Segway has just announced their glorious S-Pod personal transportation device, which does away not only with tedious walking, but with tedious standing as well. Yes, you just sit. And go.
Dr. David H. Keller wrote a piece satirizing the growing inappropriate use of labor-saving technologies in 1928; see if he didn't predict the Segway S-Pod some ninety years ago. He called it the Auto-Car
... the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia was filled with the usual throng of pleasure seekers, each in his own auto-car.
(The Autocar from The Revolt of the Pedestrians)
Noiselessly, on rubber-tired wheels, they journeyed down the long aisles, pausing now and then before this exhibit or that which attracted their individual attention... Finally, a boy stopped his auto-car in front of a glass case.
"What is that, Father? They look as we do, only what peculiar shapes."
"That, my son, is a family of pedestrians... This family was shot in the Ozark mountains. It is believed they were the last in the world..."
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 1/7/2020)
Orb Nomad Zero-Emission Electric Aircraft
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.' RH Romans, 1929.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!)
is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for
the Invention Category that interests
you, the Glossary, the Invention
Timeline, or see what's New.
'Old People Began to Cross The Continent In Their Own Cars'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
Starfall Manufacturing Drugs In Space
'The vast spinning sphere of Factory in the Sky loomed above and ahead of us, gleaming white against the unfathomable jet depths of surrounding space.'
The Solar Oberth Slingshot
'And if it doesn’t work,' inquired Lazarus, 'what does that make us? Sunspots?'
'If Anyone Is Watching Earth...'
'Our study of your race has convinced us that you are not fitted to leave your planet in the present state of your civilization.'