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The Worlds Most Annoying Stairway

Posted on: October 27, 2009 4:18 PM, by Greg Laden

Well, it is fun at first, but after a while....

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Comments

If the goal is to get people to climb stairs, why didn't they just turn off the escalator?

Posted by: Doug | October 27, 2009 5:23 PM

Doh!

Posted by: Greg Laden | October 27, 2009 6:27 PM

but turned-off escalators are so...quiet...

Posted by: gruebait | October 27, 2009 6:35 PM

Hmm, I would probably be encouraging people to take the escalator, so they wouldn't interrupt me while having fun the stairs :p

Posted by: Alcari | October 27, 2009 7:28 PM

Cool, but I imagine a lot of the fun is in the novelty. If all stairs contained some kind of "fun" gimmick I think I'd take the escalator :P

Posted by: Jeremy | October 27, 2009 7:41 PM

Next thing: reduce the keyboard to just the pentatonic scale so everything people do has some musical consistency.

The hypothesis required the choice element. The goal was to see what people would choose, not to get them to use the stairs.

Posted by: Gray Gaffer | October 27, 2009 8:46 PM

They've had these at the Boston Museum of Science for years!

Now these would be fun yet annoying stairs: http://baratunde.posterous.com/video-of-the-moment-van-ness-muni-station-wat

The escalator should be a theremin,
B

Posted by: Brian Jordan | October 27, 2009 9:02 PM

It's not safe nor building code compliant

Posted by: dalani | October 27, 2009 9:13 PM

I'll assume you guys already know this, but I'll say it anyway. Not everyone can climb stairs easily (people with bad knees or luggage or small children). That's why there's also an escalator.

Posted by: Stephanie Z | October 27, 2009 10:17 PM

The Minnesota Science Museum also has these. I imagine this is standard issue for science museums (but the technology in Boston and MSM are different than what you see being deployed here, IIRC).

Posted by: Greg Laden | October 27, 2009 10:34 PM

Anyone who thinks this would get boring isn't 2.

Posted by: Rich Wilson | October 28, 2009 12:26 AM

It's an experiment. It's a cool idea. So's the trash can. A harmless way to see what changes human behavior.

Posted by: Gwenny | October 28, 2009 1:09 PM