Subject:
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Re: Mindstorms on Slashdot
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Mon, 28 Nov 2005 12:01:49 GMT
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Original-From:
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steve <SJBAKER1@AIRMAIL.spamcakeNET>
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Viewed:
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2108 times
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Pouria Dehghanpour wrote:
> In lugnet.robotics, Orion Pobursky wrote:
>
> > I noted this article on Slashdot:
> > http://slashdot.org/articles/05/11/28/0443232.shtml?tid=159&tid=1
> >
> > -Orion
>
>
> I can't remember when exactly , but some time in the last year or so LEGO
> conducted a customer survey about the Mindstorms product line(s). When they did
> their restructuring, they had also mentioned that they want to focus on products
> like Mindstorms. Don't these facts seem to suggest they are working on new
> Mindstorms related products?
No - I don't think so.
Redesigning Mindstorms would be a fairly major R&D cost that an ailing
company could ill afford.
However, what they COULD have done for almost zero cost would have been
to come out with more Mindstorms sets using existing parts.
So if they were very interesting in keeping the line going, why would
we not have seen "Mindstorms+Pneumatics", "Mindstorms Motors and
Sensors" - or the core Mindstorms RCX+Tower bundled with a different
set of parts to make a new, "freshened" set. Not as exciting to
*us* - but if the market were clamoring for something, this would
be a reasonable (and CHEAP) solution for them.
Sure, we'd like to see a revamped RCX/Tower setup with more modern
computer parts, smaller, more modular, better motors, more sensors.
But if they were quietly working on that stuff behind the scenes,
why wouldn't they be keeping the product line alive with fresher,
more exciting sets?
It seems to me that they are just maintaining a dying product line
at the minimum possible level on a "just in case" basis so that
they have something in that arena ready if some unexpected
resurgance should happen to come along. They are probably
selling just enough to schools and colleges and to us AFOL's
to justify keeping that one set on their production schedule.
I doubt we'll see an exciting new Mindstorm replacement anytime
soon. The fortunes of Lego as a whole need to improve a whole
lot first - and their "return to core products" push is definitely
not a good sign for Mindstorms.
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Mindstorms on Slashdot
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| (...) I'd have a hard time not thinking of Mindstorms as a "core product" as it's become so ingrained in the product line-up for so long and is so important. Steve (18 years ago, 28-Nov-05, to lugnet.robotics)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Mindstorms on Slashdot
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| (...) I can't remember when exactly , but some time in the last year or so LEGO conducted a customer survey about the Mindstorms product line(s). When they did their restructuring, they had also mentioned that they want to focus on products like (...) (18 years ago, 28-Nov-05, to lugnet.robotics, lugnet.mediawatch)
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