Luddites Beware

In the famous words of Lili Von Schtupp in Blazing Saddles, "I'm tired!". I'm tired of convincing people that technology advancements in bicycles is normal, beneficial, and a good thing to embrace. In today's modern world, consumers happily lap-up technological gadgets at astonishing rates. People everywhere are willing to wait overnight in lines for the latest gadgets. While cruise control used to be a luxury feature on expensive vehicles, now GPS navigation systems appear on $15,000 economy sedans as standard equipment. People are ever-increasingly tied to techno-gadgets in astonishingly dependent ways.

And this is the world in which I find myself in a particularly annoying dilemma. I am constantly surrounded by techno-hipocrates. While I relish and enjoy almost every interaction I have with someone about bicycles, I bemoan talking to the guy with the Blue Tooth embedded in his ear and his iPhone in his belt holster about whether disc brakes are "really necessary" or whether carbon fiber is really "a safe choice" for a bicycle frame material. Meanwhile, his car is sitting out front communicating with a satellite so the OnStar advisor will know just where he is when Fifi-the-microchipped-labra-doodle jumps on the button and locks him out.

What is it about the bicycle that makes people resist advancements in technology that would otherwise be adopted without question in other forms? Perhaps it is the long history or the pure, simple mechanical nature of it. If that is so, then how do you account for the automobile. It's been around almost as long, and when you get down to it, it's not really that much more mechanically complicated. Yet it becomes increasingly garish and techno-loaded with each passing year. Meanwhile, I hear absolutely no one exclaiming that cars would be so much more enjoyable if they would just do away with silly things like gears, powerful brakes, and suspension. In fact, most people wouldn't even give up that 9th cup holder or those heated seats that warm their tushy on chilly mornings. It's in this world where I find myself.

"But sir, these tubeless tires and wheels are really fantastic. They hardly ever go flat. We have lots of customers that have been running them for years flat-free. You can run them at much lower pressures for greater traction. It's impossible to get a pinch-flat with them." That's when they giggle under their breath and look at me like I'm a naive little puppy and say "I hardly think that's necessary. I think I'll be perfectly happy with the way things have always been. I'll take the model with those good-ol' tubes in the tires. Those things have always worked and never let me down." Should I remind him about the 82 times that he has changed a flat bicycle tire in his life? Should I remind him that his Subaru has a sensor on each wheel that monitors air pressure in his tires and a little light on his dash that reassures him as he drives that his tire pressure if safe.

Bicycle techno-hating is not just in the realm of the suburbanite blue-toother. Everyone from mod-styled fixie riders to hippie mountain bikers takes their turn. The fixie rider loves the "pure" sensation of no brakes and gears while toting their 17" laptop to the coffee shop for their half-caf-mocha-latte-low-fat-whip-cream while being serenaded by the tunes from their iPod nano that is conspicuously attached to their limited edition high-fashion messenger bag. The hippie mountain biker says that gears and suspension are superfluos. They then return home in their hybrid SUV whilst listening to Sirius satellite radio. They relax that evening by downloading a lossless format, non-compressed Dead show to their external hard drive for their weekly home-spun podcast. Ahh, so pure. So simple.