How Not To Launch a Gadget

An anonymous reader writes "Starfish sells itself with this slogan: 'The next biggest thing is the next smallest thing: The world's first ever interactive iPhone and iPad mirroring device on your wrist.' The reality is that building products is hard. Building products with amazing feature sets is harder still. And, as the old saying goes, if something looks too good to be true, it probably is. From the article: 'On Thursday morning when the show floor opened, Starfish’s booth was completely empty—no product, no marketing materials, not even any people. Come Friday, various permutations of representatives appeared at the booth intermittently. ... Saturday arrived, but the watch didn’t, at least not at first. After hourly promises of its imminent arrival, a single prototype of the Starfish watch appeared sometime before 1 p.m. My colleague Dan Moren got to the booth before I did, and the Starfish device wasn't working then. It had apparently worked, briefly, in some sense of the word "worked," when a reporter for TUAW visited the booth. ... The sole representative at the booth when I returned wouldn't give his name. What information he did give me didn’t mesh with what [the CEO] had told TUAW. ... "Why did he send you to man the booth if you can’t answer questions about the watch?" I asked the rep. "I’m done talking to you," he said, as he moved to position himself directly in front of my face. His expression had gone from brusque to combative. "Did you hear me? I’m done talking to you." My accompanying colleagues and I took the unsubtle hint. We left the booth.'"

Comments

Recipe for disaster ...

[Taco Cowboy]

If you think 3D printing can solve everything, you will be in for a very big surprise !!

Re:Recipe for disaster ...

[Jarik C-Bol]

you can already order a huge number of expensive things custom 3d printed in a vast array of metals and have them mailed to your door. I personally have purchased a set of gaming dice 3d printed from stainless steel. The same company will print in various plastics, silver, gold, or even glass and ceramic. Anything you design that will fit the dimensions their hardware can print, you can order. (they may have a ban on sexually explicit items and weapons, i've never checked). Based on that, I think the idea of printing a working circuit board is more like 5-7 years out, on an experimental scale, and 10-15 on a 'I designed this board, and they printed and mailed it to me' scale.

Re:Captain Obvious strikes again

[TheGratefulNet]

have you watched modern US style TV lately?

I took a long break from TV and recently had a look again (was traveling and so was hotel bound and resorted to looking at what's on, these days).

its really IQ-insulting in every single way. very hard to find anything that could keep my interest and didn't talk down to me or assume I was a neanderthal.

TV has gone to hell and shows no signs of reversing the trend.

this is a fair yardstick to compare where our 'attention span' sits. and its not a very flattering statement to what the media thinks the US viewers want.

internet for the populous is not much different.

dancing pigs will always have a market...