Nomadness, an interview with Steven K Roberts: Boats and Bikes part one.

Steven K Roberts

S/V Nomadness somewhere in Washington state.

S/V Nomadness

Pilothouse/control center

Not all of the on-board systems are electronic

This ER grade medical kit is the latest offering from Nomadic Research Labs. Steve is here addressing a perceived need.

Land based mobile laboratory. This is in the process of moving aboard.

Microship, in all her solar panel glory

Wordplay, predecessor to Microship

Steve's biotelemetrick helmet for his bike journeys, which included a head operated mouse.

BEHEMOTH

Here is BEHEMOTH's new display in the Computer History Museum - it's part of the permanent exhibit that just opened this month: “Revolution: the first 2000 Years of Computing." I'm working on the combined book of my three bike epochs, and this might be the wrap-up image... it's a fitting long-term home for this machine that took me 17,000 miles. (Thanks to the museum for the photo!)

Many hobbyists used the newly introduced microprocessor to create their own personal computers. Steve Roberts’ microcomputer used the Intel 8008 chip. Roberts was known later for BEHEMOTH, a bicycle that was a portable computing platform.
1974-10-31 © Mark Richards

all photos courtesy Steven K Roberts unless otherwise noted

To say Steve Roberts is interesting is inadequate, he is astonishing. Steve first came to notice and notoriety during his 11 year sojourn across America aboard his computerized recumbent bicycles, pioneering a nomadic lifestyle. Sort of a modern day John Steinbeck traveling the countryside but also working as a technical writer and consultant, making a living while moving around the country aboard an innovative and outlandish series of sophisticated contraptions. Steve increasingly adapted his vehicular home with more and more technological innovations which eventually led to the establishing of his Nomadic Research Labs. Like many nomads, ancient and modern, Steve Roberts eventually heard the call of the sea and has been working toward transitioning his entire enterprise to a floating home and laboratory. There is a personal connection here. Steve grew up in suburban Louisville near my own homeplace. A close friend of his, Dave Wright has long been a friend of my brother, Rand Armstrong. Rand had met Steve during a visit to Dave on the west Coast and hearing about that I recalled reading about Steve , I think in a Whole Earth publication. I recently interviewed Steve by phone and email to get a check on his trajectory and recent activities. There are tons of information on Steve's websites and blogs to allow you to fill in the blanks in my overview. Steve is what I'd have to name a geek encrusted visionary renaissance man.

Here's the interview:

What is the significance of Homebrew? I have partially answered that question with the entry from the computer museum, but if you'd care to elaborate on that, please do.

I think that I recall from the phonecall that you're referring to my 8008 system (1974) not more recent homebrew projects. It was very early in the game and I was a lone wolf-geek and I didn't make any attempt to market it. In retrospect...Oh well.

How's the book doing?

Which one? The most recent is Reaching Escape Velocity, which folks really seem to enjoy...though it is a somewhat specialized market (people who want to create insanely audacious markets and need to leverage sponsors, media and teams of volunteers...sort of a Martial Arts Geek Expressionism). My better known book, Computing Across America, is in the process of being edited and folded into a large combined volume that includes it's unpublished sequel as well as a host of gizmological goodies (especially about BEHEMOTH)

Why the transition to sea?

Ah so many reasons. Freedom, self sufficiency, the noise of the road, open space, global range...and new conceptual territory. My Microship project was a direct human scale spin-off of BEHEMOTH and it kept evolving over a decade until I had to admit that I needed something bigger than a pedal /solar/sail micro trimaran.


I hope someone needs one, however. It's sitting here in my lab. Know any technomadlings with a yen for adventure and (access to) Deep Pockets?

Any cruises on the horizon? Would you say sail out to the Marshall's and spend a year or two? What areas interest you?

Initially my own waters; so far I've single-handed my previous boat (Corsair 36 tri) up to Desolation Sound, and the aboard Amazon 44' explored Puget Sound, San Juans and Gulf Islands with my ex. Now it's time to head further north...the boat can take it...and is perfect for this environment. Steel hull, stout rig, wood stove and lots of self sufficiency tools.

Anyway, once I've had some larger adventure on this coast, it will be a natural thing to head out the Strait and turn left. South Pacific, Aus/NZ and Europe including Scandinavia are all inviting.

Are you completely transitioned or or you still somewhat land based?

About 50/50 now, with the boat gradually becoming home. The weekly forays to the home base facilities gives me the space for business, working and spending time with my partner, and tonnage reduction...and boat projects are warming up with the weather and the completion of my mobile lab (now parked inside a building, about 2 blocks from Nomadness)


What is the next product project?

We've just started producing a much-needed line of "Expedition Medical Chests," with ER grade supplies in gasketed Lexan cases. See here.

I'm also starting a publication series ("design packages") that document various interesting boat projects, and not just geeky ones. All are detailed enough to serve as a full how-to, though of course boat contexts differ widely and they're probably more likely to be used as resources more than blueprints. Still, having a working system in hand is hugely helpful. Some will have associated kits.

You are consulting a bit, what is the nature of your consulting?

A very common problem in industry is a lack of writing skills...some amazing engineering comes with such unreadable documentation (or none) that companies stay busy with more hand holding than is necessary. I'm on the other side of this now, in fact.

Something I've been doing freelancer for about 30 years is acting as a translator...it's unglamorous but really necessary. It's also kind of fun, giving me a short but intense learning curve.

I'd like a statement of the big picture from you, what's this all about? I mean a lot of that is self evident from your material, but what's the vision, where are you going?

Well, I usually just quip, "It's fun", since that's such a big question. A somewhat more precise answer is that I find the most rewarding lifestyle to be one that incorporates all my passions into a self-sufficient enterprise...not with any emphasis on business, but with that as a sort of automatic nickel generating component that burbles along in the wake of whatever I find most interesting.

What I find interesting at the moment is a layer of intelligence on the boat that provides a deep situation awareness (both ship internals and the outside world). This should not be misunderstood as a complicated system that will lead to even more breakdowns, I would never trust a microprocessor to turn on my nav lights. But a toolset that allows me to observe trends, do failure analysis, and otherwise overlay a sort of industrial-control environment onto the boat...now that's fun stuff. It also creates a system context into which it is easy to integrate other things of interest: a piano studio, 3D printing capability for parts creation, video production, efficient power management, robust communication tools and so on.

Why a sailboat? A tug like Stewart Brand's might be easier to negotiate, what's the allure, statement made/goal. Non petroleum?

Heh...years ago when I did the Phil Donahue show, he asked me, "Why not a Harley?"

I'm not a purist, though of course the ability to move with a minimum of expensive fuel is increasingly worthwhile. A lot of it is just my personal sense of aesthetics, though I do sigh with envy at the space inside some trawlers. Really it goes back to my general desire to blend passions: interesting stuff happens at the boundaries between specialties, and if those a seemingly divergent (sailing vs distributed control networks...or bicycling vs on-board computers back in the '80s) then it's intrinsically entertaining and door opening.

I look forward to being the only guy in the anchorage who can crank out a toner-transfer printed circuit board or a custom 3D printed plastic part. Geek pleasures, mixed with the languid pace of the traditional nautical life and the time-honored practice of barter.

Personals/Dave Wright/College or self taught/How did you get here?

Self taught, which is really just another way to say that passion is a much stronger motivator than fear of tests. I've spent my life doing whatever is most interesting, and that automatically causes education. The more I learn the more I find things I would like to know...and the more I am attracted to people who have related and highly varied expertise (that's why I've always found Dave Wright so interesting). I used to have a vague sense that I had missed something by skipping out of engineering school, especially with the obvious holes in my education...but I got over that when I spent a couple of years teaching a senior projects course at a large university. I was glad not to have been defined by such an environment, though of course some folks can just extract the good bits and not be damaged by the process.

Being self employed is not easy, though-I have terrible work habits and only get away with it because my interests keep me moving in the same general direction for a long time. Sometimes interesting things emerge.

Please add anything I may have overlooked or that you feel is relevant.

The biggest challenge is that my fantasies of what can be done keep on evolving faster than my abilities to actually build the stuff...and that can be deadly. Dave once said, "You're staggered by your own imagination". That sounds like a compliment but it's actually a rather accurate assessment...I need to freeze a specification and get 'er done. Recently I've been getting a little better at that, since I am annoyingly aware of being finite. The average completion time of a homebuilt boat is 137 years, and even though my boat is already "built", it's easy to see how projects can just never end. Here there be dragons...you see them all the time in the marinas.

Good project management skills help with this, keeping focus on what I call CDT's (Clearly Defined Tasks). When working on the boat, I try not to get lost in blue sky brainstorming, or the next version will seduce me long before the current one is done enough to enjoy.

You can access far more of Steve's technomadic brilliance at these sites:

Nomadic Research Labs

Nomadness weblog

Behemoth

Store

And others pursuing a technomadic lifestyle here.

Ghost Ship 'Seasteading Community' growing in Singapore

The venerable Creed O'Hanlon sent me this communque' as an example of his ongoing quest to document all efforts at seasteading, whether communal, corporate or organic. Interesting story.

click the title bar and here.

Jay Fitzgerald, Seasteader

Jay (Jerome) Fitzgerald is the author of several books about sailing and the opportunity it affords us to change our lifestyle, our outlook and ultimately our world. He's an advocate of sailing without an engine, of making the sea our home, and of consciously leading lives that veer toward simplicity rather than consumption. He's an environmental consultant by trade, a sailor by vocation and as a writer and philosopher something of an iconoclast and visionary. He is currently homesteading in Hawaii, while preparing his next liveaboard. One of his blogs has a picture of a nice big Wharram cat slated as the next boat, but when I asked Jay what he's building he replied  that in his front yard he's working on a 30' proa and that if he's satified with the results he plan's a 70' steel version.

 Jay will be known to many of my readers for his seminal works on seasteading and engineless sailing. In reply to my query about the origin of the word seasteading Jay told me that it's first known usage was by legendary designer Uffa Fox. Been around a little while.

 I also asked Jay for his opinion of the work of Patri Friedman et. al. to establish' micronations' at sea vis a vis some kind of very large structures which might resemble floating oil drilling rig/platforms. His response was succinct, decried the likely waste of grant money that could have been used more productively and voiced scepticism that these pursuits would ever come to fruition. I agree.

 Jays books are "Sea-Steading", which you'll find in my bookstore, "Sailing With Purpose: The Pursuit of the Dream" and "Wind and Tide: An Introduction to Cruising in Pure Sailing Craft". He's got a website devoted to promoting sailing without mechanical means called The Oar Club, and two blogs, both recommended, Sensible Simplicity and CommonStrike and a website for his Sea-Steading Institute. His is a voice crying out for the wilderness and an approach to living with and within it in a manner that makes sense. Never more cogent and relevant than today! I'd like to leave you with Jay's words,

 "The model of Sea-Stead I suggest is based upon a sailboat that has been built or modified to provide an individual or family a home on the sea. More than a cruising sailboat or a recreational vehicle, this vessel is designed and equipped to provide for both shelter and livelihood, allowing its residents to live perpetually,albeit semi nomadically, where fortune and safety might lead them. This is a very special kind of vessel and a new one—although many traditional lessons learned through vessels of other types might well be of use. 

There has been, in the last ten years, a sort of movement within the idea of Sea-Steading that has attempted several different forms. Several sorts of modified oil-rig platforms and other very complicated structures have been posed. Without exception they have been expensive and ungainly. What has mystified me is why the obvious solution—the sailboat—hasn’t been much considered, although perfectly functional and non-experimental examples exist!"

top photo is of Jay's old boat "Macha" which has been sold and is blogged about here.  She's a 38' Ingrid gaff cutter that is, of course, without engine.

Flotilla (water striders)

A flotilla of water striders

bask in a pool

of autumn sun. 

Haiku and Photography graciously shared by Melinda  Schwakhofer ©

Steve Roberts has for years had a vision of waterbourne seafaring intentional communities. He calls them "Flotilla's", and has taken a step toward actualizing his vision. He's gathering a group of folks  with similar yearnings for a discussion with an eye to fleshing out the possibilities and bringing them to fruition, at least on an experimental level.  In Steve's words..."Actually, this goes back many years.  Over the gestation of the Microship, and well into my more recent Nomadness project, I have had the fantasy of forming an "intentional community" of sorts... but on water.  For a time, we had an active list geared toward relatively local adventures on small boatlets in the Pacific Northwest, but a few things have happened to bring this notion to a new level.

First, I'm now traveling on a boat of ocean-voyaging scale (see 

http://www.nomadness.com for more, especially the blog at 

http://www.nomadness.com/blog 

which is updated every few days).  The scattered community of open-ended voyagers is beginning to fascinate me, and it is not at all difficult to imagine a loose tribe with a critical mass of essential skills and tools, traveling in the same general direction and making the occasional rendezvous (all while steadily connected by the "Flotilla Area Network").

Second, I have a partner named Sky who has her own vision of nomadic community geared to ad-hoc theatrical productions that are initially a spin-off of the nautical life.  This sounds like a fun way to involve musicians and other colorful artistic folk in what might otherwise be a band of crusty techno-geeks, and I'm all for it; we even coined the term "Dramanauts" to hang a label on the meme.  Sky now has a blog by that name:  http://dramanauts.blogspot.com

Third, it has become increasingly apparent that I'm not the only one with ideas like this... not only are there long-established sea-gypsy communities worldwide, but the unnerving geopolitical and economic shifts of late are creating a sort of zeitgeist in the form of redefining one's sense of security around agility, self-sufficiency, and reduced location-dependency.  It's time.

I am not yet sure what exact form this will take, but it is clear that there are enough interesting folks with similar fantasies of aquatic adventure to yield at least an experiment or two in 

technomadic community."

If you would like to join the discussion hit my title and subscribe. 

The photo and haiku I found while searching for images of flotilla. Very intriguing blog written by Artist, Poet, Photographer Melinda Schwakhofer. Inspiraculum. Please visit her as well.

Deja Vuoogle

Whoa. Creed O'Hanlon of the Ethnic Catamaran Co. sent me a heads up on a possible new development in the evolution of seasteading and it's two (at least) divergent paths. Google has filed a patent application for databarges, to house the immense supercomputers needed to run its global search engines. Apparently there are huge energy costs associated with cooling these things, and the idea is to harness wave energy for electricity and use seawater for cooling. They would set up as far as 7 miles out to sea. Not mentioned by google is the fact that at sea they would be effectively "offshore" with all the implications of that status. Theoretically they could become a sovereign nation. What are the tax implications, and what about privacy law? Of course this is very difficult to achieve and has been tried in the past many times, almost always failing. Almost always. Then there is "Sealand" . Or is there ? Refer to Creed's recent four part discussion at his blog A Tiki in Thailand. I also recommend reading the comment left there by Michael Schacht of Proafile. My title links to the original Times article. And there's much more here... Any thoughts?

James Wharram and Hanneke Boon

I've been reluctant to post James Wharram as most of my readers are already aware of him. You may not be aware, however, of this little beauty, a tacking proa with crab claw sail which he initially designed for the Melanesians with an eye to conservation of the trees the Melanesians typically use for creating dugouts: "The 'MELANESIA' is to be used in the traditional manner as a small inter island sea truck, for daily commuting to their gardens, for out to sea fishing or just paddling around to see friends, families or nearby islands." I'd love to hear from anyone who's built or sailed one of these and also a Hitia 17.

Mr. Wharram and Hanneke Boon, his partner in design and life, are recognized as two of the most influential designers to bring the Catamaran into our era, and one of the most effective proponents of the self build community. They have a large and loyal group of builders and are responsible, at least tangentially, for much of what actual seasteading is done today.

PS. Just recieved a link from Creed O'Hanlon @ A Tiki in Thailand on the latest update/letter/whereabouts/and goings on from Mr. Wharram and Ms. Boon here.

Sealand

Creed O'Hanlon of The Ethnic Catamaran Company has published a very interesting piece on nomadic lifestyles in general and seasteading on the micro level in particular. It was published in the Griffith Review recently and is currently making an appearance on his blog, A
Tiki in Thailand. Creed had sent me the full text, unpublished, shortly after I first posted about him. I've been mulling it over ever since, because I wanted to give it the right treatment and tie it in with something relevant. It's half rant half academic research and completely compelling. I am posting it with some photo's of the Moken, a semi nomadic group of Thai "seasteaders" as that's the one extant group that I'm aware of pursuing this lifestyle. The Moken or Mogen are not true seasteaders in that they are tied to land based communities about 6 months in the year, but they still embody this ideal more than any group I know of. James Wharram has suggested intentional communities of self builders living on the sea and organised around a mothership. This has yet to occur according to my information.The Moken achieved instant notoriety after the big tsunami in Thailand because, due to their culture and awareness of the sea, they knew the big wave was coming before it hit. National Geographic was all over them, among others. Their lifestyle is of course threatened by the pressure resulting from exposure to modernity and rising fuel prices. Most of their canoes have been converted from sail to fuel.

Creed's article is a must for anyone reading this blog. It tangentially delineates the debate on seasteading and it's possible tracks, corporate or "pirate" ie: small scale or individual approaches. Please read and respond. I'd like to initiate a dialogue on this subject, but I need your input. So I am challenging anyone who reads this blog to weigh in with their views on this subject. If you don't know anything about it, read Creed's work, do some google research, but give this some time and energy.

There and Back Again

My fellow (expatriates both) Kentuckian Steve Roberts has gone over the rainbow and is back home in Camano Island, Washington. And seeing it as though for the first time. Or better than my words, as T.S. Eliot said:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time~
The Four Quartets

You can catch up with Steve's exploits here.

Nomadness

Speaking of seasteading, Steve Roberts has been working out his own version/vision of nomadic lifestyle for over two decades, first on a recumbent bicycle and more recently on a variety of vessels. Artist, writer and editor, engineer and visionary, Steve is a cutting edge techno-nomad avantgardist who is exploring a lifestyle based on the sea and reporting back to us the results of his research. Two blogs and a website. I first heard about him many years ago from my brother, who is a friend of a friend. I was particularly engaged (infected?) by this short peice. I know from our communication that Steve is currently on a shakedown in Puget Sound, Gig Harbour today. Then heading "back to the north and wilder country". Follow his progress aboard the Amazon 44 steel raised-salon pilothouse cutter Nomadness here. http://www.nomadness.com/blog

A Tiki in Thailand

The Ethnic Catamaran Company based in Pattaya, Thailand produces a nice site called a tiki in thailand. Mostly concerned with the building of a James Wharram cruising design, the blog also includes the occasional musings of the author. Creed O'Hanlon's company's mission statement includes not only building traditionally inspired pacific craft but also exploring the brave new world of seasteading and waterborne community. Ideas which I also find fascinating, but there really seems to be a dearth of information on the subject beyond what one can find about the Seasteading Institute, which seems a bit corporate. I suppose my vision, not refined or worked out at all, would be a bit more hippie, something like a floating New Alchemy Institute ala John Todd , et. al. Anyone out there who's interested in this, please post a comment! ps. the wonderful photo of a sqaull moving in off the North West coast of Borneo, above, I found at a Tiki., its origin is unknown. The dhow photo is also from the Tiki in Thailand site.