You mean "Project Ginger" aka "IT"?

https://www.wired.com/2001/01/ginger-may-be-motorized-scoote...

Segway worked exactly as advertised. They are still being made and sold. The problem is that the product didn't _mean_ what the company hoped.

> Segway worked exactly as advertised

No.

Their PR and marketing was AWFUL to build the level of hype they did around the product they released.

If you're releasing a scooter for mall cops and tourists you don't go on Good Morning America to advertise it as a world-changing technology.

They advertised the release of a world-changing technology and released nothing like that.

I remember the marketing around it. I was so incredibly excited too. They really marketed it as having discovered a room temperature superconductor.

Takes me back to a time when you were still able to shroud things with mystique and excitement. The Matrix, Blair Witch Project, and the PlayStation 2 with the emotion engine were all larger than life. Cloverfield was the last of that kind.

"Entire cities will be redesigned around this new product, which I can't tell you about. But you should try to guess, it'll be fun."

True, the Segway was not a scam at all. It was just amazingly overhyped and that's what killed it as a consumer product.

As I recall, the headline on Slashdot that day was, "This is IT?"

lol I didn't realize it had been that long. maybe I was just looking for a bright spot in the world after 9/11?

It revolutionized how mall cops got around.

I do think it's a really cool thing with good use cases but the marketing of "We'll design cities in new ways because of it" might've been overstating things a bit lol.