http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,209827,00.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4217573
http://www.sfweekly.com/2002-12-18/news/showing-segway-the-highway/

Regarding my statement about its safety, I’m willing to admit that that comment was less based in evidence and rooted more in my experience and powers of deduction. For one, it clearly couldn’t withstand any sort of true traffic collision. Secondly, main municipalities have restricted or banned the use of Segways as a result of their dubious safeguards. One such problem is the lack of a true brake. Japan actually requires users have brakes installed if they are to use it on roads.

That said, I appreciate the fact that you appreciate the Segway, but next time you feel the need to pounce on someone’s statements, please be prepared to back it up with an adequate retort. You supply no evidence to the contrary of my statements and thus are actually guilty of the very grievance that you erroneously and irrationally charged me with.

In our past long gone innovations came slowly and the time between major inventions was 100’s if not thousands of years.

Fire.
The Wheel
The printing press
The iPhone

What I find really entertaining, on nights when I am really bored, is to watch a movie from not too very long ago, say the 60’s or 70’s, hell maybe the 80’s and see what missing from the picture. No PC’s, no email’s, no IM, no internet, no cell’s, crappy TV’s, crappy cars (with notable exceptions), no microwave popcorn ( this is arguably a step in the wrong direction) no portable audio.

Ever try creating a nice letter on a typewriter… before liquid paper. Every use an early computer with a 9 pin dot matrix printer?

If your crappy 70’s car broke down in the middle of nowhere in 1975, you could die and nobody would find the body for months. Now, unless you are an ATT customer, help is just a cell phone call away.

I once used a quote when responding to a article on iPhones, “Oh the humanity”. Originally spoken by a radio reporter witnessing the Hindenburg disaster. Afterwards I thought, what would that reporter have thought back then if he knew some dude in the 21st century would quote him, using something called a computer, over something called the internet, into something called a web page, about some gadget that could wirelessly act like a telephone, play color silent and talkie motion pictures on a small viewing screen made of something called LCD and could hold more “records” than anyone could possibly own. The poor guy would be staggered and overwhelmed.

But for all of our advances are we any better off. Yes, I think the chicks now are much hotter.

That said, I disagree with you that the “state of electronics is bad.” I loved my Treo and now love my recently-purchased Sprint Mogul. (The upgraded speed, greater Outlook server connectivity, and wi-fi capabilities were much more than window dressing in my consideration to get a new smart phone). I could live without my DVR or MP3 player, but I’d prefer not to! And in terms of pure improvement of life, I could not recommend more highly the Sennheiser PXC300 noise-cancelling headphones, particularly for anyone who travels.

Point is, one can always focus on how Segway didn’t change the world or the latest cell phone doesn’t whiten your teeth, but that misses the point. If you don’t want the latest gear, don’t get it. If your PDA/phone/MP3 Player/toy is annoying you, turn it off! We all have the free will to use or not use whatever tools become available, so why complain that we have the choice.