Post by Deleted on Oct 22, 2011 22:49:07 GMT -7
We've all seen plenty of Teddy Ruxpin wannabes and competitors (the various microphone-based bears, Smarty Bear, TJ Scarytales, etc.), but I put it to all of you that this one is the worst one of the lot.
He was overhyped and undersupported, and his name is iTeddy. He was made famous in 2008 by a British television show called Dragon's Den, in which inventors of all sorts compete to get investments from top UK entrepreneurs by pitching products to them. As you might imagine, this resulted in a fair bit of hype, although to be honest, my first thought upon seeing it when I watched the installment in which the iTeddy debuted, was "It's just a bear with a media player stuck to it.".
No, really. He looks like this;
(Image borrowed from Amazon UK)
I don't find him to be the cutest-looking bear of all time, personally. At the very least, his cartoony form is a little bit more appealing, though;
(Image borrowed from iTeddy.com)
He was hyped as being "A teddy bear for the 21st Century", and I seem to recall a lot of info-outlets implying that he would be the hot toy of Christmas 2008, but to my knowledge, he wasn't.
When he ultimately got to the market, reviews from customers were not so good, and some retailers (the most often-cited one is Argos, who had a lot of stock of the iTeddy) were said to have had a lot of the bears returned either due to problems with the media player (either due to the charging/headphone port breaking, or just not functioning correctly), or in some cases due to the allegedly problematic software for converting files to work with the media player. Some users complained about there being a lack of ready-made content available, too - the plan was for TV programmes and such to be sold in downloadable form via the iTeddy website, but I've heard many complaints that there was and is very little available.
Incidentally, the aforementioned converter software, as well as the software used to apply updates to the media player gadget itself, was only for Microsoft Windows, so if you don't use that (as I don't myself) then you're out of luck! Moreover, it's not a good way to future-proof a toy that should be always able to function independently (toy designers everywhere take note).
I found the claims about him being high-tech to be a bit strange, myself, since the bear himself does not contain any technology at all - just a detachable media player of low capacity, considering that the whole package cost about £50 (roughly $80 US) or so at the time. (I said to someone I knew at the time, that there was much better value to be had by just getting a proper media player and a separate plush.
)
So, yes, that's the iTeddy. I can't help but think that he was a bit of an attempt at cashing in on the name-recognition of Apple's "iDevices", myself, although I also think there are several things he offered that, if adapted and improved upon, could perhaps make a future Teddy Ruxpin revision a bit more flexible (such as using standard SD Cards and being able to purchase new, promotional, or web-exclusive stories as MP3 downloads for a lower cost, as well as in proper packages with the usual books, for example; Not depending on particular operating systems would be a must, too, since learning from iTeddy's mistakes would be just as important).
Thoughts, anyone?
He was overhyped and undersupported, and his name is iTeddy. He was made famous in 2008 by a British television show called Dragon's Den, in which inventors of all sorts compete to get investments from top UK entrepreneurs by pitching products to them. As you might imagine, this resulted in a fair bit of hype, although to be honest, my first thought upon seeing it when I watched the installment in which the iTeddy debuted, was "It's just a bear with a media player stuck to it.".
No, really. He looks like this;
(Image borrowed from Amazon UK)
I don't find him to be the cutest-looking bear of all time, personally. At the very least, his cartoony form is a little bit more appealing, though;
(Image borrowed from iTeddy.com)
He was hyped as being "A teddy bear for the 21st Century", and I seem to recall a lot of info-outlets implying that he would be the hot toy of Christmas 2008, but to my knowledge, he wasn't.
When he ultimately got to the market, reviews from customers were not so good, and some retailers (the most often-cited one is Argos, who had a lot of stock of the iTeddy) were said to have had a lot of the bears returned either due to problems with the media player (either due to the charging/headphone port breaking, or just not functioning correctly), or in some cases due to the allegedly problematic software for converting files to work with the media player. Some users complained about there being a lack of ready-made content available, too - the plan was for TV programmes and such to be sold in downloadable form via the iTeddy website, but I've heard many complaints that there was and is very little available.
Incidentally, the aforementioned converter software, as well as the software used to apply updates to the media player gadget itself, was only for Microsoft Windows, so if you don't use that (as I don't myself) then you're out of luck! Moreover, it's not a good way to future-proof a toy that should be always able to function independently (toy designers everywhere take note).
I found the claims about him being high-tech to be a bit strange, myself, since the bear himself does not contain any technology at all - just a detachable media player of low capacity, considering that the whole package cost about £50 (roughly $80 US) or so at the time. (I said to someone I knew at the time, that there was much better value to be had by just getting a proper media player and a separate plush.
)So, yes, that's the iTeddy. I can't help but think that he was a bit of an attempt at cashing in on the name-recognition of Apple's "iDevices", myself, although I also think there are several things he offered that, if adapted and improved upon, could perhaps make a future Teddy Ruxpin revision a bit more flexible (such as using standard SD Cards and being able to purchase new, promotional, or web-exclusive stories as MP3 downloads for a lower cost, as well as in proper packages with the usual books, for example; Not depending on particular operating systems would be a must, too, since learning from iTeddy's mistakes would be just as important).
Thoughts, anyone?
