HP TouchPad firesale sparks corporate PR conspiracy theories
With the unwanted and unloved HP Touchpad now finding itself crowned as the darling of the technology world (albeit fleetingly) HP are reveling in the limelight – to the extent that they may reconsider their planned exit from the market.
In a blog post HP noted Touchpad stampedes such as that seen at Comex 2011: "since we announced the price drop, the number of inquiries about the product and the speed at which it disappeared from inventory has been stunning", adding that it was "safe to say we were pleasantly surprised by the response".
It has fuelled dark rumours of a pre-planned strategy ala the famous Heinz salad cream stunt, where the garnish provider threatened to pull production only to reverse that decision following a popular outcry – or indeed recent speculation that Apple intentionally ‘lost’ their latest iPhone to drive publicity.
Gary Marshall of TechRadar speculated: “Perhaps the whole TouchPad fire sale was the most impressive, risky and expensive marketing campaign the tech industry has ever seen: by cutting prices to ASDA levels HP has turned the TouchPad from a turkey into a major player and paved the way for its next TouchPad to be an enormous success.”
Although Marshall couched this viewpoint by noting that HP may be genuinely "surprised" or actually "insane".
Nevertheless at a mere six months old the Touchpad has already become a tech dinosaur - but what other devices havecome to be seen as collectible chunks of IT history? The Drum took a look:
Blast from the past: Ten tech collectibles
Microsoft Kin PhoneApple Mac 2Apple NewtonPhillips CDIThe PalmCommodore ComputerAmstrad video phoneEarly Motorola ‘brick’ phonesFlip CamCar phones