Best Name for EUCs

[Mortal Coil]

No. It's not a unicycle! It's a...

[Jpd]

13 minutes ago, Mortal Coil said:

No. It's not a unicycle! It's a...

Rollbot 😁

[Aneta]

There's no contest that hoverwheel is the coolest, the catchiest, and the most logical name. Everybody in the world knows what hoverboards are, this is a common word and it is used by all major retailers. Go to Walmart and you'll find tons of hoverboards labeled exactly as such. The balancing single wheel appeared after hoverboards as a natural sequel: somebody looked at hoverboards and thought, "it balances with us standing between two wheels, what if if was just one wheel and we stand on its sides?" So, it's 100% natural to call it hoverwheel, by analogy.

Hoverwheel also rhymes well and can be easily substituted in popular songs, e.g. 

I want to ride my hoverwheel
I want to ride my wheel
I want to ride my hoverwheel
I want to ride it where I like

I didn't vote, because voting shows where the puck is, not where it's gonna be.

[Denny Paul]

2 hours ago, Aneta said:

Everybody in the world knows what hoverboards are, this is a common word and it is used by all major retailers.

Yep this makes sense. Shoulda been called a hoverwheel from the start. 

[Aneta]

Here we go. The number of people in the world who use the right word - hoverwheel - has just doubled. We go strong!

Remember, it only takes one neutron to start chain reaction:

 

to make this wrong, legacy term "electric unicycle" go like this:

 

Join the great revolution of 2020! Call it what it is - hoverwheel

Don't be that old grumpy fart!

[Aneta]

Wow, googling for "hoverwheel forum" already brings us to #2 position, after some French forum. Googling for just "hoverwheel", of course, mostly brings up those Inventist's hover shoes that he trademarked as hoverwheel, which has much more exposure to search engine. Just another example of why patents and trademarks are wrong.

Together, we'll change the course of history within one year. Just stop calling it "electric unicycle", THIS is electric unicycle:

 

 

[RockyTop]

One wheeled electric cart. Otherwise know as an electric wheelbarrow. Come on guys get on board with what I want to call it! 

How about Cyber wheel? Instead of riders we could be cyborg. 

Hmmmm. An asylum of Cyborg just past by.  

Edited January 6, 2020 by RockyTop

[Spooky Chaser]

Hoverwheel is already a brand inmotion has the rights to. Just look at their website, http://hoverwheel.com/. It's definitely a catchy name, but good luck having it catch on if nobody can sell it under that title.

[meepmeepmayer]

15 hours ago, Jpd said:

Rollbot 😁

This is better than it looks at first! Rollbot, Wheelbot, you're on to something.

[Aneta]

So is https://www.hoverboard.com/ taken, yet there's no problem using that name. https://www.walmart.com/search/?query=hoverboard Nobody can prevent US from using the name "hoverwheel".

Edited January 6, 2020 by Aneta

[Cory Brown]

I'm not a fan of "hoverwheel" at all. Mainly because I think whoever named the 2-wheeled, self-balancing device a "hoverboard" is a huge asshole. A "hoverboard" is and always will be a levitating skateboard like in Back to the Future, and while it was definitely brilliant for marketing, it was an asshole move to rebrand a term that was widely used to describe a piece of technology many people still hope to see.

[Aneta]

Hoverboard is the name that stuck, that's all that matters. So will hoverwheel.

[Aneta]

There won't be a true hoverboard in the foreseeable future, not in our lifetime. Magnetic levitation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maglev) requires a track with windings (linear electric motor). Maglev trains are still just experimental, 50 years later since the concept. All those videos with hovering boards (like that Lexus video) are nothing but CGI to go viral.

[ChrisB]

Wheel

Wheel

Wheel

[Aneta]

Hoverwheels, hoverwheels, hoverwheels rock
Hoverwheels chime in hoverwheels time
Dancin' and prancin' in Hoverwheel Square
In the frosty air
What a bright time, it's the right time
To rock the night away
Hoverwheel time is a swell time
To go glidin' in a one-horse sleigh

Try that with "electric unicycle" or "ewheel"...

[Cory Brown]

All I know is that I will never call my EUC a hoverwheel....Not a chance

[Aneta]

There's no doubt on my mind that within next 2-5 years hoverwheels will become as ubiquitous (at least, in low power, low speed, $100-200 version for kids) as hoverboards that you can buy at any Walmart. Anyone asking an associate, "Can you please check the price on this electric unicycle?" will get a blank stare at the store. Purposefully avoiding hoverwheel name will just look silly, just like calling hoverboards "self-balancing electric scooters".

[Cory Brown]

I really don't see electric unicycles ever reaching that level of popularity. The learning curve is too high for these to ever be anything other than a niche market.

[Aneta]

No difficulty for kids whatsoever. Training wheels or brushes can be provided, like they were provided with early hoverwheels - Airwheel, Solowheel, Ninebot One, etc.

 

Where there's a business opportunity, there will be a commercial product with nation-wide distributors like Walmart. The market is ripe for this new toy for kids. U.S. company designed hoverwheel for adults will follow, like Hover-1 products. 

 

Edited January 6, 2020 by Aneta

[Cory Brown]

Kids are definitely more capable of learning than adults in most cases, but to say there is no difficulty at all for them is ridiculous. It still takes practice to learn and a lot of kids will not have the patience to stick with it. Especially since their parents aren't going to have any tips for learning unless they're into EUCs themselves.

You may eventually see a cheap version at Walmart, but I can't imagine it ever being popular. Maybe Ripstick levels of success at best.

[Spooky Chaser]

Agreed it'll be hard to hit mainstream levels. Having a difficulty curve of more than 10 minutes to learn already means it'll be hard for kids due to how often you fall and how frustrating it can be at first.

Also about the name, the hoverboard website has a lock on the name 'Hoverboard Technologies LLC', so the word hoverboard isn't theirs. Hoverwheel is actually the name of the Company Inmotion bought, so depending how much they paid for licensing, you can't sell a product called a Hoverwheel. It's why you can't call a product an 'Apple' thing. But again, depends if they paid enough to stop products using their name or just companies.

[ir_fuel]

The only kids (I am talking about real kids, not 13 year olds) that learn to ride an ELECTRIC UNICYCLE are those who's parent(s) rides one. No 7 year old is going to ask for one of these, especially since compared to a bicycle mom or dad won't be able to learn it to their kid, and compared to a skateboard or roller blades mom or dad know zero about it nor do they know anyone who actually rides one of those things.

And even the lamest ELECTRIC UNICYCLE is a lot more expensive than a crappy skateboard or roller blades (or hoverboard for that matter).

48 minutes ago, Spook Chaser said:

Having a difficulty curve of more than 10 minutes to learn already means it'll be hard for kids due to how often you fall and how frustrating it can be at first.

That hasn't stopped any kid from learning how to roller skate.

[Aneta]

Learning to ride a hoverwheel with equal characteristics as a typical kids hoverboard shouldn't be anymore difficult that learning to ride a skateboard, rollerblades, or a traditional unicycle. With proper technique (pushing a baby stroller) they will learn in 10 minutes.

 

 

And certainly riding a low-speed hoverwheel is not anymore dangerous that riding a hoverboard, skateboard, rollerblades, or unicycle.

 

[Aneta]

If there's enough potential for it to become a profitable toy, big retailers like Walmart will just buy the hoverwheel name from its trademark owner, same they probably did with hoverboards. I can't imagine Walmart calling it "electric unicycle" or "ewheel". It must be a catchy name, especially for a kids toy.

[ir_fuel]

Major retailers have already been carrying these for a long time. I could find them next to the hooverboards at my local store.

This is what they all look like (different colors):