Inventing stuff that's hard to use

[Jon Corby]

How does it happen?

Having watched all my kids learn to ride a bike, it got me to wondering how stuff like this (i.e. where it takes a while to "get the hang of it") gets invented. How come the inventor doesn't just try it out and go "well screw that, that didn't work".

And the Rubik's Cube. Had it been Corby's Cube, I would've messed it all up, been fairly impressed at the mechanism, but then decided that I probably had to precisely retrace the exact moves in order to get it back to how it was (as I always mess up a face when I try and get a second one), conclude that it was fairly shit, and go back to the drawing board.

[Matt Morrison]

Two very different examples there. One is purely pleasure - the Rubik's Cube - and the other is built around an essential need to travel efficiently.

So really what you've described for the Rubik's Cube is utter genius - Mr. Rubik is tapping into the incredible sense of satisfaction and reward a human gets from achieving something which IS a challenge. It's that "getting the hang of it" aspect that makes it what it is, without it it wouldn't be popular, you wouldn't have people falling in love with it, you wouldn't get people looking at other people achieving it and going "man I wish I could feel that buzz, imma get me one of them cubes".

And for the bike, the challenge isn't really part of the charm of the final result. The charm is being able to independently move in a more efficient and impressive manner than your running or your walking. There is of course a sense of satisfaction in achieving the ability to ride, but that is just the sense of satisfaction that comes from achieving anything, and is not explicitly ingrained in the human relationship with the bike as it is the Rubik's Cube. Where the challenge in the Rubik's Cube is the objective, the challenge with the bike is just the means to the objective. So I guess with the bike it just comes down to balancing out the "getting the hang of it" issue with more boring factors such as economical ones ("it's going to cost us lots more to build a bike with extra wheels and extra equipment that makes it easier to ride") and scientific/physical ones ("this design is the most efficient and versatile when it comes to the actual riding of it, manoeuvrability and so on").

[Mark James]

It's an interesting question. I've always wondered if the guy who invented the guitar knew what was possible. Did he foresee that someone would eventually be able to do this for instance.

[Jon Corby]

It's an interesting question. I've always wondered if the guy who invented the guitar knew what was possible. Did he foresee that someone would eventually be able to do this for instance.

Yeah, musical instruments are another very good example, well done. I suppose with most (all?) instruments being invented through time we already have the concept of music, so it's just whether it's going to sound good being played on a particular instrument, and whether it's sufficiently different (or nice) to make learning a new/different one worthwhile?

Going back to bicycles, I'd guess the design evolved from other vehicles with more wheels, with more proficient riders realising that the extra wheels were unnecessary, but I haven't bothered to research it.

[Mark James]

Another one I thought of was snooker. Did the guy who invented that know, or at least suspect, that you can get as much control over the cue ball as professionals nowadays can, depending on where they strike it? Was he aware of swerve shots and back spin and the like? And if he wasn't, I wonder how long after its invention did it take for people to discover these possibilities?

[Matt Morrison]

Another one I thought of was snooker. Did the guy who invented that know, or at least suspect, that you can get as much control over the cue ball as professionals nowadays can, depending on where they strike it? Was he aware of swerve shots and back spin and the like? And if he wasn't, I wonder how long after its invention did it take for people to discover these possibilities?

I like to think someone just got pissed off and smacked the ball, caught it funny and then went "oh hello!" when it started spinning around all over the shop.

[Jon Corby]

Another good one Mark, yeah.

Mark James has got the hang of this thread.

Your first post was awful Matt, and we're lucky it didn't kill the whole thing stone-dead.

[Matt Morrison]

Another one I think about is C4C. Did the guy who invented that know, or at least suspect, that you can get as many fucking mental people on there as you do now? Was he aware of the likelihood of anti-semitic messages, boring and pointless spoiler messages, Corby being a cunt and the like? And if he wasn't, I wonder how long after its invention did it take for people to discover that this was going to happen?

[JimBentley]

Another one I thought of was snooker. Did the guy who invented that know, or at least suspect, that you can get as much control over the cue ball as professionals nowadays can, depending on where they strike it? Was he aware of swerve shots and back spin and the like? And if he wasn't, I wonder how long after its invention did it take for people to discover these possibilities?

It took fucking ages, mainly because when snooker was invented, the balls weighed about ten times what they do now (they were made of ivory) and the cloths on the tables had a nap like a Persian carpet. I suppose it was all billiards then, snooker was just an offshoot, and spin isn't really important in billiards (I remember an old guy at the club I used to go to absolutely refused to use any sort of spin, as he regarded it as cheating - he still used to beat me easily at billiards every time). I think it took about fifty years after the "invention" of snooker that people really started to use spin, as the advances in equipment made it possible, but even then it was nothing like the degree of spin that players can use today.

[Andy Wilson]

This just made me picture someone walking into dragon's den and trying to sell them their new invention, the rubik's cube. I'd say they'd be having none of it.

[Gavin Chipper]

Going back to bicycles, I'd guess the design evolved from other vehicles with more wheels, with more proficient riders realising that the extra wheels were unnecessary, but I haven't bothered to research it.

I don't think bicycles are probably the best example though. It doesn't take that long to be able to get one to work and I think an adult who had never ridden before could learn how to ride reasonably well (so that they don't fall over) within a few minutes.

Chess is something I sometimes think about. I don't play it but I often wonder if it was just luck or skill or what that made it so that players can get better and better at it without reaching a point where they just know exactly what move to make, or that white would always win or something else that would stop it from being played at a serious level. And are the seemingly stuck-on rules like castling and en passant just arbitrary or are they needed to make the game good?

[Mike Brown]

Surely driving a car is another good example. The clutch always seems to me to be a strangely devised piece of equipment. But maybe it just ends up being more intuitive or useful in the long run than something that's easier to grasp (IMO). Or is it just that way because of the mechanism it controls and it's a case of man adjusting to the machine? I'm sure all the clever people on here can give me some answers!

[Gavin Chipper]

Surely driving a car is another good example. The clutch always seems to me to be a strangely devised piece of equipment. But maybe it just ends up being more intuitive or useful in the long run than something that's easier to grasp (IMO). Or is it just that way because of the mechanism it controls and it's a case of man adjusting to the machine? I'm sure all the clever people on here can give me some answers!

But I suppose that it was specifically designed as something that would work, even if it might be slightly hard to use. I can imagine people not even knowing if a bicycle would be stable.

Early cars probably didn't have multiple gears, and I don't think sticking your foot on a clutch when you're stationary would be that hard to grasp, and then it probably just evolved from there with gears.

[Jon Corby]

I don't think bicycles are probably the best example though. It doesn't take that long to be able to get one to work and I think an adult who had never ridden before could learn how to ride reasonably well (so that they don't fall over) within a few minutes.

Yeah, but that's only because you already know they can be balanced and ridden safely and fast, and manoeuvred round corners etc. Give one to some undiscovered tribe who've never seen one before, and they'll probably conclude you're trying to hurt them.

[Brian Moore]

I don't think bicycles are probably the best example though. It doesn't take that long to be able to get one to work and I think an adult who had never ridden before could learn how to ride reasonably well (so that they don't fall over) within a few minutes.

Yeah, but that's only because you already know they can be balanced and ridden safely and fast, and manoeuvred round corners etc. Give one to some undiscovered tribe who've never seen one before, and they'll probably conclude you're trying to hurt them.

Hmm, not so sure. People eventually get round to trying all sorts of weird things, and I can't see anyone not eventually at least walking along astride a bicycle, à la draisine, as a two-wheeled walking aid (or just to get a laugh from his mates). It wouldn't be long before some curious individual would wonder what would happen if he tried balancing on it while going along. Sure, he'd fall off a few times, but sooner or later...

[Steve Balog]

Obviously the missing link between walking and the invention of the bicycle

[Gavin Chipper]

Obviously the missing link between walking and the invention of the bicycle

I've got a device where you pedal but it walks.