Go ahead and laugh at the Segway. Most everyone does. Yesterday it was my colleague over at Network World’s Layer 8 doing the snickering at news that the maker of the world’s most famous scooter is plotting an initial public offering.
From Layer 8: “We’ve all had a chuckle or 12 at the expense of the goofy Segway, but is inventor Dean Kamen going to get the last laugh?”
Actually, we have not all been chuckling, nor have we all found the Segway goofy. In fact, some of us — for better or worse — have found the Segway story fascinating from day one. Some of us — and I think we know who we’re talking about here — got themselves swallowed up by the hype machine that engulfed Segway back in 2001 when it was known in the press first as “It” and then “Ginger.” Some of us have done their fair share of the hyping even after all the laughter started.
Oh, sure, some of us have had our moments of weakness where abandonment of Segway seemed attractive.
But some of us can honestly say we’ve always believed that the scooter to beat all scooters would eventually find its rightful place in the world of personal transportation.
True, some of us were expecting something more revolutionary, witness this passage from that first 2001 ‘Net Buzz column about Ginger: “Bob Metcalfe invented Ethernet, knows something about revolutionary technology and has also seen Ginger. He predicted on national TV that it will be more important than the Internet – above a nine on a scale of 1 to 10 – and that we will probably own several.”
Some of us feel Metcalfe’s pain.
So an IPO for Segway, eh? Will some of us be putting our money where our mouths have been?
Maybe if I see the thing fly.
