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Yeah, but every bike saves several inches of metal tubing.
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Jan 18, 2016 21:32
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I guess, eventually. Why not just raise a kickstarter for that, then? It's actually even sillier than I thought. I guess they're raising money to sell their super expensive bikes in the US and then giving a portion of that to charity. So basically just a hipster bike company.
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Jan 18, 2016 21:34
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So toms for bikes completely unironically
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Jan 18, 2016 21:41
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I'd sooner support that hilariously awful 3D printer bike
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Jan 18, 2016 21:51
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When Bamboopunk becomes the next big thing and hipster nerds are making everything out of bamboo and coconuts and vines like a modern-day Gilligan's Island you're gonna wish you had invested in Pedal Forward.
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Jan 18, 2016 22:01
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Gilliganpunk sounds awesome
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Jan 18, 2016 22:11
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Xandu posted:I feel sort of bad sharing this because I'm sure his heart is in the right place, but good god, what kind of moron manufactures bicycles in New York City to ship to East Africa? quote:While transitioning in 2013, we raised funds and donated 35 bicycles to orphaned secondary students in Tanzania. "Do you live in Africa? Are you trying to make a living making bicycles? Well, gently caress you, because we're just giving these away, better find another job!"
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Jan 18, 2016 22:27
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So instead of using tried and true ways of building a bike entirely out of metal, instead they will build a bike that still needs metal parts, except they're all custom since they have to interface with bamboo pieces. Also it introduces a ton of points of failure where the metal attaches to bamboo.
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Jan 19, 2016 00:18
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pairofdimes posted:So instead of using tried and true ways of building a bike entirely out of metal, instead they will build a bike that still needs metal parts, except they're all custom since they have to interface with bamboo pieces. Also it introduces a ton of points of failure where the metal attaches to bamboo. They've compromised the design to make it actually work, but never realized that at some point it stopped making any sense.
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Jan 19, 2016 00:27
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That's one of the stupidest things I've ever seen in this stupid stupid thread
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Jan 19, 2016 00:48
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Guys! People in Africa are still people. They, too, deserve overpriced rubbish bicycles. Don't act like you know better what they want, like giving them money directly or something. You just don't get how much one can accomplish with a lovely bike.
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Jan 19, 2016 00:57
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Germstore posted:They've compromised the design to make it actually work, but never realized that at some point it stopped making any sense. Yep. Bicycles are already resource cheap compared to pretty much every other form of transportation save walking. It's telling that in their pitch they make this comparison: (A car’s carbon footprint is 271 g/km; a bamboo bicycle’s is less than 21 g/km) ...rather than you know, comparing with a standard bike.
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Jan 19, 2016 00:59
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pairofdimes posted:So instead of using tried and true ways of building a bike entirely out of metal, instead they will build a bike that still needs metal parts, except they're all custom since they have to interface with bamboo pieces. Also it introduces a ton of points of failure where the metal attaches to bamboo. And more points of failure is exactly what you don't want when you're out in the parts of Africa these people were thinking about when they got started.
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Jan 19, 2016 04:07
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quote:It is lightweight, comparable to aluminum. It also has a higher tensile strength than steel and has four-times the shock absorbency of carbon fiber. Bamboo provides the best of these materials into a simple mode of transportation; a lightweight, aluminum bicycle that rides as stiff as a steel bicycle, and is more shock absorbent than a carbon fiber bicycle This is *involuntary eye twitch* not how material properties work Serak has a new favorite as of 04:19 on Jan 19, 2016 |
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Jan 19, 2016 04:15
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You can have your bamboo bike, hipsters, but don't come crawling to me when your wheels get eaten by a pack of pandas.
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Jan 19, 2016 04:17
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Xandu posted:I feel sort of bad sharing this because I'm sure his heart is in the right place, but good god, what kind of moron manufactures bicycles in New York City to ship to East Africa? lol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLm9wMWH7_o
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Jan 19, 2016 04:20
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Phanatic posted:"Do you live in Africa? Are you trying to make a living making bicycles? Well, gently caress you, because we're just giving these away, better find another job!" Congratulations, you've made a broad-spectrum argument against many kinds of charity. Scrappy restaurateurs and grocery stores being oppressed by Big Food Bank, and worse!
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Jan 19, 2016 05:34
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I'm a very controversial person, I won't purchase any conveyance that can't take a few blows from a sledgehammer.
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Jan 19, 2016 05:39
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LOVE LOVE SKELETON posted:I'm a very controversial person, I won't purchase any conveyance that can't take a few blows from a sledgehammer. This test is gonna really horrify the poo poo out of your brethren if you ever go Amish.
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Jan 19, 2016 05:45
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Serak posted:This is *involuntary eye twitch* not how material properties work I know you're correct, but I'm too dumb to know how you're correct. Can you explain it to me?
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Jan 19, 2016 05:54
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RandomPauI posted:I know you're correct, but I'm too dumb to know how you're correct. Can you explain it to me? You're not dumb for not knowing it - that's what they're counting on. Bamboo doesn't have 'higher tensile strength than steel' by any measure (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimate_tensile_strength) , but even assuming it did, tensile strength means nothing when they're claiming that this means a stiffer frame. I can make a flexible rope with a high tensile strength, but I wouldn't advise you build a bike out of it. Also 'four-times the shock absorbency of carbon fiber' is a completely meaningless statement, especially since my understanding is that shock absorbency for a bicycle is typically of concern in the front fork, which is not made of bamboo on this bike in any case. Serak has a new favorite as of 06:10 on Jan 19, 2016 |
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Jan 19, 2016 06:05
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A quick Google search reveals they're also not 1) the first to build a bike out of bamboo or 2) even the first to Kickstart it. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dhaugen/aluminum-and-bamboo-bicycle https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/817362809/bamboobee-build-it-yourself-biy-bike-kit
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Jan 19, 2016 08:01
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There are also a ton of groups that bring more bikes to Africa, in a better and more sustainable way. http://www.buffalobicycle.com for example builds local assembly shops, employs local people to build and repair bikes, bikes made to work in a rural environment, with local and standard spare parts and are affordable by the local people (134 $ at cost, usually they partner with charities to bring the price down some more, since that's still several months of income in many regions and countries in Africa).
Decius has a new favorite as of 13:26 on Jan 19, 2016 |
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Jan 19, 2016 13:20
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There's an ngo here that crams a ton of refurbished mail delivery bikes in a truck and just drives there to dump the bikes on an orphanage and gtfo
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Jan 19, 2016 14:17
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Subjunctive posted:Congratulations, you've made a broad-spectrum argument against many kinds of charity. Scrappy restaurateurs and grocery stores being oppressed by Big Food Bank, and worse! Food banks aren't in any way competing with actual restaurants in developed countries, though. However this is a very legitimate concern for developing countries where free or cheap second-hand stuff floods the market and destroys any chances the local manufacturers had: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/12/business/second-hand-clothes-africa/ Maybe consumer saving will outweigh the loss of employment elsewhere, but this isn't something you can just dismiss automatically. Send money if you want to help.
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Jan 19, 2016 14:37
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The bamboo bike is basically: (source comic is usually  just to be on the safe side)
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Jan 19, 2016 17:04
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Maluco Marinero posted:Yep. Bicycles are already resource cheap compared to pretty much every other form of transportation save walking. It's telling that in their pitch they make this comparison: Actually, that's not even true. I did the math a year or two ago, and found that a car's carbon footprint is around 150 g/km (for 271 g/km you can pretty much get any sub-SUV type car without any passengers; add one passenger and pretty much any sub-Hummer SUV fits within the budget). Public transport is 10-50 g/km. Biking, however, increases your requirement for food to a point that with a regular diet you burn approximately 90 g/km extra CO2 just from the food production. Less if you eat vegetarian or vegan, more if you're a poor African eating wildlife cooked over a bonfire. A small motor cycle is pretty much comparable to the CO2 emission of a bike. The thing bikes got going for them is that they are simple and riding them consumes less energy than walking/running. Unless, of course, they're made of some bamboo crap. E: Oh yeah, a classical bike takes around 113 kg CO2 to make; drive more than 5400 km and that's better than 21 g/km. klafbang has a new favorite as of 17:24 on Jan 19, 2016 |
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Jan 19, 2016 17:19
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What if you make a bike out of AK parts that grow naturally in africa
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Jan 19, 2016 18:08
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Subjunctive posted:Congratulations, you've made a broad-spectrum argument against many kinds of charity. Scrappy restaurateurs and grocery stores being oppressed by Big Food Bank, and worse! I'm by no means the only person making that argument, and reacting to it dissmissively doesn't reduce its importance. Second-hand clothing imports have gutted textile industries and jobs in a number of African nations. http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/12/business/second-hand-clothes-africa/ http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/mariah-griffinangus/africa-charity_b_1623561.html http://foreignpolicy.com/2012/06/18/please-dont-send-food/ http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1987628,00.html http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/14/world/americas/14iht-food.4.7116855.html http://www.voanews.com/content/food-aid-hurts-haitis-farmers--92405389/116708.html http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/spiegel-interview-with-african-economics-expert-for-god-s-sake-please-stop-the-aid-a-363663.html Even CARE thinks that food aid hurts Africa. It's a steady pattern: some disaster makes the news, Westerners out of the goodness of their hearts donate all kinds of free poo poo, the people in those countries who previously made a living by selling that kind of poo poo find themselves out of work and dependent on that Western aid that just put them out of business. quote:About three hours north of Port-au-Prince, the Artibonite Valley is the center of Haiti's rice production. If people want to solicit donations for a lovely trendoid bicycle, okay, but it's pretty awful for them to suggest that sending free bicycles to Africa is going to help anyone. It's raw capitalism wrapped in a cloak of charity.
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Jan 19, 2016 18:39
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https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/576593751/kickbackerz-your-face-cartoonized-in-a-card-game?ref=home_popular The easiest way to remind all your friends that you are absurdly vain and will buy cards illustrated with a bunch of stranger's faces if yours is included among them. Maybe a solitaire deck would have worked better.
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Jan 21, 2016 11:26
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Nagato posted:https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/576593751/kickbackerz-your-face-cartoonized-in-a-card-game?ref=home_popular So Kickstarter has devolved to the level of one of those high school poetry collection book scams. I wonder if they're planning on holding exclusive game tournaments that backers can participate in for a nominal fee...
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Jan 21, 2016 11:43
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There's an article on Engadget about the Zano micro drone failure. http://www.engadget.com/2016/01/20/kickstarter-explains-zano-drone-failure/ tl;dr: "Nobody knew what they were doing" I like this bit: quote:Whether or not Kickstarter heeds that advice is another matter. Co-founder Yancey Strickler agrees that Kickstarter "shares in the risks," and he's open to the idea of paying for someone to oversee funded projects. However, he adds that crowdfunding services depend on an inherent amount of risk. The very point is to take a chance on an uncertain venture -- you have to accept the possibility of failure.
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Jan 21, 2016 11:49
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Haha, yeah. They're really talking about a different type of risk, the 'backers better not stop funding these moon shots otherwise we'll make less money' risk.
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Jan 21, 2016 13:50
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xlevus posted:There's an article on Engadget about the Zano micro drone failure. From the actual report: https://medium.com/kickstarter/how-zano-raised-millions-on-kickstarter-and-left-backers-with-nearly-nothing-85c0abe4a6cb#.rkov7ng7t quote:Torquing’s supercomputer was switched off and would be sold for parts. Because the Zano drone checks in over the internet with Torquing’s servers each time it powers up to retrieve calibration data and updates, the few drones in the wild were instantly and permanently grounded What the gently caress? "Without a connection to the internet, your software won't work" is awful enough. *That* is just retarded.
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Jan 21, 2016 17:48
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Phanatic posted:From the actual report: Haha what the gently caress no way
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Jan 21, 2016 18:16
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It looks like the new norm for crowdfunding is to invest a ton in marketing and social media visibility while selling the stupidest product https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/foreverspin-world-famous-spinning-tops--3/ And it works, the stupid e-ink shoes almost reached 1 million simply by hiring a company to write articles about it on tech and gadget blogs and sites. https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/shiftwear-customize-your-kicks/
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Jan 22, 2016 13:24
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Oh and it looks like the "smallest camera drone" guy ran away with the money: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/3d-pocketcopter-the-flying-camera/
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Jan 22, 2016 13:26
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Phanatic posted:From the actual report: Glowforge has a similar setup, except it's $5000 laser cutters that will be left useless if they shut down their servers. Their response to that concern has basically been, "I don't know, maybe we'll open source the software, lol who knows."
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Jan 22, 2016 13:39
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SpaceGoatFarts posted:Oh and it looks like the "smallest camera drone" guy ran away with the money:
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Jan 22, 2016 13:39
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SpaceGoatFarts posted:Oh and it looks like the "smallest camera drone" guy ran away with the money: Oh man, I would never have thought he was a flight risk.
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Jan 22, 2016 13:46
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