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Gas-Powered Boots As Metaphor For Cold War 149

Posted by Zonk from the always-good-to-see-ye-olde-steampunk-technology dept.
News.com has a piece up looking at a set of gas-powered boots that were developed during the cold war. While the technology itself is interesting, article author Andrew Kramer uses it as a launching point for a discussion of Russia's technological stagnation during the cold war. Outside of military applications, many of the innovative ideas developed in the former USSR during the 80s and early 90s were left to rot on the drawing board. The boots were eventually brought to market, but failed sometime last year. They do, of course, also go into how the boots work: "Taking a step down will compress air in the shoe--as in a typical sneaker, said Enikeev, who was a designer on the project. But then, a tiny carburetor injects gasoline into the compressed air and a spark plug fires it off. Instead of fastening a seat belt, the institute's test runner, Marat D. Garipov, an assistant professor of engineering, strapped on shin belts at a recent demonstration. Then he flicked an ignition switch."
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Gas-Powered Boots As Metaphor For Cold War More

Gas-Powered Boots As Metaphor For Cold War

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  • Ummmmm? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Whiney Mac Fanboy ( 963289 ) * <whineymacfanboy@gmail.com> on Monday March 19, 2007 @05:31AM (#18399673) Homepage Journal
    The article's author holds up the boots as an example of how entrepreneurism is failing in Russia. I'm not sure it's such a good example, as the reason the boots failed is - from tfa:

    the energy in calories used to move the two-pound boot at a run would exceed the energy input from the gasoline engine.
    and

    gasoline-assisted running remains dangerous.

    "The worst situation is when the spark fires as the runner just lands, and the force of the blast is absorbed by his body," Garipov explains flatly.

    The two powerful engines tend to throw a wearer off balance or cause knees to buckle.
    Doh!

    Also, check this:

    The Russian inventor of the Tetris video game was unable to patent his invention, and thus lost out on huge amounts of money.
    WTF? Where could the 'inventor' of tetris have gained patent protection? Methinks the author of tfa has no idea what they're talking about.

    Oh - and what you really came to the comments for - links to pics & vids: Video #1 [youtube.com], Video #2 [youtube.com], and a nice diagram [ohgizmo.com] of how they work.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by 26199 ( 577806 ) *

      Well. I wouldn't bet on Tetris not being patentable in America. (Ignoring prior art at this point, obviously).

    • Re:Ummmmm? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Jah-Wren Ryel ( 80510 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @06:03AM (#18399769)

      WTF? Where could the 'inventor' of tetris have gained patent protection?

      What? Doesn't he deserve compensation for all of the uses his idea has been put to? The stacking of multiply shaped bricks to create large structures? Every building in the world was constructed using his methods. If it weren't for Tetris, there would be no construction, anywhere! The world owes him a huge debt.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Naw, man, you missed the whole point of the game. It isn't construction, he's invented a method for perfectly clean demolition by filling in all empty space in a building!

      • Re:Ummmmm? (Score:4, Funny)

        by evilviper ( 135110 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @11:03AM (#18402261) Journal

        Every building in the world was constructed using his methods.

        And when they put in the last brick... it all disappears!

    • Re:Ummmmm? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by xoyoyo ( 949672 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @07:02AM (#18399999)

      "WTF? Where could the 'inventor' of tetris have gained patent protection? Methinks the author of tfa has no idea what they're talking about."

      Completely agree with you that the TFA-A is clueless. However, you most certainly can patent a game concept in the US (search for "Board Game" on patents.google.com to see extensive examples). In the UK you're bound by the normal limits on not patenting abstracts (which are the rules) but you can patent the totality of the game: http://www.intellectual-property.gov.uk/faq/how_pr otect/board_game.htm [intellectu...rty.gov.uk]

      Of more interest is whether Pajitnov had any rights to Tetris in the first place. The Sovs did exploit the rights by selling them to Nintendo, but Pajitnov, as a scientist working for the Soviet Academy of Scientists didn't benefit from the deal. The obvious conclusion is that the state ownership of property stifles innovation, but in what way was Pajitnov's situation different from a US academic researcher or government scientsit who would find their work equally appropraited either by the University or the state?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by k_187 ( 61692 )
        Because in the USSR there wasn't any private research going on, it was all under the state. So it doesn't stifle of itself, just by the fact that there wasn't anything else going on.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by xoyoyo ( 949672 )
          Indeed, there was nowhere else for Pajitnov to go. (Although if he'd waited a year then private research would have been entirely possible, as Gorbachev permitted private co-operatives from May 86.) So the problem is systemic, not individual. But the individual example is poor: would a NASA researcher be permitted to patent work that he'd developed on NASA hardware and on NASA time?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by k_187 ( 61692 )
            Only if NASA didn't want it and it was done independently from his work for NASA (e.g. he stayed after hours) I believe. It would depend on the individual's employment agreement. Steve Wozniak developed the Apple I while working for HP, and they had first rights to it because of his employment.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by AP2005 ( 922788 )
        Under the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980, intellectual property resulting from US federal funds is owned by the researcher. In practice, the ownership is usually shared by the individual inventor and university. However, the individual still gets to make a lot of personal cash from inventions using federal money (of course, assuming that the invention has commercial value).
    • He apparently doesn't know much about carburetors, either.

      ...a tiny carburetor injects gasoline into the compressed air...

      Wrong. An tiny fuel injector injects fuel (oddly enough). A carburetor would have allowed fuel to be drawn into the airstream on the way in, before the air was compressed.

    • The Gas Powered Condom (Score:5, Funny)

      by goombah99 ( 560566 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @09:20AM (#18401093)
      This gives me a great idea. As the piston enters the cylinder, it compresses the air and a small amount of fuel is injected....
      Resulting in reciprocating action even if the wearer is to tired to propel the engine themselves. My calculations show that speeds of up to 3600 RPMs and durations of 4 hours may be possible on a single tank of gas. This should be a great boon for exhausted soldiers and sailors to make the most of their limited R&R leaves.

      The fuel injection is all handled peristatically so the only complex part is the magneto for the spark. I'm working on eliminating that by going to a diesel version, be so far the glow plug in the tip has just cause nasty burns.

    • The theme the article repeated points out is that without a profit incentive these pieces of intellectual property--which under the soviet system where not property-- languished. Sounds like they needed some sort of patent protection system that profited the patent holders so that it could have been sold to greedy venture capital firms that could have made a profit commercializing it.

      designation of things as property and assinging them as profit vehicles to the owners is what has driven the western expansi
      • "Now consider the Gas powered boots. Are these a great invention or a joke. It's pretty darn hard to tell. Sure it sounds goofy."

        I think Steve Martin might have prior-art claims if a patent was sought for the boots. He reference a "Gasoline powered turtleneck sweater" on his first album.....(along with a fur sink, $300 pair of socks, and an electric dog polisher....of course he bought some "dumb stuff too").

        :-)

      • To give an example: Two items seeking investment in england around 1775 was the steam powered troop transport and the machine gun. The companies proposed to invest in inventing and developing these. Neither stock offering for these was subsrcibed. As a result the english lost the war in America.

        Well, some of those technologies were not well-refined. The French had some sort of "steam tricycle" around this time for hauling around artillery, but it was too expensive and difficult to maintain, so was abandone

        • The troop transports in question here were of the sailing ship variety. At that time a ship was the most potent mitiary weapon possible. Few port cities could host the firepower that bring ro bear in a concentrated way. Making them able to cruise the atlantic swiftly and then picket off the coast would have dominated the Colonies in a way they could not have beat. As it was, the colonists could kill off british officiers almost faster than they could ship them from england.
          • They still wouldn't have helped. Steamships require an extensive fuel infrastructure, which simply was not present in 1775. Guess why the British laid claim to so many small islands in the middle of nowhere during the 1800s?
            • Well it is sort of a chicken and egg issue. Given the incentive of a war with the colonies the fuel supply for a military woul doubt have been mobilized. Consider for example the Pan Am Clipper aircraft which was a wide body passenger plane that could land on water. It came into service just before WWII. At that time it was needed for two reasons 1) there were no runways developed in most of the world. and pan am server the world not just major cities. 2) it was not possible to navigate since electroni
      • To give an example: Two items seeking investment in england around 1775 was the steam powered troop transport and the machine gun. The companies proposed to invest in inventing and developing these. Neither stock offering for these was subsrcibed. As a result the english lost the war in America.

        You're forgetting three amazingly important facts, and blatantly ignoring another.

        0: Technology in the 18th century was essentially all hand-crafted, and very, VERY error prone. The first attempt at a submarine in t
        • I would dispute this thesis. Indeed your point 3 is the very basis of the refutation. The entire success of the revolutionary war can pretty much be laid at the feet of a single technological innovation: the american hunting rifle. These were quick to reload compared to the smooth bore english guns wich required a mallot and minutes to reload. their accurate range was hundreds of yards compared to at most 20 to 50 for the english weapons. Early in the war washington got congress to fund the rifle brigad
          • I took a history of technology course at one point, and the professor firmly believed that every single major outcome in history was more tied to a technological difference or innovation that any other single factor. I have to say he made a damn good argument.

  • Disambiguation (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 19, 2007 @05:34AM (#18399677)

    That's gas as in `gasoline, the fuel for motor cars'. Not gas as in `gas, the third state of matter and fuel for cookers and heaters'.

    When I lived in North America, that particular usage confused me almost as much as `homo milk'.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by CmdrGravy ( 645153 )
      Motor car fuel is called either Petrol or Diesel, gasoline is something used to light lamps. I wish posters here would learn to use the correct terminology.

      • gasoline is something used to light lamps
        I'd hate to be a guest at your house when you light THAT lamp! I think you meant "kerosene", Captain Conceit.
        • Actually, Capt Wrong, I don't mean kerosene. The term gasoline originally refers to a type of oil used for lamps.
          • Well, I looked it up and we're both wrong. Gasoline lamps do exist (no longer produced, fortunately) but they use-- wait for it-- GASOLINE, aka "PETROL". Gasoline is a chemical term and not generic. If you want to use "gasoline" as a generic term for "any liquid substance burned in a lamp", feel free to be ridiculed in the same manner as Texans who call all carbonated beverages "coke".

    • Re:Disambiguation (Score:4, Funny)

      by Whiney Mac Fanboy ( 963289 ) * <whineymacfanboy@gmail.com> on Monday March 19, 2007 @06:26AM (#18399845) Homepage Journal
      When I lived in North America, that particular usage confused me almost as much as `homo milk'.

      Did you enjoy your time in North America?
    • And is't not even gasoline. From a cited article [technovelgy.com]:

      These boots use biofuels like biodiesel, vegetable oil, SVO, waste vegetable oil (WVO) to really put some pep in your step.

      Ignoring the revolting internal rhyme, it appears these boots are designed to run on multiple low-grade fuels. Petrol would simply allow the wearer to move a little faster, or at least drive his shin bone right through his knee if he hits the ground wrong.

    • that particular usage confused me almost as much as `homo milk'.

      ...especially considering that any strictly homosexual cows wouldn't be lactating.

  • In Soviet Russia.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by CommandoMBJ ( 1017442 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @05:55AM (#18399735)
    In Soviet Russia boots run you!!

  • How is this news? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by WaZiX ( 766733 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @05:56AM (#18399737)
    Communism by definition (at least in the non-utopic form) is a state where production is decided by the state. Now The state itself is quite good at defining its needs, especially militarily, but whenever R&D is not pushed by consumer need/demand, it will never be able to satisfy consumer demand. And when there is no consumer demand for a product, how can R&D not stagnate? This is the most fundamental flaw of communism, and this flaw has been demonstrated around the same time Marx came out with his theory in the first place!

    • Re:How is this news? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by mi ( 197448 ) <slashdot-2017q4@virtual-estates.net> on Monday March 19, 2007 @07:04AM (#18400005) Homepage Journal

      but whenever R&D is not pushed by consumer need/demand, it will never be able to satisfy consumer demand.

      This is true, of course, but even "Communism" (Socialism, really — USSR never completed the "building of Communism") could've done much better than it did, if it did not spend so much on the military. They tried to keep up with the West on military spending, which meant, pretty much, no resources for anything else... I believe, this was the GP's point...

      The Cold War drained them of everything and bankrupted the country, while leaving the US with "merely" a huge national debt...

      • The Cold War drained them of everything and bankrupted the country, while leaving the US with "merely" a huge national debt...
        Don't forget a military industrial complex to make Eisenhower proud!

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mi ( 197448 )

          The Cold War drained them of everything and bankrupted the country, while leaving the US with "merely" a huge national debt...

          Don't forget a military industrial complex to make Eisenhower proud!

          Well, yes, and there were many other positive results too. The huge national debt was the negative one, so that's why I brought it up to contrast with USSR's complete collapse.

    • This is the most fundamental flaw of communism

      Government corruption is the most fundamental flaw of Communism. Power corrupts. At least in a Democratic system, the "top level" of control is actually a cycle between government and citizens, which can theoretically maintain a balance between tyranny and anarchy.

  • Skinned knee? (Score:3, Informative)

    by LaTechTech ( 752269 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @06:01AM (#18399763) Journal
    I would try these things out. Imagine going three miles in about 10 minutes by foot. That would be really cool. However, if you did trip it would be pretty bad. I would probably break an arm. I would definitely don the mandatory "stunt" helmet. Skinned knees be damned. Link to an older article with pictures [bbc.co.uk]
    • It would sure make MY 2 mile commute a lot quicker and, eyes flame war of over "gas", Fuel efficient.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by kalirion ( 728907 )
      Reminds me of the seven-league boots they experimented with at the Soviet Scientific Research Institute of Sorcery and Wizardry. The problem of course was that with the very first stride your leading foot would end up seven leagues away from the rest of your body.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Reziac ( 43301 ) *
      I want 'em too :)

      Tho I'm wondering if a lighter-duty engineless model, more of a walk-booster than seven-league boots, might be practical using essentially a compressed-gas chamber that is recompressed by your downward step, and your stride is enhanced by its desire for decompression.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sjames ( 1099 )

      In a world where climbing rocks on a bicycle, jumping out of an airplane with a parachute, and bouncing on the end of a huge rubber band are considered sports, gasoline powered shoes have latest craze written all over them.

  • These seem to be a variation on the gas powered pogo stick. Like this; http://www.bpmlegal.com/wpogo.html [bpmlegal.com] They were a commerical product. They were also pretty dangerous. They appear on ebay on occasion.

    • Nuclear powered was better (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Flying pig ( 925874 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @06:50AM (#18399939)
      At University we worked out the feasibility of a nuclear pogo stick. The idea is that the piston and the top end of the cylinder each contain subcritical masses of a suitable isotope. As the pogo stick compresses, the masses approach, generating heat, which expands the gas driving the stick. As the piston expands, at one point it uncovers a suitable gas to air heat exchanger through which the gas flows, cooling it and allowing the cycle to resume. (Basically a Stirling cycle). The air side of the heat exchanger is cooled by air movement.

      Shielding is a bit of an issue, also ensuring that the helium used as the gas doesn't get out, though a suitable nuclear isotope would replace a slow loss of helium with alpha particles.

      So there you have it, a carbon neutral, cheap and easily manufactured transport system. I'm honestly amazed we couldn't get anybody interested in manufacturing it in volume.

      • just imagine if a really fat guy got on the nuclear pogo stick, and brought the two subcritical pieces together, BOOM!
        • As the masses get closer, the heat generation increases very rapidly. In the unlikely event they are forced very close together, the heat generated melts the fuel which is then absorbed in porous graphite plates in the piston and the cylinder end, thus moderating the reaction.

          Look, this is serious engineering, not some half-assed scheme. You'd expect us to have taken safety seriously, wouldn't you? (Thinks of Sellafield (AKA Windscale, aka "Perfectly safe just don't visit the beach") reactor catching fire a

          • So, you guys didn't go around calling it the "glow stick", did you?

          • (Thinks of Sellafield (AKA Windscale, aka "Perfectly safe just don't visit the beach") reactor catching fire and the burning graphite sending plutonium particles up the shaft and out into the atmosphere...)

            lol, so how do you make a pebble bed pogo stick? :-)
            On a somewhat more interesting note, could you take this same process from the pogo stick and put several of them together, making an engine? I mean it is almost like a piston. I doubt such an engine would be as effecient as the normal steam turbine method, but I don't have any numbers to back that up.

      • Very nifty concept. Assuming it worked, wouldn't it be more practical to drive a stirling engine with the mechanism? A non-critical nuclear car seems like an easier sale than a pogo-stick.

      • I'm honestly amazed we couldn't get anybody interested in manufacturing it in volume.

        I'm sure al-Qaeda would bid on those contracts.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Belgand ( 14099 )
      Why on Earth would I want a gas-powered pogo stick? ... when I can have gas-powered stilts! Now that's a great idea!
    • I remembered that from my youth and wanted one in the worst way. I think they were advertised either in Boys Life, or comic books.
      BTW, this article from 2001 mentions the boots and the pogo stick.
      http://www.post-gazette.com/healthscience/20010528 bowgosidehealth9.asp [post-gazette.com]

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Alien Being ( 18488 )
      "They were also pretty dangerous."

      That's easy to believe; they were sold by "Chance Manufacturing." When I'm buying an explosive device to put near my privates, I'll take a Chance© every time.
  • This seems like a situation that would benefit from the application of composite materials, seeing how they seem to incorporate a fair amount of metal...
    • You mean something like this: http://www.powerisers.de/english/index-eng.htm [powerisers.de] and http://youtube.com/watch?v=YDNZzseSeJ8 [youtube.com] ?

      This idea surpasses the gas powered boots easily. Not only do they probably weigh less cutting back the excess energy on moving, being made out of aluminium and fibreglass, they also contain few (no?) 'moving' parts, and require no refilling.

      I also think they are cooler, simplicity.

      PS. I dont own/sell the boots, or own shares in the company.
      • On the other hand, the Powerizers seem to be more difficult to use in certain situations... such as standing still. Plus, you're stuck being about a foot taller while wearing them, it looks like. Though it would be neat to have a pair of them anyways.

    • Silly Americans and their plastic toys. In Soviet Russia, ve make toys from metal so they do not break. You even make your fighter planes out of plastic! It is a wonder how you von Cold Var.

      • Better brush up on your fake "accent" there dude, you're a couple hundred (or thousand) miles east of where you think you are. You will be eaten by a Grue.

  • Military secret, not a political problem (Score:4, Informative)

    by xoyoyo ( 949672 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @06:35AM (#18399881)
    The reason given for the fact that the boots were not commercialised before the fall of the Communism was that they were classified as a military secret. Very frustrating for the inventor, but nearly all western patent regimes allow the government to classify any invention as a military secret - in the US they're called "Secrecy Orders" - see http://www.bitlaw.com/source/mpep/120.html [bitlaw.com] and http://patentbaristas.com/archives/2006/12/06/is-t he-government-keeping-more-inventions-secret/ [patentbaristas.com] for more information.

    Better yet, there's obviously no way we can know how many inventions are covered by such orders, or what they cover.

    Note that this has nothing to do with Communism or capitalism, which is the thesis the author's trying to build. The R&D regimes are actually identical: invent something militarily useful and it will dissappear from public knowledge.
    • Note that this has nothing to do with Communism or capitalism, which is the thesis the author's trying to build. The R&D regimes are actually identical: invent something militarily useful and it will dissappear from public knowledge.

      Absolutely right! Now pardon mee for my brevity, but I must hasten to thee General-Store, where I shall awaite the next Express Pony bounde for the Slashe-Daut Message Barne--you Communist Hack.

    • Re:Military secret, not a political problem (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @09:34AM (#18401265)
      >invent something militarily useful and it will dissappear from public knowledge.

      Man, wouldnt it be cool to have something like the internet (a military project) in the US (to spread to the rest of the world) where we could complain about the oppressive military-industrial complex and falsibly equate the soviet and US systems. damn you secretive regimes! Oh wait...

      • Re:Military secret, not a political problem (Score:4, Interesting)

        by xoyoyo ( 949672 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @09:55AM (#18401477)
        Funny that you think I'm complaining about the oppressive industrial-military complex. Couldn't give two hoots about that, to be frank. I was more interested in picking apart the TFA's author's logic. He was making an argument that the lack of access to a modern IP regime and a lack of experience in entrepreneurship has led to Russia falling behind the rest of the technologically developing nations, but chooses an eyecatching story to back him up that doesn't actually have anything to do with that thesis.

        As far as "falsibly" equate: well, in the Soviet Union if you invented something that might have military use they'd make it a military secret. In the US (as in the UK, Australia, Germany etc) if you invent something that breaches a military secret or could be used by the military, they'll declare it a secret - read the links I attached with my post. The two systems are identical in that respect. Of course the rules were/are applied differently, and the Soviets were much keener on suppressing such information than the west, but that doesn't invalidate the comparison.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by RexRhino ( 769423 )

      Note that this has nothing to do with Communism or capitalism, which is the thesis the author's trying to build. The R&D regimes are actually identical: invent something militarily useful and it will dissappear from public knowledge.

      In Capitalism, there is a financial incentive to move the military technologies into the civilian world: to make a profit on consumer goods. In fact, there are often the implication that military contracters intentionally leak technology to move them into the civilian use quicker (I don't know if the implication is true, but the fact that they are accused of doing so implies they have the incentive). Under Communism, the incentive is to keep technology secret as long as possible, as there is no real benefi

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by xoyoyo ( 949672 )
        That's a fair contrast. And indeed, if there's a four year waiting list for a car, there's not much of a civilian economy to move such a project into.

        The failure of the communist economy was far wider and more drastic than its inability to ship some robo-boots into the leisure market. The TFA blithely ignores the simple fact that Soviet Union was quietly collapsing when the boots were invented.

    • About a dozen non-government funded inventions a year get hit by a secrecy order in the United States. (That number is from the 1990s; this may have changed.)

      One of the best suppressed ideas was Airadar, which was a radar for light aircraft developed in the early 1970s. It was a phased-array radar with a conformal antenna built into the wing and a fast sweep rate. All modern radars are like that, but back then, the USAF still had only systems with a big moving dish in the aircraft nose and slow-updati

    • For a case study of how innovation and intellectual property was handled in a communist country, see the story of Otto Wichterle's invention of the soft contact lense in Czechoslovakia:

      http://www.dynamist.com/articles-speeches/forbes/p lay.html [dynamist.com]
  • Here's the original NY Times article with a half dozen pictures of the contraption and on a single page:
    http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/17/business/worldbu siness/17gazshoes.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted =all [nytimes.com]
  • ... And then he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

  • Of course, it will be several years after the initial commercial release before these boots will be available in California, pending additional emissions control devices.

  • At first I read the title as:

    Gas-Powered Boobs As Metaphor For Cold War


    I think that would have been more interesting...

  • A threat to homeland security? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Call Me Black Cloud ( 616282 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @08:57AM (#18400893)
    From the article...

    "They should work like a Kalashnikov," he said. "Reliable in anybody's hands."

    That's all we need...a bunch of speedy terrorists carrying AK-47s.

    On a more realistic note...if you think Heelies are bad can you imagine the kids in the mall wearing these things?

  • Link to an article with photos and a movie (Score:3, Informative)

    by VitrosChemistryAnaly ( 616952 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @09:09AM (#18401011) Journal
    Here it is. [technovelgy.com]

    Enjoy.

  • The Hop Rod (Score:3, Informative)

    by Deadstick ( 535032 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @09:17AM (#18401067)
    We had that beat in 1960:

    http://www.bpmlegal.com/wpogo.html [bpmlegal.com]

    rj
  • What's a redneck's last words? "Watch this!"

    What's the last thing many engineers do? "...And then he flicked the ignition switch."

  • As a senior project, I was on a team that built something like this. We were told we had to design the better pogo stick. The first question was whether or not it had to have one foot... we took the liberal notion that a pogo stick didn't need to have one foot, since this clearly removed a lot of man's built in skill in maneuvering...

    We modeled our design on the old Wile E. Coyote cartoons - the springs on the feet thing... We quickly found out that the real problem wasn't putting springs on your feet, b

  • SMB Super Boots? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sabernet ( 751826 ) on Monday March 19, 2007 @10:47AM (#18402009) Homepage
    Those things reminded me too much of the super boots in the Super Mario Bros movie. Please tell me I'm not alone in this.
  • "Now, they have been held up as a symbol of both Russia's deep and rich scientific traditions and the country's inability to convert that talent into useful--and commercial--merchandise outside of the weapons business." if u follow the link to: http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News .asp?NewsNum=740 [technovelgy.com] there is a youtube video if translated. talks about today. they boots are used as attraction and rented like roller skates. additional talks about how 50 exported to japan/australia. these is how m

  • US Version (Score:1, Redundant)

    by xs650 ( 741277 )
    The shoes sound like a shoe version of this US gas powered pogo stick that actually made it to the market.

    http://www.bpmlegal.com/wpogo.html [bpmlegal.com]
  • If you want a picture of the future, imagine a [gas powered] boot stomping on a human face -- forever.
  • 1. Russian engineers _REALLY_ suck at marketing. It may be a good thing for Russian economy, too, judging by how modern marketing allowed huge amounts of unimaginable crap to worm its way into consumers' lives. I am a Russian engineer, and I suck at marketing, though I am in US and therefore it's a bad thing for me.

    2. Software patents aren't exactly a great thing now, and they certainly weren't in 80's. Copyright and trademark could protect the game implementation though, but protection of them were very we

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