WEBVTT - RERUN: The CES Products That Never Made It 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:07.840 Welcome to text Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:11.840 --> 0:00:14.680 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:18.119 Jonathan Strickland, Diamond executive producer with I Heart Radio and 0:00:18.160 --> 0:00:21.360 how the tech are you. You're likely to hear a 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:25.320 similar intro in a little bit with my old tagline 0:00:25.520 --> 0:00:29.600 possibly uh. I am bringing you a rerun because it's 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:33.360 the new year, Happy New Year, and we are off today, 0:00:33.400 --> 0:00:36.240 but of course I wanted to send you an episode 0:00:36.280 --> 0:00:39.680 your way. So this is an episode that originally published 0:00:39.680 --> 0:00:44.800 on January one, so not quite two years old. Now. 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:48.320 It's called the c e S Products That Never Made It. 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:53.239 I decided to rerun this one because this week is 0:00:53.280 --> 0:00:56.920 when c e S Tree is taking place. I am, 0:00:56.920 --> 0:01:00.600 of course I'm not there, my old be covering it 0:01:00.960 --> 0:01:05.679 from the comforts of my home office, which honestly is 0:01:05.760 --> 0:01:09.560 pretty nice. I do miss seeing all my colleagues at 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:11.960 c e S. That was always the highlight for me. 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:14.840 I mean, it was great seeing tech in person and 0:01:14.880 --> 0:01:17.840 occasionally getting hands on experience with it. That was awesome. 0:01:18.360 --> 0:01:21.240 I'm not I don't wish to dismiss that is a 0:01:21.319 --> 0:01:25.440 really incredible experience, but it's the people who really made 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.440 it truly special. So I will miss that, and I've 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:31.360 got friends out there. Hi, Shannon, hope you're having a 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:36.199 great time out there, but yeah, I'm gonna be home anyway. 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:40.080 One of the things about C E S that typically 0:01:40.360 --> 0:01:44.200 gets a little frustrating over time is that not everything 0:01:44.240 --> 0:01:47.400 you'll see when you're at the show will ever actually 0:01:47.480 --> 0:01:51.160 make it to market. Sometimes it's because the thing you're 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:55.120 looking as a prototype. Sometimes it's because the company that 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:59.600 was going to introduce it doesn't exist anymore later on 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:02.480 in the year. So I thought you would enjoy this 0:02:02.520 --> 0:02:06.240 episode from January one the C E S products that 0:02:06.320 --> 0:02:12.320 never made it. Now, sometimes we see a product that 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:15.760 isn't bad, it's just ahead of its time. The implementation 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:18.600 of the technology might be a little on the crude side, 0:02:19.000 --> 0:02:22.040 and the price tag might be a lot on the 0:02:22.120 --> 0:02:25.000 high side, and so an idea, while a good one, 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:28.480 might not go very far. That might be why the 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:33.840 robot called Genus never really had a chance. Genus that's 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:38.000 g E n U S debuted at c S N. 0:02:39.720 --> 0:02:43.359 The robot looks a little bit like a pedestal on wheels, 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:46.440 kind of similar to some of the robots that Samsung 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:50.320 showed off at the c E S T one like uh, 0:02:50.560 --> 0:02:55.600 like the the bot Handy robot. However, the Genus robot 0:02:55.880 --> 0:02:58.679 is a little more angular. It's not quite so smooth 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:02.880 and round as the other robots are. It's also quintessentially 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:05.600 eighties in style, so I recommend you check it out. 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:10.440 The promotional pamphlet for Genus said it is quote fully 0:03:10.520 --> 0:03:15.760 programmed for beginners, yet is programmable for advanced users end quote. 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:20.160 Now clearly, the Robotics International Corporation, which was the company 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:24.720 behind Genus, saw how personal computers were beginning to take 0:03:24.760 --> 0:03:27.480 off in the consumer market, and they knew that they 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:30.520 would need to remove some of the barriers of entry 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:34.800 for the average person, that is, the average wealthy person. 0:03:35.000 --> 0:03:38.800 Because this robot, depending on the options you picked, could 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:44.640 cost upwards of twelve thousand dollars in ninety three, and 0:03:44.680 --> 0:03:48.120 when we adjust that for inflation, that's more than thirty 0:03:48.320 --> 0:03:52.560 thousand bucks today, a princely s I mean you could 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:56.440 buy a car for that. Anyway, Genus was to have 0:03:56.560 --> 0:03:59.800 a lot of cool features that we would later m 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:04.040 much later seeing products like the Roomba. It was supposed 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:06.360 to be able to learn your home and map out 0:04:06.400 --> 0:04:09.560 the environment and learn where obstacles were, so it could 0:04:09.600 --> 0:04:13.240 avoid bumping into things and maneuver around. It could return 0:04:13.280 --> 0:04:16.279 to its charging station on its own when its batteries 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.240 got got really low. Uh. It could even be equipped 0:04:19.240 --> 0:04:22.000 with a vacuum. So gosh, I mean it was a roomba. 0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:24.840 I mean not really. It wasn't like an official roomba, 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:27.800 but you get what I mean. The technology behind this 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:31.760 was pretty impressive for the day. It included stuff like 0:04:31.839 --> 0:04:35.120 a computer system with at least forty eight whole killer 0:04:35.200 --> 0:04:39.960 bytes of memory. Yalza, had a CRT display, had an 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:43.080 optional keyboard so you could program it if you wanted to, 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:49.159 had passive smoke detectors, motion detectors, and more. But Genus 0:04:49.240 --> 0:04:52.719 never got much further than its debut at CES and 0:04:52.880 --> 0:04:59.000 Robotics International Corporation would dissolve sometime in nine. Well, I 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:01.960 think the product was far too ambitious for the time. 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.440 It was certainly an indicator of where things would eventually 0:05:05.600 --> 0:05:07.880 end up, although it would take a couple of decades, 0:05:08.400 --> 0:05:12.080 and we're still seeing companies like the aforementioned Samsung introduced 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:16.560 large robots at c E S, so that trend continues 0:05:16.600 --> 0:05:18.919 as well. We don't tend to see those large robots 0:05:18.920 --> 0:05:22.240 actually getting adopted into the consumer market. But we see 0:05:22.240 --> 0:05:25.080 a lot of that technology kind of trickled down into 0:05:25.120 --> 0:05:30.440 other implementations like roombot. Speaking of Samsung and robots, we're 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:33.760 still waiting on BALI, that's the spherical robot that the 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.599 company showed off at c E S. For that matter, 0:05:37.800 --> 0:05:42.640 we're still waiting on scout About. What's scout about? You ask, Well, 0:05:42.680 --> 0:05:46.920 it's about always being prepared if I remember correctly. Huh, 0:05:48.000 --> 0:05:51.479 how's a joke. No, really, The scout About was the 0:05:51.600 --> 0:05:54.680 name of a line of robots Samsung showed off at 0:05:54.720 --> 0:06:00.000 c E S. The scout About robots look like little 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.599 old domes on wheels. I read one review that said 0:06:03.640 --> 0:06:06.400 it looked like little motorcycle helmets that were scooting around. 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:10.160 They could roam autonomously around your home, and the purpose 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:12.960 of the scout About was to monitor your home for 0:06:13.000 --> 0:06:16.520 the purposes of safety. It was to have ultrasonic sensors 0:06:16.640 --> 0:06:19.520 as well as a passive infrared system, and it would 0:06:19.600 --> 0:06:23.919 let the robot sense everything from sounds to the presence 0:06:23.960 --> 0:06:27.160 of smoke. And it also had a temperature sensor if 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:30.440 it were to detect a danger like a fire or 0:06:30.480 --> 0:06:33.159 someone breaking a window to gain entry to a house, 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:36.080 it could sound an alarm and phone home to a 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:40.760 security service, which then could coordinate with authorities. Samsung said 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:43.320 the plan was for the robots to hit the market 0:06:43.400 --> 0:06:47.640 by early spring of nineteen, with a price of somewhere 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:51.480 between a thousand and fifteen hundred dollars. So again, this 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:55.760 is n that would be somewhere between eighteen hundred and 0:06:55.760 --> 0:07:00.200 twenty seven dollars today. However, the scout about never it 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:03.760 came out. Now, I'm not saying that last year's Bali 0:07:03.880 --> 0:07:07.440 robot will also never come out, Nor am I saying 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:11.560 that Samsung's bought Handy robot demonstrated this year's virtual c 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:16.880 e s will never come out. But I wouldn't hold 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:20.640 my breath. All that being said, I think it's only 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:23.120 fair I point out that, at least in some cases, 0:07:23.240 --> 0:07:27.280 it's not so much about a specific product, but rather 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:33.320 the advancement of the technologies that power that prototype or concept. So, 0:07:33.360 --> 0:07:36.680 in other words, the bot Handy, which Samsung showed off 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:39.320 picking up a bottle of wine and pouring a glass 0:07:39.360 --> 0:07:43.080 of wine for somebody, or another video where it showed 0:07:43.120 --> 0:07:46.760 the robot filling up a dishwasher. It's not really necessarily 0:07:46.760 --> 0:07:49.880 about the robot. It's showing off something that actually is 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:53.200 pretty darn cool, and that's the fact that the AI 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:57.400 guiding this robot gives the robot guidance on how hard 0:07:57.520 --> 0:07:59.960 or soft the robot's grip should be whenever it picked 0:08:00.200 --> 0:08:03.360 up something. You know, we humans get a pretty intuitive 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:06.000 grasp on that kind of stuff to use a pun, 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:11.400 but for robots it's different. A robot doesn't innately know 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:15.240 how tightly it needs to grip something, and so it 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:18.960 might approach a cinder block or a breeze block for 0:08:19.040 --> 0:08:22.680 you folks in the UK, and a delicate champagne glass 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:26.400 with the same amount of gripping force. That would probably 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:28.800 not work out so well. It would either be two 0:08:28.800 --> 0:08:30.560 week a grip for the center block and so it 0:08:30.560 --> 0:08:32.800 wouldn't be able to pick it up, or it would 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:37.440 crush the glass and it's mighty robotic hand. Either way, 0:08:37.720 --> 0:08:41.040 not exactly the result you're looking for now. All that 0:08:41.080 --> 0:08:44.080 being said, the scout about was being demonstrated as if 0:08:44.120 --> 0:08:47.079 it were actually about to go on the market, so 0:08:47.360 --> 0:08:50.400 that particular example doesn't really fit into the hole. This 0:08:50.480 --> 0:08:53.480 is more about showing off a technology than making an 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:57.600 actual product kind of thing. So maybe that was Samsung 0:08:57.720 --> 0:09:01.480 learning its lesson. Some times the stuff we see at 0:09:01.520 --> 0:09:04.120 C E S is really just meant to grab our 0:09:04.160 --> 0:09:08.559 attention period and doesn't indicate a sincere desire to bring 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:11.560 a product to market. I'm pretty sure that was the 0:09:11.640 --> 0:09:14.920 thinking that went into the twenty twenty robot marketed by 0:09:14.960 --> 0:09:18.800 Sherman that is, the toilet paper company, and it was 0:09:18.840 --> 0:09:24.920 called robot because that's genius, but not genus anyway. The 0:09:24.960 --> 0:09:28.040 company had a booth set up complete with a toilet 0:09:28.280 --> 0:09:31.280 where you could test out this robot, though you were 0:09:31.360 --> 0:09:35.720 encouraged to, you know, not actually use the toilet. The 0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:40.200 things you learn after experience. So you would sit on 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:42.800 the throne and you would call out for precious t 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:46.720 P allegedly by using an app on your smartphone, and 0:09:47.040 --> 0:09:50.680 a little two wheeled self balancing robot with a face 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:53.680 plate that looked kind of like a a semi abstract 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:57.160 bear face, you know, very like like children's drawing kind 0:09:57.160 --> 0:09:59.640 of bare face. The robot also had little ears on 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.280 top of that that the toilet paper roll would sit between, 0:10:02.880 --> 0:10:05.040 and it would wheel out with that roll of toilet 0:10:05.040 --> 0:10:08.320 paper on balanced on top of its head, uh, you know, 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:11.800 flat side down obviously, otherwise it just roll all over 0:10:11.840 --> 0:10:14.079 the place. And there was no way to see how 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:17.160 the robot, which had no arms, is just the wheels 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:19.319 and a box, and the toilet paper roll would be 0:10:19.320 --> 0:10:21.280 on top of the box. There's no way to see 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:24.320 how the robot would get the roll of toilet paper 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:27.240 balanced on its head in the first place. I'm pretty 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:30.840 sure there's just some poor booth attendee behind the scenes 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:33.920 whose job it was to place rolls of toilet paper 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:36.520 on the self balancing robot before it would wheel out 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:39.360 of its alcove to the rescue. Again, this was never 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:41.959 really meant to come across as a real product. It 0:10:42.080 --> 0:10:45.440 was more of a marketing gimmick. It is too bad, however, 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:49.040 because as we saw in getting hold of toilet paper 0:10:49.160 --> 0:10:51.480 was sometimes a challenge, and it would be really useful 0:10:51.520 --> 0:10:54.400 to have a robot bear do battle for you in 0:10:54.559 --> 0:10:58.240 grocery stores to get t P. But that was not 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:03.959 meant to be Moving on. In five two years after 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:08.600 Genus rolled around at CS Commodore, the computer company that 0:11:08.800 --> 0:11:11.320 had been a real contender in the early days of 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:15.520 home computers, revealed a portable computer and what's amazing is 0:11:15.559 --> 0:11:18.719 that this one did not weigh a ton. A lot 0:11:18.760 --> 0:11:22.800 of the early portable laptops were portable in name only. 0:11:23.400 --> 0:11:26.600 They typically had a handle like a briefcase, and it 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:30.000 required a strong back to lug around places. But the 0:11:30.040 --> 0:11:33.160 Commodore l c D tipped the scales and a smelt 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:37.720 five pounds or about two point three kilograms. The Commodore 0:11:37.880 --> 0:11:40.679 l c D looked a bit like a truncated laptop, 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:44.640 or maybe like a typewriter connected to a small flip 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:48.120 up l c D screen. That screen could display up 0:11:48.160 --> 0:11:51.240 to sixteen lines of text, and it could run a 0:11:51.320 --> 0:11:54.960 subset of software that was programmed for Commodore computers, but 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:57.720 the l c D was not fully compatible with the 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:02.160 Commodore desktop line. Had a Rockwell sixty five C one 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:06.080 O two processor running at a blistering one mega hurts 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:09.680 clock speed. It boasted thirty two kilobytes of memory, but 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:13.640 it was expandable up to sixty four kilobytes. Now. While 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:16.800 the company didn't announce a price for the planned product, 0:12:16.920 --> 0:12:20.760 analysts estimated that it would have likely retailed for around 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:26.040 six hundred dollars, and in that would be let's see 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:30.560 for today's money about one thousand, one forty bucks. This 0:12:30.600 --> 0:12:34.880 project became the victim of internal politics at Commodore, or 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:37.920 so the story goes. So the way the story works 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:42.000 is that the CEO of Commodore, Marshall Smith, was talking 0:12:42.040 --> 0:12:46.480 to John Roach, the CEO of Tandy, another company that 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:50.640 was selling home computers, and during that conversation, Roach told 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:55.880 Smith that l c D s were going nowhere fast baby. Subsequently, 0:12:55.920 --> 0:12:59.120 Smith decided to cancel the Commodore l c D project, 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:02.760 along with all other l c D related projects at Commodore, 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:06.600 and legend says that only five prototypes of the Commodore 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:09.480 l c D were ever made, but only two of 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:13.440 them have ever been officially verified. Let's jump around in 0:13:13.480 --> 0:13:16.520 time a bit and more and head up to I 0:13:16.559 --> 0:13:20.320 was actually at that ce S. One of the ways 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:22.720 that companies will try to stand out from the crowd 0:13:23.000 --> 0:13:26.679 is to tap celebrities to announce or endorse products. I 0:13:26.800 --> 0:13:30.360 was not the celebrity. I'm not a celebrity at all. 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:34.600 But these celebrities, these real celebrities, will make an appearance 0:13:34.679 --> 0:13:37.080 at ce S for what I believe could be described 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:40.000 as here let me check my notes. Um, yeah, a 0:13:40.160 --> 0:13:43.920 truckload of money at least I assume so. I mean, 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:46.360 I have no idea how much Slash was paid to 0:13:46.400 --> 0:13:48.720 come on stage in two thousand and eight to play 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:51.560 the opening riff of Welcome to the Jungle for Bill 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:54.600 Gates and then just disappear and smoke. But I bet 0:13:54.640 --> 0:13:59.400 he was paid way more than I made that entire year. Anyway, 0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:03.080 in twenty eleven, a different celebrity showed off a product 0:14:03.240 --> 0:14:08.240 to all her little monsters. Yep, Lady Gaga was at 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:12.280 c E s in. I'm actually really upset I didn't 0:14:12.320 --> 0:14:15.400 get to go to the event where she announced this. 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:18.840 I really wanted to see it. I wasn't terribly familiar 0:14:18.840 --> 0:14:21.840 with Lady Gaga, but I knew spectacle when I heard it, 0:14:22.080 --> 0:14:25.960 but unfortunately I was elsewhere. Anyway, she was partnering with 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:30.800 Polaroid to allegedly design and then unveil the g L 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:36.080 twenty glasses, a pair of very boxy looking sunglasses with 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:39.240 a built in camera and a digital display that was 0:14:39.280 --> 0:14:43.000 also built into the frames. And I guess that with these, 0:14:43.280 --> 0:14:51.560 Lady Gaga could become the Papa Rozzie oh Lah poker face. There. 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:56.240 I've exhausted my Lady Gaga knowledge. Anyway, while Lady Gaga 0:14:56.280 --> 0:15:00.520 could wear the glasses and look fashionably weird, I most 0:15:00.560 --> 0:15:04.400 of us would just look weird wearing them. But it 0:15:04.400 --> 0:15:06.960 wouldn't matter, because a year later there were still no 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:10.520 g L twenty glasses on the market. Polaroid claimed to 0:15:10.560 --> 0:15:13.640 still be planning a rollout, but another year went by, 0:15:13.920 --> 0:15:17.960 and another, and by fourteen, Lady Gaga had bid au 0:15:18.040 --> 0:15:22.160 revoir to Polaroid and the two had parted ways, still 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:26.440 no glasses. Lady Gaga's involvement with the project definitely got 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:29.320 a lot of attention, but in the end, there didn't 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:31.920 seem to be much of a payoff, and depending upon 0:15:31.960 --> 0:15:34.280 the terms of that partnership, it may have been a 0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:36.760 big loss for Polaroid, which I think is a shame 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:40.720 because I still have a soft spot for Polaroid cameras. 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:43.880 We've got more gadgets that never made it to prime 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:47.680 time coming up, but first let's take a quick break 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:59.160 and now for the that Smells funny category for c 0:15:59.760 --> 0:16:03.920 S gadgets that never went anywhere. And I'm being literal 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:06.720 here because I want to chat about the I smell 0:16:07.240 --> 0:16:10.960 from the company digit Sense. Yeah, this was a real thing. 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:13.840 I think of this as sort of the Internet generation 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:17.640 version of Smellow Vision. This one made the news back 0:16:17.640 --> 0:16:20.320 in two thousand one, so this was way before I 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:22.920 ever went to c E S. And I'm sorry about that, 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:25.720 because I wish I could have seen it in action. 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:30.280 The device looked like a little pod with a shark 0:16:30.360 --> 0:16:34.560 fin like protrusion, and it had vents through which SENSE 0:16:34.720 --> 0:16:37.480 could pump. The ideas that you would load this thing 0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:41.080 up with some cartridges filled with scented oils, and the 0:16:41.160 --> 0:16:45.200 device would heat up specific oils before using a fan 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:48.720 to blow the smell out of the vents. By heating 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:52.440 different combinations of those oils, it could produce different SENSE 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.920 and it would connect via USB to a computer. Now, 0:16:57.280 --> 0:17:01.360 just imagine the possibilities. You're on your computer, you're checking 0:17:01.360 --> 0:17:05.520 out possible vacation destinations online, and you're looking at a 0:17:05.520 --> 0:17:08.560 beach in Hawaii, and then your nostrils detect the scent 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:11.600 of an ocean breeze. Maybe there's even a hint of 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:15.000 coconut there. Or maybe you're playing a video game and 0:17:15.000 --> 0:17:18.040 you're rushing through a burning building and you can actually 0:17:18.080 --> 0:17:21.800 smell something that resembles would smoke, Or maybe you're looking 0:17:21.800 --> 0:17:25.480 at an ad for cookies and you smell, I mean cookies. 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:29.119 You know, it definitely falls on the gimmicky side, but 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:30.880 at the same time you can kind of see how 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:34.919 incorporating smells into other computer activities could really increase a 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:38.600 sense of immersion. The team behind the I Smell included 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:42.400 Joel Lloyd Bellinson and Dexter Smith, both of whom had 0:17:42.440 --> 0:17:47.239 backgrounds in business. They envisioned a database of smells with 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:50.320 an algorithm that would best match sense to whatever it 0:17:50.359 --> 0:17:54.440 was the computer was, you know, encountering, so that way 0:17:55.000 --> 0:17:59.240 you would have a relevant smell, so you wouldn't just have, oh, 0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:01.720 that smells like and rubber while I'm looking at Daisies. 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:03.920 That would make no sense now, I'm sure. They also 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:06.360 envisioned a world in which people would need to purchase 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:10.199 refills for those scented oil cartridges, kind of similar to 0:18:10.240 --> 0:18:13.960 how printer companies really count on you having to order 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:18.320 lots of new printer toner cartridges. But unfortunately for the team, 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:22.080 the idea received a little more than ridicule, even for 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.680 the name I Smell. Now, keep in mind they were 0:18:25.800 --> 0:18:29.000 launching this or trying to in two thousand one. That 0:18:29.160 --> 0:18:32.280 was two years before Apple had even launched the iPod, 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:37.440 so they were actually anticipating the eye trend. The company 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:40.560 failed to release anything to market due to a distinct 0:18:40.640 --> 0:18:44.199 lack of consumer interest, and it faded away, and it 0:18:44.280 --> 0:18:48.000 really stinks. How about another category now, This one could 0:18:48.040 --> 0:18:51.080 be called the old bait and switch, or in this case, 0:18:51.119 --> 0:18:55.200 the belt and switch. And I'm talking about Belty, which 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:57.720 was one of those weird gadgets that gets a lot 0:18:57.760 --> 0:19:00.520 of buzz because you know, it's not another or big 0:19:00.520 --> 0:19:03.720 screen TV or fitness tracker. That's one of the reasons 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:06.119 a lot of these gadgets get a lot of coverage. 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:08.479 It's not just that they're weird, it is that they 0:19:08.520 --> 0:19:12.479 stand out because it's not yet another version of something 0:19:12.480 --> 0:19:16.679 that we see all the time. BELTI appeared in and 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:20.480 it was a smart belt. Yeah, like the thing that 0:19:20.520 --> 0:19:23.440 holds up your trousers. BELTI was supposed to be able 0:19:23.520 --> 0:19:27.119 to make automatic adjustments all on its own, tightening or 0:19:27.200 --> 0:19:30.399 loosening as the occasion demands, such as when you go 0:19:30.560 --> 0:19:33.919 from sitting down to standing up or vice versa. Small 0:19:33.960 --> 0:19:37.760 motors inside the buckle would activate and increase or decrease 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:41.560 the tension on the belt. Accompanying the smart belt was 0:19:41.720 --> 0:19:45.240 of course an app, and together belt and app would 0:19:45.240 --> 0:19:48.440 track activity and give you a running tab on your waistline, 0:19:48.920 --> 0:19:50.879 just in case you were worried that you were starting 0:19:50.880 --> 0:19:53.879 to feel a little too good about yourself. And it 0:19:53.960 --> 0:19:57.880 was going to market for around four hundred bucks. This 0:19:58.040 --> 0:20:02.159 version of BELTI, however, failed to materialize beyond the demo 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:05.520 models that shows like c S. It was supposed to 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:09.720 go to market later in and instead the Belty that 0:20:09.760 --> 0:20:13.600 would ultimately come out was a very different device. You 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:16.400 can buy a Belty today, but it is a ratchet 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:19.600 style belt, so you can make minor adjustments, but you 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:23.760 have to do so manually. There's no motorized buckle doing 0:20:23.800 --> 0:20:27.359 it for you. The smart part of the belt, the 0:20:27.400 --> 0:20:30.920 current Belty, is that it has a built in battery recharger, 0:20:31.160 --> 0:20:36.400 so you can charge your phone on your belt and 0:20:36.560 --> 0:20:39.399 plug your devices directly into the belt buckle. I guess 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:42.040 to give them more juice. Now, my guess is that 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:45.520 this recharging battery and the belt is itself a lithium 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:49.760 ion battery, and knowing how those can sometimes be a 0:20:49.800 --> 0:20:52.800 little dodgy, I'd be a bit hesitant to strap one 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:58.160 right up against my pants. I mean, it's probably Okay, right, 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:02.199 I mean phones don't usually spawn taneously combust unless it's 0:21:02.240 --> 0:21:06.200 the Samsung Galaxy Notes seven and a yeah, I'm gonna 0:21:06.240 --> 0:21:11.640 skip BELTI but hey, Jonathan, I hear you ask. Yes, 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:15.280 that's right, I can hear you. How about you talk 0:21:15.359 --> 0:21:19.280 about a product that was demonstrably a bad idea and 0:21:19.400 --> 0:21:23.760 that is why it never came to market. Okay, I 0:21:23.800 --> 0:21:28.760 guess I will. Let's talk about the Mattel Aristotle because 0:21:28.840 --> 0:21:33.040 who boy? Was that a bad idea and the reaction 0:21:33.080 --> 0:21:36.520 to it would ultimately lead Mattel to cancel launch plans 0:21:36.560 --> 0:21:40.520 for this device. Mattel unveiled the gadget at c E 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:44.960 S And if you really want an easy way to 0:21:45.040 --> 0:21:47.480 describe this thing, all you have to do is say 0:21:47.560 --> 0:21:51.879 it's Alexa, but you know, for kids, shout out to 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:55.119 the Hudsucker proxy for that one. Anyway, it was a 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:59.320 smart home assistant similar to Amazon Echo or Google Home. 0:22:00.040 --> 0:22:03.600 Bundled with the smart speaker device was a camera, and 0:22:03.640 --> 0:22:06.680 the whole package was supposed to retail for three dollars. 0:22:07.160 --> 0:22:09.879 The back end of the system included stuff like image 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:15.040 recognition algorithms that could recognize specific things within a child's room. 0:22:15.119 --> 0:22:18.720 Those specific things. I'm sure we'll surprise no one could 0:22:18.720 --> 0:22:23.280 include other Mattel toys. I'm gonna paint a picture for you. 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:26.199 Not the Mattel ever said this, But this is just 0:22:26.280 --> 0:22:29.720 something that I imagined when I was reading up on it. 0:22:29.960 --> 0:22:32.400 So think for a moment that you're a little kid 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:35.240 and you're in your room, and then suddenly the smart 0:22:35.359 --> 0:22:38.760 robot that lives in a speaker says to you, Hey, 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:42.040 little so and so, how about you go pick up 0:22:42.080 --> 0:22:45.399 that Hot Wheels car and play with it? Room room. 0:22:45.440 --> 0:22:48.320 That sure is fun, isn't it. Man? You know what 0:22:48.400 --> 0:22:50.960 helps would be fun if you had the super Ultra 0:22:51.240 --> 0:22:55.480 Deluxe Stunt Spectacular Hot Wheels set. Then that car would 0:22:55.480 --> 0:22:58.520 go really fast and you would be the most super 0:22:58.560 --> 0:23:02.399 awesome cool kid in the universe. Hey, how about we 0:23:02.480 --> 0:23:05.399 ask Santa for that this year? Yeah, that's a great 0:23:05.480 --> 0:23:09.879 idea you had, so and so. All right, So I'm 0:23:09.880 --> 0:23:12.640 definitely taking some major poetic license here, but you get 0:23:12.680 --> 0:23:15.720 to where I'm going right, The idea being this could 0:23:15.760 --> 0:23:19.199 easily become a tool that Mattel could have used to 0:23:19.240 --> 0:23:23.399 try and convince kids to get more Mattel toys. Numerous 0:23:23.440 --> 0:23:26.800 critics also pointed out the other very glaring problems with 0:23:26.920 --> 0:23:31.639 privacy that a connected device complete with webcam would represent 0:23:31.880 --> 0:23:35.199 for parents. And the fact is, Mattel did plan for 0:23:35.240 --> 0:23:37.399 the smart device to allow you to do stuff like 0:23:37.480 --> 0:23:41.919 place orders for things like diapers, for example, because Aristotle 0:23:41.960 --> 0:23:44.800 could switch from child mode, where it would play with kids, 0:23:45.080 --> 0:23:50.640 to adult mode and then tap into Amazon's Alexa assistant. Now, 0:23:50.640 --> 0:23:54.439 I found all of this particularly surprising, not because the 0:23:54.480 --> 0:23:57.399 company would try to tap into that market that I 0:23:57.440 --> 0:24:01.200 think was inevitable, but rather because Tell had already been 0:24:01.240 --> 0:24:05.400 burned pretty badly with a Barbie doll called Hello Barbie 0:24:05.560 --> 0:24:10.159 from earlier on. This WiFi connected doll was vulnerable to 0:24:10.240 --> 0:24:14.440 being hijacked. According to a security researcher named Matt Jakubowski, 0:24:15.000 --> 0:24:18.800 they could turn into a surveillance tool and spy on kids. 0:24:19.160 --> 0:24:22.919 And that is beyond terrifying and so, faced with some 0:24:23.080 --> 0:24:28.000 very tough questions, including some coming from politicians, Mattel decided 0:24:28.040 --> 0:24:32.920 to scuttle the plans for Aristotle later in Alright, I've 0:24:32.920 --> 0:24:37.040 talked about failed products, marketing, gimmicks, and stuff that falls 0:24:37.040 --> 0:24:42.000 somewhere in between, But how about something that was called 0:24:42.000 --> 0:24:45.080 a scam? I mean, that's what some people said the 0:24:45.160 --> 0:24:48.560