Blogs gush about them. PR campaigns blow millions on them. News anchors announce their arrival like they’re members of state. And the rest of us suffer when they utterly fail to deliver. They’re overhyped tech products, and unfortunately, we’ve run across quite a few of them through the years. Here are a few of our favorites… or at least, the ones we most bitterly remember.
Segway Personal Transporter
SegwayBy the way its inventor Dean Kamen and folks like Steve Jobs (who seems to have a blessing for hyperbole) talked this thing up, you would have believed it was the solution to all the world’s problems. And some people did. But instead of defying gravity, producing limitless energy or any of the other things people had dreamed up for “IT,” the thing basically, well , moved. Like an electric wheelchair. But standing up. Guess we’ll have to wait a few years for Kamen’s fusion reactor.
Palm Foleo
Before the Asus Eee hit the states and shook up the market for ultra-portable, low-cost PCs, Palm was building up the same concept with its Foleo PC. In theory, it had a number of concrete features that push it to the front of the pack, including zero boot time, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and a full QWERTY keyboard. We say in theory, because the Foleo went off radar during the summer it was supposed to debut, then finally slipped beneath the waves for good when Palm formally announced its death in September. Thanks for getting our hopes up.
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Segway Personal Transporter
SegwayBy the way its inventor Dean Kamen and folks like Steve Jobs (who seems to have a blessing for hyperbole) talked this thing up, you would have believed it was the solution to all the world’s problems. And some people did. But instead of defying gravity, producing limitless energy or any of the other things people had dreamed up for “IT,” the thing basically, well , moved. Like an electric wheelchair. But standing up. Guess we’ll have to wait a few years for Kamen’s fusion reactor.
Palm Foleo
Before the Asus Eee hit the states and shook up the market for ultra-portable, low-cost PCs, Palm was building up the same concept with its Foleo PC. In theory, it had a number of concrete features that push it to the front of the pack, including zero boot time, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and a full QWERTY keyboard. We say in theory, because the Foleo went off radar during the summer it was supposed to debut, then finally slipped beneath the waves for good when Palm formally announced its death in September. Thanks for getting our hopes up.
[ Read Entire Article ]
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