New Breed of Nomad – Doctor Tomorrow
This Doctor Tomorrow column was written during the final phase of my time in the Bikelab at Sun Microsystems, and is a lovely take on the implications of the technology that was being packed ever more densely into the BEHEMOTH bicycle. The photo was taken by Maggie Victor against a wall at Sun, and this…
Read MoreHigh-Tech Nomad Steve Roberts – N4RVE – W5YI Report
by Fred Maia W5YI Report November 15, 1991 I first met Roberts a few years ago at the Dayton HamVention where he was selling autographed copies of his book which detailed his bicycle jaunts across the country. He had a booth right across from mine and I got a chance to periodically chat with him……
Read MoreBikelab Report #13 – Mothership and Mini-reviews
by Steven K. Roberts Silicon Valley, California October 30, 1991 “Pardon me, do you have any Grey Poupon?”— unknown cyclist on RAGBRAI, passing me on a 90-degree day as I cruised easily with Cusco on the stereo and ice water circulating through my helmet. Shakedown post-mortem Well, I’m back at the lab. Three months of adventure…
Read MoreNomadness Report in Whole Earth Review
A delicious find in a musty box of media from the Bikelab epoch, this is the Nomadics page from a late-1991 issue of Whole Earth Review. RU Sirius did a little piece about my Nomadness Report journal, and from the perspective of 30 years later as I add this to the archive, I am delighted…
Read MoreBEHEMOTH Project Sponsors
The bicycle adventures never could have happened without wonderful help from sponsors, volunteers, and media… a three-way symbiosis that I wrote about in the Reaching Escape Velocity book (where to look if you are contemplating a massively audacious project and need to figure out how to get industry support). BEHEMOTH in particular, being so technology-intensive,…
Read MoreHigh-Tech-Nomade in Übermorgen by Philip Morris
This magazine focused on the future was sponsored by Philip Morris, and I vaguely recall a photo-session in Building 4 at Sun Microsystems, a few months before departure (no landing gear or other frame attachments, but the fabric RUMP packs are done). The photo was done with studio lights and a sweep, then paleo-shopped onto…
Read MoreThe Rhythms of the Road
After 3+ years of intensive development work, BEHEMOTH finally got some road time… beginning with RAGBRAI in Iowa, then a languid yet difficult mini-adventure up through Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan. It is dreamlike in retrospect… not an open-ended life epoch like the first two versions of the bike, but a sort of frantic escape from…
Read MoreBits, Bytes, and Bikes
This story was written two years before I landed in San Diego to begin the Microship trimaran project… teaching at UCSD. At this point, I was on the road after 3 years of BEHEMOTH development in Silicon Valley, beginning a speaking tour with a mobile lab and trying to figure out what I was going…
Read MoreDown the data road – Middlesex News
by Laura Myers, Associated Press Middlesex News September 5, 1991 Nomad Steven Roberts and his ‘Behemoth’ Mountain View, Calif. — Steven Roberts lives in ephemeral “Dataspace” when he’s on his bicycle built for too much computing power, at least for most ordinary human beings. But the high-tech nomad, who has peddled his computer-burdened Behemoth more than…
Read MoreTraveling Journalist – Sheboygan
This local newspaper article came out during a dreamy phase of my wanderings… not only was I at last on the road with BEHEMOTH after 3.5 years of development in Silicon Valley, but I was traveling with a lovely friend named Susan, barely visible in this photo… out in front of my bike. She was…
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