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Dead Startup Toys

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Re: Dead Startup Toys

#181

Post by 908B64B197 »

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...

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#182

Post by [deleted] »

avs733 wrote: post #54
md_ wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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 desig…

[deleted]

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#183

Post by forgetfulness »

Biganon wrote: post #166
forgetfulness wrote: post #40

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.

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.

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.

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#184

Post by dunnevens »

throwawayboise wrote: post #163

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.

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.

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#185

Post by kmeisthax »

olejorgenb wrote: post #165
kmeisthax wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 diff…

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?

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.

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#186

Post by Arrath »

Simulacra wrote: post #20

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.

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.

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#187

Post by meatmanek »

Biganon wrote: post #166
forgetfulness wrote: post #40

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.

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.

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...

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#188

Post by mushufasa »

dotBen wrote: post #56

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

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.

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#189

Post by davidkuhta »

com2kid wrote: post #82
davidkuhta wrote: post #21

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 :/

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).

Interesting, cool to hear that it wasn't all bluster. So now I must know... how's that blender?

Re: Dead Startup Toys

#190

Post by Nursie »

tinco wrote: post #74
ghaff wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>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.

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 wa…

I wouldn’t have wanted to take a MacBook round outback Australia for months.

A netbook, feh, doesn’t matter if it breaks.

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