Sinclair's Answer To The Segway

slumos writes "BBC News Online is reporting on Sir Clive Sinclair's reaction to the Segway. The British inventor thinks it's fine for factories, but not for crowded streets, and he's even planning some competition in the form of a top-secret follow-up to the Sinclair C5."

The real question is:

[oscast]

would make S. Jobs shit his pants?

Followups

[barbazoo]

I would like to see a followup to the ZX-Spectrum.

Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

.... but can I run linux on it?

I'm Glad He's Doing This

[Anonymous Coward]

A response to a product that is a total flop is REQUIRED. We can't just let the Segway sit around with it's monopoly of 50 units sold, can we??

Sinclair C6

[sardonic2]

Sinclair swipes the Segway prints some nifty stickers up that say Sinclair C6 and put them all over the Segway causing severe balance problems and all the Sinclair rebranded Segways flip the heads of large nations over the handle bars, backers of the Sinclair C6 pull out and the C6 is a failure.

Re:Sinclair's other attempts...

[Meowing]

the Zike (a folding electric scooter)

Yikes, serious flashback time. "You can go on a zike bike if you like. If you like you can go in an old blue shoe. Just go go go, please do do do!"

GWB on the segway...

[keplon]

Even George Bush took a ride on one, although any White House endorsement was somewhat undermined when he was catapulted over the handlebars.

That's what he would call bad driving strategery.

dodgy

[freedommatters]

the c5 was cool but if you rocked it too much the ram pack fell out so you had to restart the engine and go back to the start of your journey. pisser.

He's missing out on a crutial market...

[canning]

If I were him I'd throw an over-sized muffler on it, a huge wing and some carbon fibre parts. Than offer bigger rims, lowering springs and an enormous stereo as aftermarket add ons.

He'd sell alot more that way.

Re:Oh what a surprise...

[__aamkky7574]

The fact is that they cost a fortune ("somewhat cheap"? Pur-leaze.), are slow but still unwieldy and make you look like King Dork McDork of Dorkania from the the planet Dorkeraan. They have all the disadvantages of a car (problems with parking, cost, lack of exercise) with the disadvantages of a bike (no weather protection, no passengers, relatively slow speed) and none of the benefits. In short, they are ridiculous. There is definitely a market for one-person medium-speed transportation systems, but this is not the solution.

P.

Re:What's so wrong with what we HAVE?

[kikai suki]

The problem with high performance cars is that they are too fast to drive in the city. City traffic tends to go from 30mph to about 8 but high performance sports cars go anything from 150 to 200+mph. You just can't use a car like that in the city, that's why you only see them whizzing by on the highway and their owners all have car-shaped holes in their garage doors because the things aren't capable of slower speeds.

Re:Interresting to see the difference

[Anonymous Coward]

So it will be cheap, but made of plastic and probably won't work very well.

A bit like the British railroads then..?

Yes, apart from the cheap aspect.

Re:Interresting to see the difference

[Bushcat]

Well, all the British bits will be made in Taiwan, and all the US bits will be made in China.

C6 power supply?

[AndroidCat]

Perhaps we could combine this with a about getting power from blood? [slashdot.org]

Add the optional forward ramming scoop for refueling, and you're good-to-go!

I had one of these growing up

[SengirV]

It was called a big wheel. WTF?!?!?!

Re:The real question is:

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the real question is what happened to the missing C4?

It was used to blow up most of the unsold Sinclair C5's.

Re:The real question is:

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. Without the use of my right hand I haven't been able to consumate my relationship with it properly. But, keep in mind that this really does not mean anything:

"shit his pants"

Does that mean that he excreted his pants into being?

Does it mean that he had previously eaten his pants (as a given) and is just now excreting them back into the world?

Or is it an ignorant usage of language meaning:
"shit IN his pants"?

The last option would not make any sense since it would indicate that he is potentially incontinent due to his usage of the Segway. Or he is frightened by some quality of the Segway, in which case I would advise that he seek counselling immediately.

If it means that he ate his pants, then counselling is still not out of the question. There are many mental illnesses that will cause a person to eat something that is not meant to be eaten.

If it means that he actually produced a pair of pants whilst excreting digested matter, then I think it's time to say "stop the presses! Man shits pants into existence! New textiles on the horizon!"

I am not a troll.

Re:Gone googling...

[Anonymous Coward]

"...the C5 was declared a death trap by the Automobile Association..."

I was wondering just how dangerous it was.

Not nearly as dangerous as the previous model, the C4, which had a tendency to explode.