[HN Gopher] Dead Startup Toys
___________________________________________________________________
Dead Startup Toys
Author : notknifescience
Score : 374 points
Date : 2021-07-12 15:08 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (deadstartuptoys.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (deadstartuptoys.com)
| DeadBeatDad wrote:
| You could train an AI to generate these randomly, something
| similar to:
|
| https://thischemicaldoesnotexist.com/
|
| https://thispersondoesnotexist.com/
| stuaxo wrote:
| I know it's a joke, but a bit harsh it says OLPC achieved
| nothing.
| breck wrote:
| Speaking off the cuff, without knowing the insider details, but
| I would say OLPC helped pave the way for Raspberry Pi; Theranos
| helped paved the way for a lot of future blood testing
| companies (and let's hope discourage people from pursuing a
| secrets and patents strategy), et cetera.
|
| Dead trees feed the next generation.
| axiosgunnar wrote:
| I'm not too familiar with OLPC (perhaps they were indeed a
| money grab), but I feel there is a difference between "oops..my
| startup that would have made me rich AF failed" and "oops.. my
| startup that would have made the internet more accessible for
| african kids failed"
| skavi wrote:
| "oops.. my startup diverted funds that could have gone to
| actually effective charities"
| jandrese wrote:
| OLPC was far from the least effective charity though. It
| could have diverted funds from an even worse charity.
| intuitionist wrote:
| To the (small) extent that it was Jeffrey Epstein's money I
| think I prefer it being lit on fire to whatever else he
| might have done with it
| jhbadger wrote:
| Although Negroponte is an angel investor these days according
| to Wikipedia, so he did become wealthy somehow. I'm not sure
| how much OLPC helped that (although leaders of seemingly
| noble non-profits can do quite well for themselves in
| general).
| ghaff wrote:
| Well, he's from a wealthy family, an early investor in
| Wired when they were cool among other well-known startups,
| and a co-founder of the MIT Media Lab. Being an angel
| investor doesn't necessarily mean billionaire.
| BoorishBears wrote:
| I'd love to see what about hard to repair e-waste dumped on
| teachers with minimal training was supposed to lead to making
| the internet more accessible for kids.
|
| https://books.google.com/books?id=v4y5DwAAQBAJ
| Trufa wrote:
| As I said elsewhere, it was pretty successfully implemented in
| Uruguay, where every child received one.
| xkeysc0re wrote:
| I'm lucky enough to have an original Pets.com sock puppet still
| in my possession
| juanuys wrote:
| I thought I was going to see my Cognitoys Dino on that site...
|
| https://www.wired.com/2015/02/cognitoys-ibm-watson/
| juanuys wrote:
| I say "my". I mean my daughters'. _ahem_
| throwawaycities wrote:
| Where's the Frye Festival toy tent?
| dotBen wrote:
| Seems prudent to point out this isn't the product of a
| disgruntled's weekend project with fancy webdesign.
|
| This is a product from MSCHF which is a $100M+ startup [1]
|
| (feels like they're getting a bit of an astroturfed free ride of
| prime PR on HN because folks may not realize who is behind this)
|
| [1] https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/279769-42
| mushufasa wrote:
| from going to their website, it seems like they try to use
| clever web design and limited-time deals to sell weirdo and
| off-kilter failed products. I clicked on a link to a 'chair
| simulator' which ended up as a steam game a-la-goat simulator.
|
| It seems like they are a factory to sprinkle some clever web
| design and marketing to create demand for failed products,
| making something out of nothing. With time as an incentive.
| Reminds me of the early days of Groupon.
|
| Clever.
| slg wrote:
| For those unware, this is the same people behind those Lil Nas
| X shoes with blood in them that made the news a few months
| back. While they do sell products, they seem to be less of a
| traditional startup with the goal of making money and more of a
| mix of satirists, artists, and trolls.
| sombremesa wrote:
| They seem to have raised a bunch of money but still ended up
| being the "poor man's" version of Meow Wolf [0].
|
| They also seem to be pulling some wool over journalists' eyes
| by misrepresenting their raise as hinging on one or the other
| of their "drops".
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGHxXw7Qcs8
|
| [1]
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/curtissilver/2020/11/09/push-
| pa...
| whymauri wrote:
| Is it astroturf, though? I think this is genuinely hilarious.
| Elizabeth Holmes as the patron saint of the website is the
| cherry on top.
| harikb wrote:
| thanks, I didn't notice that small image!
| cercatrova wrote:
| The *cherub on top
| legohead wrote:
| I'd say so as they just picked the most well known gadgets.
|
| So they basically put minimal effort into research and
| surrounded it by a pretty site.
| crackercrews wrote:
| Where was the pretty site?
| johnnyfived wrote:
| Who's the target audience for this crap? A bunch of Hacker
| News-esque weekend projects that get a bunch of PR from Vice,
| WSJ, Verge, etc. every time they release something. Just seems
| like a team of copycats stealing hackathon ideas, giving them a
| slight twist, then calls it art and journalists fall all over
| themselves for it.
|
| You won't see these publications writing about similar projects
| on HN, because they're not called "drops" (lol) and doesn't
| have an edgy site. Maybe I'm just jealous of their success, I
| just don't think it's noteworthy at all.
| lupire wrote:
| It's VC funded (for some bizarre reason) Silicon Valley late-
| stage Burning Man appropriation of counter culture.
| whymauri wrote:
| I don't think it's counter culture, at all (or attempting
| to be). They were selling Lil Nas X shoes, which is
| basically peak mainstream culture.
| johnnyfived wrote:
| In today's world where everyone's trying to be ironic
| counterculture is mainstream culture, just with more
| smugness
| rozap wrote:
| The best part is when you go to mschf.xyz there are a bunch of
| links, and when you click one it logs `TypeError:
| n.setAttribute is not a function` to the console and then
| doesn't do anything.
|
| millions of dollars to build a homepage with some links on it
| that spit out JS errors is the ultimate commentary. i think
| it's genius.
| trhway wrote:
| Recently when I tried to configure Mustang EV to get
| price/etc. the Ford site was erroring ... That's billions
| that their future rides on .
| ajcp wrote:
| I really hope they didn't pay someone millions of dollars to
| generate them a Create Nuxt App with really terrible design
| and tracking.
| yobert wrote:
| Are they going to have a toy for themselves in a month? :D
| mushufasa wrote:
| Did One Laptop per Child truly fail as a startup? It was always a
| nonprofit, so of course it didn't make money.
|
| While the technology was lacking in many respects, it did serve a
| lot of children at the time, and proved the market that
| Chromebooks came to later dominate with a similar approach
| (linux-based OS with minimal resources at $100-300 price point).
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| right, didn't really 'fail' as a 'startup' - it just took a
| very long time to develop and tech continued to move/struggles
| to be independent and stable with manufacturer messes and giant
| competing companies, various interests slowing things down all
| while user needs changed rapidly and capabilities of platforms
| increased. This was really a long time ago early 00s things
| were very different and nowhere near mobile device era and so
| at the time was very noble and promising.
|
| I didn't need to hear Justin Kan talking stupid claiming it
| missed the mark because of phones in that video about the toys
| ignoring the timeline/history, it was years before that which
| is a lot considering how fast things changed
| fnord77 wrote:
| One Thousand Laptops per Warlord
| legitster wrote:
| Even 8+ years ago, OLPC was taught as a case study in business
| school. It was a largely failed project.
|
| It's a pretty classic example of a CEO who was very capable at
| establishing business partnerships but had such a rigid view
| about the problem they were trying to solve. They never really
| proved that the 1:1 concept actually had merit, but ended up
| being so invested in quantity over quality.
|
| In developing countries, the computers were too simple to teach
| effective computer skills. And in undeveloped countries, the
| laptops did nothing to address actual education problems.
|
| Chromebooks have the benefit years of Chrome apps being
| developed to solve actual problems. They also give up a lot of
| the goofy ideas like hand crank recharging or mesh networking
| and etc.
| jasondigitized wrote:
| Agreed. This site is laden with cynicism.
| Camillo wrote:
| OLPC straddles the line between startup and social program.
| Given that it wasn't actively harmful [citation needed], it
| actually managed to produce the laptops, and they had some non-
| zero if modest utility, we'd have to place it in the upper
| ranks of the latter category. Even if it had zero impact, that
| would merely place it in the modal group [0], nothing to be
| ashamed of!
|
| [0]: see the Iron Law of Evaluation.
| gre wrote:
| The trackpad had terrible bugs that pinned the cursor to the
| side of the screen. That's as far as I got using it. I'm sad
| that some kid probably ended up with one on account of me.
| cavalierfrix wrote:
| I was given an OLPC laptop as a gift, and learned that their
| CMOS battery (If I remember correctly) was hardwired, and when
| the battery died the laptop was useless. I sent my OLPC to
| someone on a forum who claimed to fix them, along with a fee,
| and never heard back. The only time I've been screwed by
| someone on a niche forum like that.
|
| Still, it was a fun thing to play with. The form factor was
| like a durable OG iBook, and it worked well for basic tasks.
| seumars wrote:
| Chromebooks simply took over the netbook market which was
| already established by the time OLPC got some publicity. I
| think OLPC failed because it became more about proving that
| tech and "bold ideas" from silicon valley could change the
| world, instead of seriously addressing issues in the third
| world - it reminds me of the PlayPump.
|
| https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2010/07/01/the-playpump-wh...
| ghaff wrote:
| OLPC wasn't "silicon valley." It came out of the MIT Media
| Lab.
| Trufa wrote:
| Every child in the Uruguayan public system got his/her laptop,
| I don't know at a global scale but it gave access to the
| internet/technology to thousands of children that would
| otherwise wouldn't have. So calling it a total failure seems
| off to me.
| garmaine wrote:
| By all accounts they were not really useful, broke easily,
| and couldn't be repaired in the field. Many countries backed
| out of their commitment once they tried out their samples.
| Those which took delivery ended up not integrating them into
| curriculum because they didn't deliver on their promise.
|
| It did kickstart the "netbook" form factor, which ended up
| replacing most OLPC use cases. So not a total failure from a
| technology standpoint, like Juicero and Theranos were. But it
| is a bit of a poster child for everything that's wrong with
| the MIT Media Lab.
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17233946/olpcs-100-laptop.
| ..
| lupire wrote:
| It didn't kickstart netbooks, which predate OLPC XO by a
| decade and were far less experimental designs.
| jefftk wrote:
| Netbooks are usually considered to have started in 2007
| with the OLPC and eeepc:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netbook
| ghaff wrote:
| There were older subnotebooks of various kinds but
| "netbooks" by that name are usually associated with small
| Atom-based machines that Intel was pushing partly in
| response to OLPC hype. See, e.g., this article from 2009.
| https://web.archive.org/web/20110130085835/http://blogs.c
| omp...
| ghaff wrote:
| >Did One Laptop per Child truly fail as a startup?
|
| I'd say it kind of did (as did Netbooks as a technology for the
| most part as well).
|
| It's smartphones really that won the segment that OLPC was
| primarily targeted at. Chromebooks became fairly big in
| education but primarily AFAIK in developed countries.
| [deleted]
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| "Netbooks as a technology for the most part"
|
| I know people that created books and websites on a netbook,
| who got though school and business meetings with them. I
| never seen that for a smartphone.
| crazygringo wrote:
| People absolutely get through school and business meetings
| with smartphones.
|
| If you visit a community college or know someone who
| teaches at one, a surprisingly high percentage of students
| do their homework and write papers entirely on their phone.
| It's kind of amazing.
| [deleted]
| tinco wrote:
| If it, and netbooks as a hardware category, failed, it was
| because in the end they turned out to not have been worth it.
| I used a netbook happily for about a year or two, it cost
| ~$400 if I recall correctly, and afterwards I donated it to
| my sister who I think used it for a while as well.
|
| That's at least $150/yr for a low end product fun but
| uncomfortable product. After the netbook I upgraded to a
| Macbook Pro that was $1250, and I used it for 8 years, after
| which I also donated it to my sister, and she's still happily
| using it. That's a roughly similar $150/yr, but for a best in
| class product with great comfort and wide usability.
|
| I wonder if anyone used a OLPC's for more than a year or two.
| Symbiote wrote:
| Didn't netbooks as a category just merge into cheaper
| laptops? I doubt they were unprofitable for the
| manufacturers.
|
| I'll bet the children in Africa etc with the OLPCs used
| them for several years. They can't switch to a MacBook.
| chirau wrote:
| They didn't really do much in Africa eventually, if
| anything at all.
| McMiniBurger wrote:
| but not anyone's OK with spending $1250 upfront
|
| if you earn $250 a month in a developing country, $1250 is
| like 9-month pay (* calculation may be wrong --- gotta
| sleep?)
| tinco wrote:
| Sure, but it is just an extreme example of the TCO of the
| OLPC being comparable to a high end professional grade
| laptop. It was just a very hard problem to solve, and the
| technology was not quite there yet.
|
| Definitely not suggesting kids in Africa should just buy
| macbook pro's, but $100 is also a lot of upfront cost for
| a product that's actually not that useful and destined
| for the wastebin within a year or two.
|
| I do hope I'm wrong and it brought some cool technology
| too some kids far removed from the big cities.
| Nursie wrote:
| I wouldn't have wanted to take a MacBook round outback
| Australia for months.
|
| A netbook, feh, doesn't matter if it breaks.
| tinco wrote:
| I think you underestimate the build quality of the
| Macbook Pro, it is quite literally the best laptop ever
| created, if they produced them now with modern chips and
| monitors, developers would buy them by the thousands and
| possibly macos would still be the developers os of
| choice. I wouldn't hesitate to bring it to the outback.
| What do you think would happen to a macbook in Australia?
| ohazi wrote:
| For "cheap," netbooks as a category have been replaced by
| your run-of-the-mill entry-level laptop. The cheapest Dell
| Inspiron starts at ~$300. $400 gets you an Intel i3 or an
| AMD Ryzen 3, both of which are leagues better than an Atom.
|
| For "small," the category was replaced by Ultrabooks as
| people realized that it's usually better to have a thin
| laptop that doesn't force you to compromise on the display
| or keyboard size.
|
| I remember traveling with a netbook so that I'd have a
| computer I could use for tickets and reservations, and even
| for that, the low resolution 8-10" netbook screens were
| painful. 12-14" Ultrabooks with >= 1080p panels are much
| more comfortable, and the weight is comparable.
| techrat wrote:
| To be fair, you're comparing netbooks then what what we
| have now. At the time, the pokey, sluggish Atom _was_ the
| best you could get for a lightweight system and longer-
| than-usual battery. Remember... the common alternative to
| a netbook then were awkward 1-2 inches thick 'desktop
| replacement' style monstrosities unless you wanted to pay
| a LOT of money relative to performance... and netbooks
| were $300ish versus $1200+ for laptops at the time. I was
| grateful for my netbook and they really did seem to push
| portables into becoming better at being... well,
| portable.
| ghaff wrote:
| To be fair there were fairly compact/light* laptops at
| the time from a variety of manufacturers. But the period
| between, say, 2000 and maybe the late 2000s in particular
| laptops were becoming common but you had to make serious
| tradeoffs between price, size/weight, performance, and
| other features.
|
| * By the standards of the time
| thrower123 wrote:
| The Asus eeePCs were great for the time as a beat-around
| little on-the-go laptop, when most laptops were still 15
| or 17 inches and weighed 5-10 pounds.
|
| I really enjoyed the one I bought in college - it
| actually fit on those terrible fold-out desks that
| lecture hall seats have.
| ghaff wrote:
| I've had both a "subnotebook" (a Fujitsu) and a small
| Chromebook. The <13" form factor can be nice for travel
| but, in both cases, I ultimately came to the conclusion
| that the compromises relative to a 13" form factor that
| didn't weigh that much more just wasn't worth it.
| agloeregrets wrote:
| Might I add...don't buy this. Why? Because you can literally
| buy an ACTUAL OLPC for $20 more.
| potatolicious wrote:
| Arguably OLPC's approach has - in hindsight - been discredited,
| but yeah, it seems overly cruel to lump it in with Juicero or
| Theranos.
|
| We do have impossibly cheap computers now that are far more
| accessible, that do nearly all the things normally expected of
| computers, and with widely available resources for programming
| on them - RPi, Chromebooks, etc.
|
| The success of those devices relative to OLPC (with of course,
| the benefit of hindsight) seems to come down to a few major
| differences in the approach:
|
| - insistence on highly-custom _everything_ , rather than
| exploiting as much as possible off-the-shelf to keep costs
| down.
|
| - insistence on targeting the absolute lowest-cost end of the
| market initially rather than starting at a higher price point
| and using that as a starting point for iterative cost-
| reduction.
|
| The latter pitfall one still sees various hardware startups
| fall into with some regularity. Universal accessibility is a
| fantastic goal, but often the easiest way to do it is to sell
| something considerably more expensive first.
| blihp wrote:
| It did fall short of what they wanted to deliver as a device
| probably because it was far too ambitious... but they
| accomplished quite a bit due to that ambition. Consider that it
| was conceived of in a time before inexpensive laptops were
| available. In 2005, a low-end laptop still cost well over
| $1000. Things like a Chromebook, netbook, Raspberry Pi etc.
| didn't exist yet. If anything, the OLPC probably got companies
| thinking sooner and more seriously about the low cost portable
| computing space than they would have otherwise.
| dwheeler wrote:
| I agree. OLPC wasn't a failure in the same sense as the
| others. They created laptops, they got used, and a lot of
| people _did_ learn a lot. It didn 't succeed to the level
| they hoped, but that's true for almost all projects. It's
| easier to be critical in retrospect. OLPC did succeed in
| making the world a better place, and that's to be commended.
| cthomson wrote:
| Reading the amount of money invested in each of these inspires a
| huge sense of waste lol
| fortyseven wrote:
| Nice website, but something feels really shitty about this.
| duxup wrote:
| >coolestcooler
|
| The hyper expensive cooler segment of society is one I never
| would have predicted / don't understand.
| spookthesunset wrote:
| When you go camping, "cooler management" is a pain in the ass.
| Ice becomes one of your biggest limiting factors in the
| duration of you trip. Anything that can make keeping cold stuff
| cold for long periods of time is a worthy investment.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| I thought so too, but after months of occasional research I
| ended up buying (what I consider) an absurdly expensive pelican
| cooler.
|
| I looked at it based on some main criteria, like:
|
| 1. Is it durable
|
| 2. How long will it keep stuff cold?
|
| 3. What's the warranty like?
|
| The pelican was 2-3x the cost of alternatives (but the same as
| a few competitors like Yeti), but ultimately scored best on
| each. Based on the material it's made from and the experience I
| have with their other products (particularly cases, which the
| cooler essentially is) I felt confident the cooler would be
| effectively bomb proof and last ages in harsh conditions. It
| has a lifetime warranty, but I don't want to have to use those.
| I want something to really last.
|
| After a few years it still looks brand new and still keeps ice
| a ridiculously long time.
|
| It's kind of funny - I put fish in it when spear fishing
| remotely, which seems ridiculous because I'm putting gnarly
| stuff in a really nice cooler. Somehow though the plastic
| doesn't retain the smell, and it's still perfectly usable for
| regular camping trips. Having insurance that fish I catch will
| stay fresh is incredible though. If I stay somewhere three
| nights and get my limit each day, I can bring fish/crab/etc
| home.
|
| Combined with our rooftop tent it means we can camp really
| comfortably for a long time. It was well worth the cost so far.
|
| Edit: I should add that I don't work for pelican or anything, I
| just like my cooler and have become conditioned to justify why
| I bought it, haha. So many people give me shit for it, it's
| programmed in now. I swear it's worth it - if you'll actually
| use it. Something 1/3 the price is fine for plenty of people's
| needs too.
| Pxtl wrote:
| Yes, but the Coolest Cooler with its blender and speakers
| seems obviously designed for beach parties and not
| outdoorsmen. I don't doubt there's a market for high-end
| coolers but there are very different use-cases.
|
| Like, as a car-camper I always spring for the plug-in car-
| powered Peltier coolers.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| Oh I see what you mean, I thought you were more along the
| lines of someone who thinks the $50 cooler from Walmart is
| no different from the $350 cooler I bought.
|
| The coolest cooler isn't for me either, but I guess if
| you're at the beach a lot it could have been nice.
|
| I'd prefer to bring ready-made things in my pelican and a
| travel speaker (though I never play music in public spaces)
| - I'm not a fan of do-everything devices.
| forgetfulness wrote:
| It's missing "Pryme Vessyl", the "smart cup" that tracked your
| water intake and told you when to drink water.
|
| You know, just in case you lose the sense of thirst for some
| bizarre reason.
| BugsJustFindMe wrote:
| > _You know, just in case you lose the sense of thirst for some
| bizarre reason._
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adipsia
| LamaOfRuin wrote:
| "Due to its rarity, the disorder has not been the subject of
| many research studies."
|
| The definition of "for some bizarre reason"
| s_gourichon wrote:
| Definitely a huge market for a startup then! ;-)
| Biganon wrote:
| If you only drink when you're feeling thirsty, you're probably
| not drinking enough. Not saying this product is the way to go
| though.
| meatmanek wrote:
| No, you're probably fine unless you have actual symptoms of
| dehydration.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/25/upshot/no-you-do-not-
| have...
| forgetfulness wrote:
| Why though? It's the signal that you're lacking water. If you
| aren't feeling thirsty, your body is judging that it doesn't
| need more. There's special circumstances when you should push
| away any discomfort in getting it when thirsty, like when
| you're sick, and give it priority, but thirst is pretty much
| the indicator.
|
| You don't even need to drink that much in the form of glasses
| of water either, because you are getting it from food
| throughout the day too.
| maerF0x0 wrote:
| That Elizabeth Holmes cherub! OMG best part of my morning.
|
| https://deadstartuptoys.com/_nuxt/img/cherub-animate.319d6a4...
| sandworm101 wrote:
| I want one of those soccer balls with an inbuilt dynamo. Or those
| tiles tested in UK schools that harvest power from footsteps. I'm
| thinking of a similar website for all the failed products that
| tried to use children as a source of electricity.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empower_Playgrounds
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2013/02/28/the-soccket-is-an-electric...
|
| https://theswitch.co.uk/energy/guides/technology/energy-harv...
| Digit-Al wrote:
| No need for anything super elaborate if you want to generate
| electricity from kids. Just shove 'em in a big hamster wheel
| with a large can of red bull and a bag of sweets. I mean, sure,
| some of them will probably die but if we carry on the way we
| are with the environment they'll all die anyway, so swings and
| roundabouts. /s
| rogual wrote:
| I love that people are still doing fun page designs like this.
| I'd started to forget it was possible.
| monkeybutton wrote:
| The animated Elizabeth Holmes cherubs have a real 90s internet
| feel to them. Totally the stuff of nightmares too.
| muyuu wrote:
| some people ran away with million$
|
| failure is relative
|
| plus Negroponte got to learnt that communism doesn't work (or
| maybe he didn't)
| motohagiography wrote:
| One hopes there is some dignity to be found in the discovery
| that, if nothing else, your purpose was to be an example to
| others.
|
| The OLPC thing is a useful lesson in product design though. It
| wasn't really a product, it was a mandate about what some people
| thought others should do, and now instead we have netbooks, the
| android ecosystem, tablets, and everything else. If someone in
| the world wants a laptop over other immediate needs, they can get
| one. Juicero I think had the same problem the rest of juicer
| market had, which it was a niche product for a nexus of people
| who both had an upper middle disposable income and thought it was
| a good idea to convert fibre rich foods into insulin spiking
| sugar water. Jibo's robot without a purpose was existentially
| pretty accurate, but they discovered nobody wants that kind of
| uncanny reminder of the absurdity of their existence hanging
| around. I joke, but a well aimed joke can destroy a brand, and
| having funny people around to take those shots can be company
| saving.
| marvindanig wrote:
| The funnest piece of information (and a notable one) is the
| amount of money these "smartest folks on the planet" put into
| all of these bullshit projects. And the list doesn't even
| include the photo-sharing apps that met Bay Area's standard of
| innovation for rest of the world to follow.
|
| Ha!
| spookthesunset wrote:
| The thing about Juicero's story that makes it amusing is the
| fact the company managed to get several brand name VC's to pour
| in a metric ton of money. I mean in an ideal world, Juicero
| should have been something you'd have seen on Shark Tank right
| after somebody's pitch about socks with pockets or something.
| throwawayboise wrote:
| I thought this was going to be about the office toys from dead
| startups. I don't know how it is now but in the first dot-com
| boom in the late 1990s we had all kinds of kids toys like
| scooters, nerf guns, all over the office. Even then I thought it
| was sort of ridiculous to see grown adults playing with that
| stuff at work. In retrospect it should have been a big warning
| sign that none of this was going to last.
| dunnevens wrote:
| I had a related thought: this was going to be a collection of
| dead startup tchotchke. The t-shirts, pens, light-up pens, etc.
| with long forgotten logos. That would be a fun and depressing
| collection.
|
| The thought made me a little sad because there's a box in my
| closet with precisely those items emblazoned with the dead logo
| of my dead startup.
| mxwsn wrote:
| The art collective behind this project, MSCHF, has done some
| pretty interesting stuff: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSCHF
| samstave wrote:
| The juicero is actually a well designed device.
|
| I found a few a while back for $100 as I wanted to harvest the
| motors and gearing out of them...
| mrfusion wrote:
| There must be a bunch of others they're missing.
| backtoyoujim wrote:
| needs a kozmo scooter w/matching bag
| sathley wrote:
| Why didn't someone think of this sooner?
| axiosgunnar wrote:
| Is ,,one laptop per child" really as bad as the other
| vaporware/fraudware in the list?
| edly wrote:
| I knew a girl in school who had one of these. It was a neat
| little gadget at a cheap cost, but was criticized for not
| solving more pressing issues (water, schools) and there was no
| training provided for teachers. The laptops also weren't
| sustainable and difficult to repair.
|
| It seems the initiative is still kicking since their website is
| still alive (albeit without an HTTPS certificate).
| philjackson wrote:
| > but was criticized for not solving more pressing issues
|
| Sounds very much like a fallacy of relative privation to me.
| md_ wrote:
| Well, if you think OLPC was a deliberate grift--I don't--then
| it's like the moral difference between scamming buyers looking
| for an Internet-connected juicer and scamming donors looking to
| help the world.
|
| As a non-deliberate grift--I guess the same math applies?
| Wildly overpromising and underdelivering on a picnic cooler
| seems somehow _less_ morally problematic than wildly
| overpromising and underdelivering on an effort to improve
| third-world childhood education.
|
| Of course, the counterpoint is that Silicon Valley (or MIT
| Media Lab) bros whose hearts are in the right place deserve
| plaudits for their ill-informed-but-generally-well-meaning
| efforts, even if those efforts waste millions of dollars that
| could have gone to more effective altruistic endeavors.
|
| Which, like, yeah, that's an argument, I guess?
| avs733 wrote:
| I think you are on the right track here, and its important.
|
| In the context of work with developing nations, the defense
| of good intentions is increasingly dismissed out of hand.
| Good intentions are often deeply problematic and can cause
| more harm than good - including capture/transfer of resources
| that could have been used in some other way improve
| conditions for people.
|
| c.f., many NGO projects to improve stove design in less
| developed countries [0]
|
| [0] https://nature.berkeley.edu/er100/readings/Crewe_1997.pdf
| [deleted]
| schwartzworld wrote:
| It's not. Chromebooks just came along and made their goals
| obsolete.
| ghaff wrote:
| At least with respect to the developing world educational
| tool for children goal, it was probably filled by smartphones
| far more than Chromebooks.
| kmeisthax wrote:
| Not necessarily. The list is actually two different categories
| mixed together:
|
| 1. Products which failed because they were targeting their
| niche poorly (e.g. Juicero, OLPC)
|
| 2. Products which failed because they were outright scams (e.g.
| Theranos, Coolest)
|
| However, I do think the failure of OLPC _is_ still interesting
| enough to deserve a mention on this list. With OLPC in
| particular they were trying to be like three different things
| all at once and they succeeded at none of them.
|
| - OLPC wanted to sell computers to the educational market, so
| they were selling lots of cheap machines to schools. This is
| actually not a bad business model; Google and Apple today have
| basically cornered that market with Chromebooks and iPads. Had
| OLPC succeeded, we could have had schools covered in cheap
| XO-1s instead. However...
|
| - OLPC wanted to be a philanthropic mission to the third world,
| so they were designing the laptop with all sorts of weird
| features that only made sense for that market. Some of them are
| reasonable, like they actually intended it to be ruggedized and
| easy to repair. But they also had some weird features - like,
| it was designed around being able to mesh-network an entire
| village together with them. And at one point they were even
| going to have a handcrank on the thing so you could charge the
| laptop by hand if necessary. All of these features are
| unnecessary if you're just selling laptops to schools and they
| ultimately wound up getting dropped.
|
| - OLPC also was built around it's founder's pet theories about
| constructionist learning. If you don't know what that means,
| well, then you're probably not a Hacker News user; because
| constructonism is how most techies learn a new system. We _play
| around with it_. The laptop was designed around a Linux-based
| UI called Sugar and was specifically intended to push Free
| Software onto the third world. The idea was that kids could
| learn how the computer actually _worked_ by modifying the
| software onboard. It even had a _view source_ button on the
| keyboard! All of that is catnip to people like us and
| _completely useless_ for educators.
|
| Ultimately they wound up delivering a very weird product that
| didn't actually do the thing it promised to do. That's very
| much in the spirit of a failed startup.
| olejorgenb wrote:
| Juicero: Did they really have the technology to get you
| *fresh* juice from those packs?
|
| > ... and had a limited lifespan of about 8 days
|
| Ah, so maybe semifresh then. What's the advantage of the
| packs then? I can buy such juice at the supermarket, no?
| kmeisthax wrote:
| The packs were pre-juiced, the Juicero Press just squeezed
| the juice out of the packs.
|
| The advantage of the packs is that they can lock you into
| their ecosystem and charge you more money for the
| convenience of using the machine. Razor-and-blades is a
| common, worthwhile business model... if the razor can be
| made cheaply enough to give away, and the whole package
| actually solves a problem.
|
| The idea was to basically be "Keurig, but for juice"; and
| it would have worked had they not charged SEVEN HUNDRED
| DOLLARS for the press.
| olejorgenb wrote:
| Hehe, charitable to not call i a outright scam :)
|
| > and the whole package actually solves a problem
|
| The problem of having to carry one less item from the
| supermarket?
|
| Soda stream is kinda the same, a machine which produce a
| easily available product directly in you home. But the
| soda cartridge doesn't expire after a week and can
| produce alot of fresh soda. So you save _alot_ carrying
| and it 's easy to always have soda since an extra
| cartridge takes little space. In addition it offer you a
| choice of how "strong" soda you want.
|
| The only advantage of the juice packs is that they
| presumable ship it to your door. But it seems very
| strange if the packs actually are any fresher than
| presqueezed juice shipped in a regular container (which
| would've been _more_ convenient). And from the few
| pictures I saw no water was added to the juice so no
| volume /weight is saved.
|
| Keurig seems to be coffee capsules which arguable does
| solve a problem/brings convenience.
| spookthesunset wrote:
| That was always my take on OLPC. They tried to do way to much
| and kept expanding scope.
|
| If they just focused on one slice of the pie, they might have
| been able to pull it off. For example, build an inexpensive
| laptop that could be shipped en masse to their target
| audience.
| ghaff wrote:
| I'd add the technology probably also just wasn't there for
| the price point they wanted to build to. After all, a
| succession of netbook and adjacent laptops over the next few
| years didn't really hit a sweet spot either--certainly not
| commensurate with the hype in certain circles.
| dale_glass wrote:
| Theranos was a scam, but I think Coolest Cooler wasn't.
|
| It was just a stupid idea and they underestimated the
| difficulty of getting them made. It cost far more than they
| thought and they tried to dig themselves out of that hole by
| selling them on Amazon and trying to use the profit to pay
| for the copies they owed to their Kickstarter backers. This
| caused all sorts of drama, but my impression that they did
| their best to try to deliver what they had promised.
|
| Theranos was very different in that they were clearly lying
| about their capabilities, and hid the truth at all costs, up
| to causing serious problems for people that needed a real
| analysis and got a fake one.
| ansible wrote:
| Coolest cooler was intended to address a perceived need.
| One that may still exist.
|
| What the world "needs", is an easy-to assemble frame that
| you can yourself integrate the functions you need. So if we
| made coolers to a standard size, with some standardized
| attachment point, that would be a start.
|
| Then you could have a lightweight wheeled frame of standard
| dimensions and attachment points, that you could then
| integrate the components you need: portable power pack, BT
| speaker system, etc.
|
| We have so few standardized systems for connecting things
| together physically. There are things like the screw mount
| for cameras, picatinny rails, and 19in equipment racks, for
| instance. But so few of the other items in our everyday
| lives, like BT speakers are engineered that way. They are
| all designed for style, and can't easily be combined.
|
| If you had a system where everyone with nearly zero
| mechanical skill could attach things together, this would
| get us closer to the world where everyone who wanted one
| could have a coolest cooler. Otherwise you have people
| trying to stick things together with duct tape, which
| usually works very poorly if at all.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > Ultimately they wound up delivering a very weird product
| that didn't actually do the thing it promised to do. That's
| very much in the spirit of a failed startup.
|
| Also, it had the typical techie issue of "solving" a problem
| by trying to _force_ more tech into it. Tech people are often
| like the proverbial person who only has a hammer so sees
| every problem as a nail.
| karmakaze wrote:
| I'd feel bad having a $40 toy for a failed make-the-world-
| better $100 product. Wasn't there even a 2-for special where I
| buy one, and one gets sent abroad?
| mcphage wrote:
| Yep, I did that, and got one for myself.
| karmakaze wrote:
| That's cool, better than the toy version as cute as it is.
| (For a sec, I thought you might have meant feel guilty and
| get a toy :-)
| Robotbeat wrote:
| Yeah... that one kinda makes me sad. I agree it's different
| from the others.
| londons_explore wrote:
| I contributed to the OLPC project.
|
| They had a lot of cool tech, but all the poor integration of a
| bunch of unrelated open source projects and a lack of people
| with the ability to design something to fit their market.
|
| The end result was a cool product that nobody wanted that
| didn't work awfully well. I now use my OLPC as a sunlight
| visible status board - and I still need to reboot it once a
| month because the kernel has some memory leak somewhere.
| nullspace wrote:
| It looks like they are still around though, and at least seem
| to be active. The specific laptop itself, probably not, olpc
| does not seem to fit this list. I agree.
| goldcd wrote:
| Coffeezilla did a fun launch video for the range -
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KxdkpjQ31s&ab_channel=Coffe...
| monkeybutton wrote:
| Interesting to see that it is by the same people as the Satan
| Shoes.
| Simulacra wrote:
| I loved the Coolest Cooler idea but thought maybe it was
| overengineering something that most people didn't really need.
| How often do we get to use a cooler in a summer? Not much for my
| family, not enough time.
| Arrath wrote:
| My only exposure to that was my roommate at the time backing
| it. I must say I did enjoy his months of complaining about all
| the issues they had.
| ddek wrote:
| It was a rare case where breaking the _interface segregation
| principle_ IRL causes product failure.
| post_break wrote:
| Needs to add lockitron and little printer.
| Semiapies wrote:
| I was just about to post Little Printer. Because we need a
| machine to make receipt-paper printouts of all the stuff we can
| take three seconds to look at on our phones.
|
| It was a cute design, though.
|
| ETA: Of course, as this is a limited-edition marketing thing,
| they can't actually make toys for more than a half-dozen or so
| models.
| davidkuhta wrote:
| I almost backed the Coolest Cooler, until I saw the built-in 'ice
| blender' and realized I didn't want a cooler that required a
| power supply. Sad to see so many people get taken for a ride :/
| com2kid wrote:
| A friend of mine got hers and loves it. She uses it multiple
| times per year, it is a staple at her parties.
|
| I understand not all backers were so lucky, but it seems to be
| more a situation of the company not being able to execute on
| something that a lot of people actually did want (judging by
| the # of backers they had).
| davidkuhta wrote:
| Interesting, cool to hear that it wasn't all bluster. So now
| I must know... how's that blender?
| axegon_ wrote:
| Jibo got $73M for a product that had no practical purpose or
| market but involving tons of R&D? For real?!?!
| Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
| I'm pretty sure that many of these toy versions of products might
| actually outsell the ones they were inspired with.
| philjackson wrote:
| It it actually selling something? It takes me to a shopify
| link...
| milkthefat wrote:
| They are selling miniature replicas of the products as "toys"
| for 40$.
| agloeregrets wrote:
| Also all sales are final and any order mistakes or anything
| is final. It's all Grifting.
| leth_dev wrote:
| I'm wondering it too. If so, it appears that they do not
| support international shipping. :(
| cercatrova wrote:
| They are actually selling the toys, yes.
| SamBam wrote:
| But that's still ambiguous. It refers to all the products as
| toys. So is it actually selling the original hardware, like
| the Jibo, for $40? Do they "work" in any way? Does the OLPC
| turn on?
| cercatrova wrote:
| No they're plastic toys that resemble the startup product.
| Not the actual startup product itself. It's simply an item
| to collect for novelty, not for any real purpose.
| robgibbons wrote:
| Fairly safe to add Magic Leap to the list.
| javier10e6 wrote:
| Who can forget the adorable Nabaztag?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabaztag
| noxer wrote:
| the "Dead Startup" part reverse to the page which is litterally
| broken on any device I have.
| justin wrote:
| I made a video of these toys, which were hilarious to play with:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhJye7Xfmys
| 8iterations wrote:
| atrium was really bad my dude.
| stingrae wrote:
| totally unnecessary comment "dude".
| adamcharnock wrote:
| My mind is blown by the effort that has gone into a product
| (even if it is only a mock-up) that celebrates failed products.
|
| I just went on a very enjoyable rant about this which included
| the phrases, "what's wrong with people?!" And "just create
| something of value!"
| er4hn wrote:
| Thanks for posting this! I wanted to get a feel for the size
| and movability of the toys. They look pretty fun :)
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| The Juicero teardown is hilarious; the device is ridiculously
| overbuilt. [0]
|
| But I still think it was a viable business model. The Nespresso
| of Juices. Except Nespresso makes machines for ~150$. [1] Had
| Juicero been able to make one for that price (or cheaper or a
| wooden bio-degradable hand-crank free with the first pack of
| pouches) they would still be growing today and making millions in
| monthly revenues. Because the money is in the subscription.
|
| [0] https://youtu.be/_Cp-BGQfpHQ
|
| [1] https://www.amazon.com/Nespresso-Essenza-Original-
| Espresso-B...
| croes wrote:
| Don't forget the ZANO mini drone, the OLO smartphone 3D printer,
| Peachy printer, the $100 resin printer and Blocks, the modular
| smartwatch.
|
| https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/torquing/zano-autonomou...
|
| https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/olo3d/olo-the-first-eve...
|
| https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/117421627/the-peachy-pr...
|
| https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2106691934/blocks-the-w...
| SamBam wrote:
| I don't think counting products that never made it to
| production really counts, through...
|
| I backed the Peachy Printer and was sad to see it fail (and
| definitely assume that large parts of the creator's
| explanations were not entirely true), but a failed $600k
| Kickstarter is not in the same league as an eight- or nine-
| figure company producing something that turns out to be
| completely stupid.
| BoorishBears wrote:
| If they included failed 3D printer startups the Elizacherubs
| would grow old by the time you reached the bottom of the page.
| exabrial wrote:
| If you've got thick enough skin to hear a bunch of highly
| offensive and hilarious Canadian cursing, AvE on YouTube tears
| down a Juicero machine.
| ehnto wrote:
| Great recommendation, I learned a lot when I first watched that
| video. I learned bits and pieces about product design, material
| science, the nature of startups and venture capital, some
| introspection occurred, I learned to love again, and a whole
| bunch of new slang I will neither remember nor understand.
| goldcd wrote:
| A Rosetta stone exists - https://avedictionary.com/browse/
| lxe wrote:
| Amazing website design. Need to bring this aesthetic back.
| pjdemers wrote:
| I had an OLPC. My children liked the apps, but struggled with the
| keyboard because they kept fat fingering the keys. They were
| little at the time, younger than the target audience. I can't
| imagine bigger hands trying to type on that keyboard.
| SavantIdiot wrote:
| I was expecting a well-researched collection, instead there are a
| whopping six items. This website is like a startup: promises
| something exciting, delivers a dud. Feels more like a grudge
| page.
|
| Also, a friend of mine was lucky enough to get a Coolest cooler.
| It's actually well made and still works.
|
| EDIT: I'm a dingdong: this site is actually selling scale-model
| replicas. Duh.
| gkoberger wrote:
| I mean, they had to somehow procure stock from startups that
| are long out of business. Items nobody actually wants, so
| what's the point of having _more_ items nobody actually wants?
|
| (EDIT: oh. whoops. they're miniatures haha)
| thedogeye wrote:
| They are not selling the actual products of these startups
| but rather super cute miniaturized versions that they made.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Some of these items barely existed in the first place. You
| can get a Juicero, probably, but good luck getting your
| hands on an honest Theranos device. Few existed, and most
| of those are probably in the hands of the federal
| prosecutors charging Holmes with fraud.
| Pxtl wrote:
| Yeah, the Coolest Cooler seems like a great product if you're
| into making blender cocktails at parties. A single unified
| battery for a Peltier and speaker and blender seems like a
| sensible idea, although it doesn't add _that_ much value over a
| separate battery-powered blender, Peltier cooler, and speaker.
| But realistically every place you 're going to want a battery-
| powered blender you're also going to want a good cooler, so
| that kind of makes sense, and you can get a pretty good
| bluetooth speaker from a cereal box-top these days so that's a
| cheap bolt-on to make this the all-singing all-dancing party
| machine.
|
| edit: Googling, I can't seem to find out - does it actually
| provide electric cooling? Or is it just a big high-quality
| insulated cooler with some electronic doodads attached?
| egypturnash wrote:
| Damn, this web design is stunningly gorgeous work in service to a
| stunningly dumb joke.
| PicassoCTs wrote:
| Calling end-stage capitalism ventures a stunningly dumb joke
| seems a bit harsh. The fewer people have surplus cash, the more
| idiotic-exotic the devices & services peddled to them have to
| become. Mind the gap!
| abrawill wrote:
| Did you press 'F' to pay your respects though?
| jffry wrote:
| In case anybody thinks this is offtopic: pressing F does
| indeed do something on that page (be warned: there is sound).
|
| There's an inscription in the marble below the list of
| products that implores you to pay your respects to
| capitalism.
| namdnay wrote:
| The irony being that this website is the product of a
| startup that is itself valued at an eye-watering 100M..
| notananthem wrote:
| Love this, would never buy this crap, its the thought that
| counts. Also appreciate how many people are upset by it.
| sircastor wrote:
| Man, that Jibo toy makes me sad. I feel like Amazon realized that
| they didn't need the screen or the character movement to
| accomplish 95% of what consumers were interested in: voice-
| controlled task automation. The Echo and similar devices make
| more sense, but I would have liked to see what Jibo could have
| become.
|
| In some alternate reality the world is full of expressive
| robots... and probably doors that sigh when you walk through
| them.
| hbosch wrote:
| > I feel like Amazon realized that they didn't need the screen
| or the character movement to accomplish 95% of what consumers
| were interested in
|
| Or did they?
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/24/amazons-new-echo-show-10-f...
| fossuser wrote:
| There was a great little video on twitter I can't find where
| someone took one of those little robots with big on screen eyes
| and had it reading output from gpt-3.
|
| It was cool since you could basically ask it anything - I'd buy
| one of those.
| bserge wrote:
| It kinda lives on, Elliq is very similar, but aimed at old
| people.
|
| https://elliq.com/
|
| There's actually quite a few of these that I never knew about,
| aimed at old people. Not quite sure why.
|
| https://roboticsbiz.com/top-seven-companion-and-social-robot...
| ashleyn wrote:
| > https://roboticsbiz.com/top-seven-companion-and-social-
| robot...
|
| In the context of the "loneliness epidemic" there's something
| very _Black Mirror_ about this phenomenon.
| k12sosse wrote:
| That ElliQ banner video is something special. I love the
| reactions.
|
| https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/2679/2074/files/banner-
| vid...
| davidkuhta wrote:
| Not by any means a Jibo replacement, but Peeqo may be of
| interest for some of the social aspects. https://peeqo.com
| andyjohnson0 wrote:
| They could add the CueCat to their list. I seem to remember that
| Wired got all excited about it at the time.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CueCat
| ceautery wrote:
| Is this the one by the Cyber Ninjas guy?
| BigGreenTurtle wrote:
| He's not the cyber ninjas guy, but he is involved in the big
| lie: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J_Hutton_Pulitzer#Election
| _aud...
| takeda wrote:
| Looks like the creator is one that brought idea to look for
| bamboo fibers in 2020 ballots. One genius idea after another.
| duxup wrote:
| That was a neat one.
|
| I never thought it would go anywhere because who would buy
| hardware just for that? But I did kinda admire that they tried.
|
| One of those 'oh man great idea ... oh no I don't think it will
| ever work' kinda situations.
|
| It was very much a fun early mass consumer days of the internet
| kinda shot in the dark / fun to me.
| sophacles wrote:
| In retrospect I see it as ahead of it's time. The idea of
| "place a computer readable label on things to send you to a
| special website (etc)" is still alive and used today in the
| form of QR codes. The hardware problem ended up solved by
| convincing everyone to carry a computer in their pocket and
| image recognition, but the central idea is pretty much
| unchanged.
| duxup wrote:
| That's a good observation. The custom hardware solution as
| the smartphone has enabled so much.
| monkpit wrote:
| The Dallas Morning News sent them to subscribers with their
| Sunday paper back when this was a thing, because they
| realized nobody would buy one. It still failed miserably.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > I never thought it would go anywhere because who would buy
| hardware just for that? But I did kinda admire that they
| tried.
|
| I think they gave away the readers for free. I had one at one
| point, and I certainly wouldn't have paid a penny for it. I
| think they were also the basis for quite a few barcode-based
| hobbyist projects at the time.
| stoolpigeon wrote:
| Yes. I still have mine and I didn't pay for it. I don't
| remember how/where I got it but it was free to me.
| cyansmoker wrote:
| If you ever find one, here is how to make it work properly (but
| why would you need it?):
|
| http://zteo.com/posts/sunday-hacking-cuecat-delicious-librar...
| MattGrommes wrote:
| I always appreciated CueCat because years after they failed I
| bought one on ebay for $2 and used it as a barcode scanner to
| categorize all my books. Worked great for that. :)
| xkeysc0re wrote:
| I got one! It still works pretty good as a standard bar code
| reader. I have it integrated into my library cataloguing
| software
| EamonnMR wrote:
| That checkout had just enough friction that I didn't purchase
| anything.
| feross wrote:
| I'm usually a fan of MSCHF's parodies, but it's a bit
| disappointing to see reflexive tech-hate using the usual
| examples, Theranos and Juicero, on the HN homepage.
|
| It's not kind or curious. It's just a bit boring.
| 54712throwaway wrote:
| the ultimate irony is that they are funded by top-tier VCs.
| https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/09/mschfs-push-party-raises-a...
| jonny_eh wrote:
| No OUYA?
| saul_goodman wrote:
| The plethora of strange and weird homebrew games on ouya was
| great, part of what made the platform so great.
| jonny_eh wrote:
| 100% agree, I worked at the company during its brief lifespan
| and one the best parts was meeting various indie devs.
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