Dean Kamen on The Luke Arm. Simply Amazing.
medgadget.com
medgadget.com
HN talks a lot about startups and I'm sure most of HN's readers dream of their own startup. Something to think about before taking the plunge is "What benefit is this startup offering?" It can't be just to "make a lot of money". That's why I like what Dean has done. Sure he has made a lot of money, but look at how much he's helped people.
They solve some really tough problems, but the rewards are unbelievable. The video show's a guy named Chuck who has no arms and hasn't fed himself in 13 years, feeding himself. I mean can you even put a price on that kind of reward.
That's the kind of thing that drives you. That keeps you going even when things seem hopeless.
Here's another very interesting story involving Dean Kamen, Steve Jobs, and Jeff Bezos:
Much respect to Dean. Wow.
E.g.:
"You're sure your market is upscale consumers for transportation?" said Jobs.
Turns out Segways weren't a hit with the target market and they ended up selling to enterprises and mailmen. Bezos had some good analysis too saying the real question is whether it would be legal to ride them - in many places it was illegal to drive Segways on either sidewalks or roads.
Of course, I don't have their initial presentations so it's possible they were already expecting these to be their main problems. I just think it's unfair to call it "prattling on" when in fact they were giving some pretty accurate analysis on why the product wouldn't be a success.
I wonder what I might do if I had an invention and Steve Jobs told me it sucked, or if I got Bill Gates' trademark "thats the stupidest f*cking idea I've heard since I've been at Mircosoft." Considering their advice, shrugging my shoulders and then pressing on anyway might not be high on the list.
According to New York city officials, New York is already too crowded for Segways.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/nyregion/12segway.html
Gov. David A. Paterson signed a law in July legalizing Segways everywhere else in the state.
Officials in New York City, where many streets are already clogged with taxis, tourists, dogs and double-wide strollers, deliberately asked lawmakers to leave the city out of the bill. ...
“To introduce a foreign, unproven, untested element into the mix complicates the job before us, which is to make the most efficient use of city streets,” said Noah Budnick, deputy director of Transportation Alternatives, a New York advocacy group.
Either way, it's tough when you have a big bang strategy like this, because you can't iterate, you have to just decide when it's cool enough and then launch. If that decision's wrong, you're in trouble. It might be necessarily to go big bang here, though, because you need the cooperation of so many large organizations (like, governments need to legalize your product) and the goal is to help that along through PR.
"I know burn rates are important, but you'll only get one shot at this, and if you blow it, it's over."
I would say this is basically what happened with the Segway.
Not to take anything away from his work on the arm but I find his comments on the US's education system and our cultural values from the last two videos the most interesting.