5 ms·
The article tries to blame all sort of things for not selling well, but the real reason is super simple: They were too expensive. Back when they came out I too
by ars 6y ago
The article tries to blame all sort of things for not selling well, but the real reason is super simple: They were too expensive.
Back when they came out I too was affected by the hype and wanted to get one - until I saw the price and said "never mind".
Drop the price to 1/10 of the amount, to $500, and it would still be expensive, but at least there's something to talk about there. At $5000 it was an easy decision not to get it.
- stephen_g 6y agoYeah, very funny to hear “durability” blamed in the article - in that apparently they were too durable so people who bought them didn’t throw them out and buy new ones periodically. Apart from how terrible the attitude of “we should have made the product more disposable to milk more cash out of the only people who bought it, creating a lot more e-waste in the process” is, do they really think that people would have kept buying them if they kept breaking?
- oska 6y ago> but the real reason is super simple: They were too expensive Disagree. I wouldn't buy one if they were one-tenth the price (and I think that sentiment would be shared by many people). The real reason is that it was and is a stupid product, even if some of the technology involved was innovative.
- TheCondor 6y agoStupid now that you’ve only seen wealthy dorks on them or stupid like people don’t want rechargeable urban mobility devices? Because in Denver, before COVID, there were maybe four escooter outfits and people flying all over on them. Seems like they almost didn’t have enough. I think they had a brilliant idea, they were too early to the market, over marketed and then simply priced themselves out of contention. I’ll never understand why they didn’t have a cost reduced model
- oska 6y agoStupid because the forward facing standing stance is wrong for mobility. Standing sideways is better for a fixed stance on a moving platform (e.g. surfboards, skateboards, snowboards, sailboards, etc). If you're forward facing then you should have active independent movement between the two legs (as with walking, running, skiing, ice-skating, etc).
- tartoran 6y agoI disagree. I own a solowheel and after the initial learning curve it became safer and even more intuitive than walking. IMO, the sidestance may be okay if one switches sides as to exercise the body and the brain both ways. In reality people stick to whatever their dominant leg is upfront. Feels weird and prone to skeletomuscular imbalances.