This has to be a joke.
MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
41–50 of 149 posts
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
These are people with a life and feelings and needs just as much as you. If you were in a rough situation and needed some help, how would it feel to have people dehumanise you with comments like this as if you’re some sort of pest and just want you to go away somewhere else instead of helping?
All of this is easy to say when you're personally not affected by them.
But is that really a good enough reason to dehumanise people? Because them existing annoys you?
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#43What’s the advantage of using those bicycles, as opposed to just having a crank on it? Pedaling a bicycle backwards isn’t really ergonomic.
Regular humans can put out ~100 watts on a dual foot crank (like a bicycle) for hours. Since a phone battery is ~12 Watt-hours, you can collect energy for a full phone charge in ~10 mins (but you'll need a special buffer battery, since few lithium cells can charge that fast). Yet on a single hand crank, even 20 watts and you'll get tired pretty quick. Part of that is that leg muscles are bigger. Part of it is that yo…
It looks like the device even includes a little battery; I wonder if it holds enough charge to charge a phone battery fully, or if it just needs to be active charged for a while.
This is definitely more about the message, but actually, if a person could pedal pretty hard for like a half hour and get a couple charges out of it, that doesn’t see too impractical (ignoring the obvious objections, like usually coffee shops will let you get a little charge).
It could be a nice camping accessory. I bet a product already exists.
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#44Man, when I saw "hack" I thought the Santander bikes are e-bikes, and the hack would be a device that leeches power off their batteries...
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#45Homeless people are known for having so much free time and energy that an hour of pedalling is a better solution than the two cents of wall power needed to charge things while they sit and correspond with potential employers, deal with paperwork, pay bills, figure out their kid’s school plans, and working out how to keep their healthcare without a full address. I dunno… this “idea” feels so ignorant that it’s basical…
I'm American so as ignorant as I'm sure this sounds... Are the people who become homeless in London doing so for significantly different reasons than over here? Because most of the homeless in my city (a fairly large California coastal) aren't significantly engaged in any of the things you're alluding to and frankly would probably be happier with a bike that charged their phones since the ones who aren't just living…
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Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm American so as ignorant as I'm sure this sounds... Are the people who become homeless in London doing so for significantly different reasons than over here? Because most of the homeless in my city (a fairly large California coastal) aren't significantly engaged in any of the things you're alluding to and frankly would probably be happier with a bike that charged their phones since the ones who aren't just living…
I’m not sure of the demographics in your region but are you sure your perception of homelessness is correct? Or is it just a bias where you only see the ones who aren’t busy trying to dig out?
Most of the homeless in my city migrated here from outside of the city (and often State) to come here for our weather, services, and lax attitude towards drug use as far as demographics go. We're a navy town so there's also a tragic sub-group of veterans with mental health issues but the bulk of our homeless (we actually use the term "transient" as side context) don't fall into this category and mainly came here for the conveniences. I'm sure there are some who are trying to "dig out" as you say but it's certainly not most of them and for the ones who aren't trying to do so a bike with charging capabilities would be both a mobility boost (again assuming theft wasn't a concern) and a general utility boost (smartphones are largely ubiquitous amongst our homeless and are actually extremely valuable as tools since they're both navigation aids and access points for online services offered to them in my city). This is why I was asking what the demographics of the homeless in London are like since if they resemble our population then the bike wouldn't be such a terrible idea (but I'm also still unsure about the practicality since while some of our homeless ride bikes most get around via public transit and so just putting chargers on busses would probably be more pragmatic as a service to them).
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#47TL;DR theory of operation
> Talbot's product takes advantage of the fact that, without having to pay to take out one of these bikes, their chain will still move when pedalling backwards. This can power up the tiny pedal-powered generator contained in the portable charger.
The electricity generated in the process is then stored in MyPowerbank's internal batteries, with around 25 minutes of pedalling equating to one full phone charge.
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
These are people with a life and feelings and needs just as much as you. If you were in a rough situation and needed some help, how would it feel to have people dehumanise you with comments like this as if you’re some sort of pest and just want you to go away somewhere else instead of helping?
All of this is easy to say when you're personally not affected by them.
How do "they" affect you, poor soul?
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#49Homeless people are known for having so much free time and energy that an hour of pedalling is a better solution than the two cents of wall power needed to charge things while they sit and correspond with potential employers, deal with paperwork, pay bills, figure out their kid’s school plans, and working out how to keep their healthcare without a full address. I dunno… this “idea” feels so ignorant that it’s basical…
Note that the person who made this actually interviewed homeless people about whether or not this was a problem beforehand. Whether that extended to running the idea past them to see if they thought it was helpful as well, I don't know, but that he even bothered to listen in the first place makes it stand out.
Re: MyPowerbank hacks Santander bikes so London's homeless can charge their phones
#50Homeless people are known for having so much free time and energy that an hour of pedalling is a better solution than the two cents of wall power needed to charge things while they sit and correspond with potential employers, deal with paperwork, pay bills, figure out their kid’s school plans, and working out how to keep their healthcare without a full address. I dunno… this “idea” feels so ignorant that it’s basical…
As someone who is homeless, I agree. This is a solution looking for a problem.
Most people do not know how easy it is to access a power source in most towns and cities.