Loos like a SKYNET version of the Segeway :)

Fagatron

@ARP: I believe the "deux ex machina" translates to "god as machine". in movie and literary terms, it basically means when there's some totally stupid and heretofore unmentioned device or character used to wrap up a story in a quick and lazy way. like the 3rd matrix, where you literally got a machine god who just snaps his fingers and solves everything.

Alfonzo

@newgalactic: Seems like a high speed, less practical (can you believe it?), dangerious Segway.

newgalactic

Yamaha, Death is on line one...
He says he wants to thank you for all the "new business".

Anyone who's ever used a full body harness would not look forward to riding that. Besides that, you'd run over crap and it'd splash right on your clothes. Go for a spin and return with CityJuice™ sprayed all over yourself... Mmmm.

DustyButt

What do you do when you are not 5'4'' to 5'9''? What do you do when you are >250 lbs.? As mentioned, how will this perform in an accident? Will driving while pitched forward be like watching a movie in the front row (neck pain)? No trunk? How fast can i get off if the Li-ion batteries catch fire?

..Can I get mine with jump jets?

newgalactic

@ARP: I think it's just silly to call it a Deus Ex Machina when it doesn't miraculously solve any problems whatsoever, and possibly presents whole new ones.

@Jason Chen

At least with a Segway you can hop off and do your business.

But don't you see? While you're riding this, the framework is wrapped around you, rather than you mounted on it, so, with some garment tweaking, you can do your business WHILE you ride it!

@Wraithen: You were almost there with the Gizmoduck reference, but the passcode for the parts to assemble around Fenton is "Blathering Blatherskite!"

Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish

@bosskev: gah you beat me to it! That movie had some incredibly weird parts to it... most dealing with the crossdressing gnome king

lpranal

and what do you do to the first idiot that flips it? you know it's going to happen, and then insta death.
or if you have long drives? what if you have to travel to grandmas? i sure as hell aren't going on I 90 on that thing.

UrIt

ndammm,i wanna see someone kiss some Ford F series truck with one off thouse.... i think your head will kiss your ass in blink off an eye!!!... maybe this thing will work if everyone drive 4mph on the road.

Tossik

Did anyone here ever see the movie "Return to Oz"? Overlooked by the public when it was released, I actually liked it a lot. It featured evil creatures known as "wheelers", which look a hell of a lot like this contraption.

bosskev

Anyone else getting tired of seeing every cool new gadget getting called a Deus Ex Machina? How exactly is this a Deus Ex Machina?

Blue Oyster Cultist

"It's a green vehicle, and all of the numbers are based in the real world."

Fuck you. Don't give me back of the napkin calculations when you aren't an engineer. He's still a design/art student not an inventor last time I checked.

Log1c

Ever since I watched Robotech as a kid and they had those motorcycles that became exoskeleton fighting suits I have dreamed of owning one to this day. If this sucker is a precursor to that I am stoked... soon I will be able to hunt down Rich from 9th grade music class who picked on me and broke my clarinet! Take that Rich!!!!

Maksimir

I know how I can get one now.

"Blatherskite"

Wraithen

A little presumptuous to call it God from the Machine [lit. translation]?

ARP

I love how he used the motion blur to show us how fast it goes. I wouldn't have been able to tell otherwise.

Ill take 1.

odnet

Give me one that uses a solid carapace with cushions or inflation bags (or both) to create a snug fit instead of "seat" belts.

Also, why must you "hang" under it?

If they made it recumbant so that you could recline, you would not have to worry about getting gutted by the first piece of heavy road debris that you drove over.

nospamsam

@Jason Chen:

But don't you see? In the future, when we go to work in our Deus Ex Machina, we can just hop off once we arrive, whip out our cans of spray-on clothing, and voila! All set!

And please, groceries? Just order online. And grandma? Put her in a home! That will take care of your trivial issues!

xAnarChisTx

I want to know what the crash test rating will be like.

GBirdii

and when the first guy wacks himself using one, that will be the end of it for all time.

godwhacker

Thats really awesome!!!
Until you come across that at random piece of truck tire or dead animal that hits you in the sternum!

jizzlo

I WANT ONE NOW DAMN IT

ratheen

@Alfonzo: Wow. Way off, there, buddy. "God out of the machine" refers to an ACTUAL machine that was used to lower an actor into position to act, as god, to save the protagonist through divine intervention. it has since come to mean a seemingly divine, yet random occurance that saves the main character at just the right moment, but the term is often misused because of most people's misunderstanding of the phrase and its original etymology. It could be argued that that misuse is happening here, but it's actually more accurate in this case than it is is common usage.

Christ, I sound like a dick-head theater-snob, don't I?

DeusExMach

Motorcycles are the motorcycles of the future. Just like cars are the cars of the future. This is the dumb, three wheeled, deathtrap, pipedream of the future.

RoboChop

@Wraithen: @Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish: I have a photographic memory when it comes to episodes of Ducktails from when I was 8.

Gizmo is showing Scrooge his new "money-bin protection" system: the Gizmosuit. He then says that he built in a password protection system, and was waiting for McDuck to come up with one. "I don't care. Any non-sense will do"

Gizmo looks up "Non-sense" in a thesaurus. "Blatherskite" is one of the synonyms. As it's the least obvious, that's the one he goes with. Fenton's favorite saying is, indeed, "blatherin' blatherskite" which he says in vicinity to the suit by accident.

And then he takes out the ED-209 by pushing all the buttons on his suit at once, and jams his data-spike through the lead Beagle-boy's throat, or something.

See? photographic memory.

DeusExMach

@bosskev: yessss. i was about to post that.

turi319

I can totally see a squad of cops on patrol with these in the Big Brother like world that we will soon be living in.

Then again, motorcycle gangs would be just bitching to watch racing down the express way.

PS. some one over at Yamaha has truly been influenced by all the Tron 2 hype.

Go Team Venture

@Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish: You were almost there with the Gizmoduck reference, but the passcode for the parts to assemble around Fenton is Blatherskite. Blathering Blatherskite was Fenton's favourite phrase which just so happened to contain the password.

I had to think about it for a while but I'm pretty sure I'm right. What really matters, though, is that I'm not the only oldie 'round here ;)

Wraithen

Very cool design and I would love to "fly" down the high all superman like.

2 big issues.

1 it looks like when it shifts into high speed flying mode you're one speed bump or hydrolic failure away from cheese gratered knees.

2 Speaking of speed bumps what about road debris? you're like 10 inches off the ground. One retread blow out, hell one pebble bounced up at 75 MPH and you're in pain town.

Boter

also, to everybody citing safety concerns, i get what you mean, but this thing is supposed to replace the motorcycle, as i understand it, not the segway or car. and maybe it's just me, but it sounds like most of the things said about this apply for a motorcycle as well (dangerous etc), except for the strapping in bit. but that's for cool points. i think that the kind of audience that rides a motorcycle would be more inclined to buy this than i would.
just sayin'.

Alfonzo

nice non-functional prototype and computer simulation. Too bad this thing called physics makes this idea an impossibility. Care to point me to the large volume where the battery pack is? Sorry, but i'm calling BULL$HIT

LeadxSled

@RoboChop:
very good, i was just about to call "trike".

sportster FTW!!!!!

godwhacker

Did you ask, "who would?" Dude, this is 2008. We go through the hassle of removing our clothes and underwear, putting them back on, shepherded to a gate, board an aluminum tube, suffer the ignominy of being served no food or drinks...each time we go on vacation, to granma's house, etc...

Who wouldn't mind strapping on this ultra coolness and zip down I5? Please, sir, if you don't want to, let me have at it.

Cobol_Mongol

all the talk about crashing. geez. if you all ran the world i wouldnt have my r6. bunch of freaking pansies.
anyway, to call this 'on video' is a misnomer.

sluzzuls

@Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish: his name WAS Gyro, wasn't it?

DeusExMach

@DeusExMach: Flooding back memories. I loved Gyro Gearloose.

Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish

Yup, junk on the road will now fly up and smack you in your junk..

PocketLint

@Saboth: GiggityGiggityGiggity-GONE!

DeusExMach

@Saboth: LOL that made my day.

Kaiser-Machead's WALL-E fetish

hahahaha...

Lame.

tehdahl

I'm going to pull up beside a car of girls and do the forward/backwards transition really fast.

Saboth

Yeah... Um.

Dumb.

Where was that article about Apple and concept designs?

ltethe

AWESOME! When's the hybrid version coming out?!?

Poon

This is cool. I imagine it being a great idea in a future where everyone has extremely safe cars and trucks (no giant monster cars), and all the roads are perfectly paved. It would be great then.

RE-L

well...to solve almost all problems mentioned here, you could just make the rider lay on top of the main 'spine' rather than hang underneath it.

mister_s

whats with the creepy music?

pradster

So, that thing against a prius...finally, the prius could kill something. Either way, I would gladly give up my safety to own one.

chizelord

Yes, but does it says stuff in cute voice? Like:
"Hellooo"
"Are you still there?"
"I see you"

Bokusatsu_Tenshi

@DeusExMach: Yes.

But you're completely right, so you're okay.

The phrase originates in Greek theater. When various gods were wheeled (or lowered) into the scene to wrap everything up. In today's terms, you could probably think of it more as "phoning in the ending".

makanai

gizomoduck, haha it definitely does remind me of him - seriously though it's really cool but kind of intimidating.

split decision

Deus Ex Machina? It's all Greek to me. I'd rather watch Ducktales, now THAT had some classical story devices.

Wraithen

OMFG, It's like Gizmoduck from Ductales o.O.

Oh, I'm getting old -_-

SewerShark

@DeusExMach: He used the text book definition, "god from a machine", which seems much more fitting so not only do you sound like an (uninformed) snob, your name compounds the error leading to this mornings most delightful bit of irony.

Deus Ex Machina - [www.merriam-webster.com]

Irony - [www.merriam-webster.com]

Blue Oyster Cultist

That looks fun to drive but is it really practical? Segways are much more compact...
And that video has some of the worst sound effects.

chrstphr

Wonder does the Rollerman feel threatened by it.

UnderTheHill

good concept. but thats exactly what its gonna stay.

aniruddha23

Hah, gizmoduck. That takes me back. Which reminds me I need to take some more geritol.

I just can't stop imagining what happens when something like this gets into an accident with a low car and the riders bottom half ends up inside said car without his top half attached anymore.

shini

@xAnarChisTx: LOL spray on clothes. Aerosol will be outlawed at this point of oblivion when the Deus emerges, so you will have to settle for "Clothes in a Can" AKA Can 'O Clothes.

SinAmos

@Alfonzo: Well said.

Anybody crying 'dangerous' is clearly not in the 'crotch rocket' demographic. All those guys on Ducati's at 3am turning my freeways into racetracks are asking, "Why isn't this already on the road?"

codemagic

@Blue Oyster Cultist: Man.
A: When a creator chooses an existing word or phrase to represent something he's created, he gets all of the associated definition baggage. Did you even read your own m-w link?
B: Thanks for trying to prove yourself through your interpretation of irony.

My favorite piece of self-inflected marketing pain from the creator is the term "wearable motorcycle". I picture a man trying to get through a revolving door. A Vespa, then, is apparently the future today. It is much more wearable than this thing. A BattleMech is about on par.

svnt

I dont see any shocks...am I missing something?

Also, wouldn't this make you a little "saddle sore?"

namabiru

Crap, I seriously thought I'd be totally original with a Gizmoduck reference.

And by default for browsing a gizmo site and making a Gizmoduck reference before me you are all therefore nerdier.

Now I can sleep comfortably.

Absent Blue

"Sure, it looks pretty amazing and you can park it vertically in a garage to save space, but imagine having to unfasten yourself from this every time you get to work. Or the supermarket. Or grandma's house."

I don't have to imagine. I commute via motorcycle regularly. Getting all the gear on and off at each stop is the biggest PITA, especially in the heat and humidity of summer. Sure, I could skip wearing the full moonsuit each time, but one crash at 55 mph without armor was enough for me.

So really, this wouldn't be any less obnoxious than the kit I already wear.

crevans

@DeusExMach: Thanks. Is that like a MacGuffin? ;)

RoboChop

@RoboChop: A MacGuffin? Like with egg and sausage? What would this

have to do with divine intervention?

bosskev

My nine year old went nuts. He said he wants one and doesn't care how long he has to save up his allowance for it. I gotta admit it is pretty dang cool. But I don't think it would be practicle in our world. First bad bump, roadkill, trash, etc. in the road would send you flying into an impressive but catastrophic crash, followed quickly with dismemberment and death. But it would happen so fast you wouldn't appreciate any of that.

winchester20

Hahaha, I can see all the bikers who come to work after riding in the rain with the streak up their back now sporting identical ones on the front of their clothes as well...

MagnusButeo

There is something about being strapped to anything that makes me think twice. Maybe they need to watch the kite surfing video.

Husar

I had request for 'wheelie' .. what happened - do you have the email for Jack the Luniac.

honk4RC

I'd be less worried about things flipping up off the road and "hitting you in your junk," as several people have mentioned. I'd be more concerned that I might go too fast and scrape my nuts off on the street as it "dive accelerates."

X___X

ldsdj

It could also be a wearable motor-sky-cycle, with folding wings attached to the two front tires frames; and add a rocket jet pack that can swivel like Mollers Sky Car and like MIT's jet pack but with a parachute and morphing materials, and add to the fused fuel cell system. So that it can have more than 100 horse power to take flight like an air plane or just levatate like a Sky Car! And maybe add a more comfortable standing platform for your feet too, and THE SARCOS exoskeleton suit; that's the cover page for Popular Science Magazine. The 2010-2050 visions! Would be awesome!
Now that would be alot of fun, especially if the two front tires could connect at the front and be controlled like a TRON motorcycle!
Ciao.-Fabian.

StealthNinja

I mean the foldable wings from the ICON A5, but a similar design; yet, with morphing materials maybe, and constructed with the two front tires frame so that it covers the outside of the tires would be kind of interested with a fuel cell rocket jet pack, like at the MIT convention for jet packs, but add a HALO (High Altitude Low Opening - Budoka) parachute system! Plus, a morphing material, shape memory chrystal polymer nanotechnology materials with stealth x adaptive camoflage that can morph from the harness and wearable back pack system to form a HALO styled switch blade board concept for aerodynamic purposes (ie-The HALO scene in the 007 film with Brosnan and Berry) ha would be so rad!

ciao.

StealthNinja

all i can say is roadkill would suck

peterlarson233