When Success Breeds Contempt: The UMPC Fiasco

The Washington Post's Personal Technology Consultant, Rob Pegorao takes a look at Samsung's Q1 UMPC/Origami and like the majority of the Main Stream Media finds it lacking. Chris Pirillo says I told you so. James Kendrick asks Where's the UMPC love? Mark "Sumocat" Sumimoto and Kendrick both point to the marketing as a part of the problem. My anonymous troll who only emails his/her comments (leave a comment, expand the conversation) accuses me of being a "piker partisan" for taking to task some of the very negative reviews of the Samsung Q1. Real users are starting to report their findings.

Shaky times in the Tabletscape and the Origami orbit.

Anyone who follows Tablet PCs and the Origami/UMPC who didn't see this kind of negative response coming is blind or just hopelessly naive. The brain trust behind the Origami viral launch created a fiasco. Yes, their campaign in marketing standards was a raging success. It got folks talking and buzzing and excited. Lots of folks. But that kind of success often breeds failure in the end when the product can't keep up with the hype. The semiotics skewed hype into hope and hopelessly missed.  This is a completely classic case of marketeers being too smart for their own good (and the product.)

I remember a theatre marketing campaign back in my Chicago days when a very well respected theatre started a campaign that began with Once in a decade a great theatre company meets a great play and great things happen. The production that resulted was good. Not great. Just good. But the reviewers had a field day with leads that began with statements that said, Maybe once in a decade a great theatre company meets a great play and great things happen, this is isn't it. The production, NOT THE MARKETING CAMPAIGN, undeservedly became a running joke in the community.

Kendrick and Sumocat are both correct. Overreaching marketing hype is a big part of this fiasco. Heck, even Scoble started backing away quickly after the viral approach became a little too infectious. But once the cat was out of the bag, like a virus, it took on a life of its own.

This has roots far deeper than just the Origami campaign though. It stems from the pitifully poor marketing efforts of the Tablet PC platform. There is good news out there on the Tablet PC front, but except for those who have seen the light and blog about it, and a few media types who are actually digging deeper than the press releases, it is hard to find. I've blogged countless times that using a line about the failure of the Tablet PC platform has become almost boilerplate language when someone writes about it. Strike that, it has.

Another anecdote from my Chicago theatre days. I worked for the now defunct Body Politic Theatre. The executive director, at a time that the theatre was foundering badly financially, launched a "Save the Body Politic" campaign going public with the theatre's desperate financial woes. It was good tactic that indeed saved the theatre. But for the rest of that remarkable theatre's run, every article or review that ever got written began with the lead "The financially beleaguered Body Politic Theatre..." We could never get past that and the theatre eventually folded.

If you ask me, the folks behind the marketing efforts of the Tablet PC in Redmond and elsewhere are snake-bit and therefore don't try to counteract the damage past efforts created. Why else would you see so little mention of the Tablet capability in the UMPC? But in ignoring the past they've just thrown more fuel on the future fire and that fire is about to consume the launch of the UMPC before it gets out of the gate.

I'm no partisan piker here, although I do believe in the promise of the concept. There are real issues (battery life, performance, Vista capability,) with this first generation of UMPC devices that reach beyond the typical first generation isn't always a winner panacea so often uttered. I just don't think you can roll out beta hardware to the public unless you say so.

Sadly, I fear we are going to see a new concept for mobile computing saddled with mistakes of the past, mistakes in marketing, and mistakes in timing before it has a chance to get started. And even if it does eventually begin to win the hearts and minds of users, like the Tablet PC, it is going to be hereafter referred to as a failed effort. The early UMPCs may or may not be ready for prime time. Regardless, the folks who thought they could squeak one by deserve the rap that a growing chorus is singing.

Microsoft is awfully proud of its deck reshuffling to get on the Web 2.0 bandwagon. It is also time for a sea change or house cleaning when it comes to its marketing and launch efforts.

Comments

[Mark Sumimoto (Sumocat)]

Man, I love it when people say I'm right, although I wish it were under better circumstances. :)

[Matt Chaput]

Tablet PC is indeed a failure *according to the expectations set by Microsoft at its launch*. I'm shocked you don't see this since it plays to your entire thesis in this piece.

Tablet PC and UMPC are both pieces of kit that don't offer *most people* any compelling features over what we already had, yet Microsoft talked like they were going to change the world. Remember when every lapsold sold was going to be a tablet?

[Warner Crocker]

Matt,

Yes, I do remember that every laptop sold promise. I believe it will still come true with Vista, when it ships. But that's another story and one that proves our points, (I don't think we disagree at all.) How many folks know that Vista will include the Tablet OS as native in most of its skus? All that needs to happen is for the OEM to include the appropriate hardware (digitizer) for any laptop to be a Tablet PC. The answer to the question is very few know it.

I do agree with you that the semiotic and expectation game is way off and that is part of the problem. The litany of Tablet PC as a failure that keeps being printed in UMPC reviews points that up clearly.

What's truly sad is that there is actually great movement happening on the Tablet PC front, but that postive news keeps getting drowned out by the failed marketing approach and expectations game. I've said that many times in other posts here.

[Aaron Axvig]

"All that needs to happen is for the OEM to include the appropriate hardware (digitizer) for any laptop to be a Tablet PC."

And put a hard cover on the screen, and completely re-engineer the chassis to accomodate the rotating hinge, and add buttons to the screen bezel.

[Warner Crocker]

Aaron, you make a valid point. That said, witness Acer's C302 (I think that is the model number) Tablet PC that did not have a revolving hinge but a conventional laptop hinge assembly. Manys scoffed at that design when it was released, but it is a vaild option.

[Josh Einstein]

It was a 250 something. The 302 rotated.

I like the comparison Gartner made to color LCD's. Same issue. As premiums go down, it becomes a "why not" feature. The inclusion of touch screens already brings the cost down from an active digitizer.

If they can get to a $600 UMPC (and they will) they can surely produce a $1000 touch screen laptop with a basic rotating hinge.

Think: if the price is the same for a convertible tablet or a regular laptop, why the hell WOULDN'T you get the tablet.

[Josh Einstein]

Actually, what am I saying. Gateway already has a $1000 tablet with an active digitizer.