an inventor who devised the first medical portable infusion pump and the first phone book-sized dialysis machine.   From the Wired biography:

Kamen, 49, is a self-taught physicist and multimillionaire entrepreneur who lives in a hexagonally shaped house of his own design atop a hill just outside Manchester, New Hampshire. Invisible from the road, the estate is outfitted with a softball field, a wood-paneled library that’s full of awards and honorary degrees (Kamen never graduated from college), a wind turbine to help supply power, and a pulley system that can deliver a bottle of wine from the kitchen to the bedroom.

-snip-

Though Kamen doesn’t visit the island much anymore, it’s a microcosm of his worldview, a whimsical combination of leave-me-alone and dreams of techno-utopia. An aerial photograph that hangs in Kamen’s office at Deka bears a caption that reads “The Only 100 Percent Science-Literate Society.”

When Kamen wanted to erect a wind turbine on North Dumpling and the state of New York objected, he seceded from the US. Though the secession has never been officially recognized, he signed a nonaggression pact with his friend, then-President George Bush, and enlisted Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield of Ben & Jerry’s as “joint chiefs of ice cream.” North Dumpling has its own flag, its own anthem, a one-ship navy, and its own currency. One bill, which Kamen carries in his wallet, is the value of pi. “You can’t make change for it,” he says with a grin. “It’s a transcendental function.”

What also is of interest (probably more, personally) are how these luminaries of innovation (Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Dean Kamer, et al) react to the devlopment of ideas and whatnot.  It’s a fascinating glimpse. 

“What does everyone think about the design?” asked Doerr, switching subjects.

“What do you think?” said Jobs to Tim. It was a challenge, not a question.

“I think it’s coming along,” said Tim, “though we expect—” “I think it sucks!” said Jobs.

His vehemence made Tim pause. “Why?” he asked, a bit stiffly.

“It just does.”

“In what sense?” said Tim, getting his feet back under him. “Give me a clue.”

“Its shape is not innovative, it’s not elegant, it doesn’t feel anthropomorphic,” said Jobs, ticking off three of his design mantras.

Onward…

Bezos suggested starting slow, using one city or country as an experimental station. Once Ginger’s benefits were clear, the company would have a wedge to pound into U.S. regulations. The perfect place to begin, thought Bezos, was Singapore. “You only have to convince one guy, the philosopher king, and then you have four million people to test it.”

Vern Loucks, who had been quietly watching the fireworks up to this point, said, “You mean Gob Click Tong. He’s not a king, he’s the prime minister. I can get us in to see him if we want to do that,” he added.

More…

But Jobs was still shaking his head at Bezos’s suggestion. Because of the Internet, he said, slow was no longer possible. People would learn about Ginger in a flash of bits and bytes, and would want one now. So a small launch in a foreign place was foolish, because if the machine was unavailable in the United States, the company would blow its chance for $100 million of free publicity in its biggest market. Plus, Singapore was a nest of pirates, and the company would end up spending a fortune fighting them. If the company wanted a slow, controlled launch, better to start on a handful of U.S. college campuses.

Etc..

It’s kind of interesting.  The End. Except for the question: How many Pink Floyd songs could you listen to on a 10 mph trip from coast to coast on a Segway? Answer: One. Hahahaha, just kidding. Oh boy.