Explaining the "Single Speed" Philosophy

In previous posts, I have made reference to the term "Single Speed", so what the hell does it mean?

If you google "single speed", you'll get a bunch of hits relating to bicycles. In its simplest term, a single speed is a bike without gears and a bike without gears is simplicity defined. So what's that got to do with computers, Linux, OS X and why do I care?


The idea of a single speed bike is that there is nothing between the rider and the road, other than what is absolutely necessary. It could be considered a reaction to the ever increasing use of technology to make both mountain biking and road cycling more accessible to ordinary Joes with fat wallets, and we couldn't have that not, could we? Multiple suspension points on the rear and front, disc brakes and 21 or 27 gear bikes are quite common. Mountain biking on a modern bike can be akin to sitting on a large soafer, bobbing up and down and throwing mud on your face... although not too much mud, those $300 mud guards will catch most of it.

So Mountain Bikers cyclists decided to drop the rear suspension, the disc brakes and in some cases the front suspension and gears too. The bikes would be lighter and meaner and the rider would
have the opportunity to test his or her skill, rather than just the quality of the suspension.

Computers have followed a similar trend to bikes (stay with me, it makes sense honest!). Just about anyone can get to grips with a modern computer. Simple interfaces, wizards, automatic installations and millions of dollars worth of R+D to make life simple has all resulted in computers that are now simple to use by anyone. The days of typing 3 or 4 lines of code just to get your word processor to save a file are long gone. Computers are smart - the users are stupid - and that sells software.

So can the single speed philosophy be applied to computers? What would a single speed computer be like to use. My wife wanted one... and I thought it was a great idea. The obvious choice was Linux... simple, no complex wizards and nothing to distract the user from getting on with what is important. Using the damn thing!