3Discover fatal flaw

[P3D <PTWW@xxxxxxx>]

Now that the topic of 3Discover has come up again, I thought I
would chime in with some thoughts I have been sharing with Gabriel
off-list.

I recently used a 3Discover for the first time.  It is great to see
someone actively trying to mass market an interesting 3D product.  But
it does have a number of annoying design aspects such as significant
obstruction of the view if wearing glasses; inadequate interocular
adjustment capability; placing the motor controls "backwards" relative
to what a camera user would expect; chintzy sounding motor that tends
to get stuck; no manual override of film advance in the event of motor
or cartridge malfunction.  Most of these can probably be tolerated by
the average user.  (Many of us more experienced with stereo will likely
get tired of the excessive use of hyper-stereo, though.)

IMO, however, the 3Discover suffers from a fatal design flaw--assuming
they have aspirations of achieving a sort of success even remotely
reminiscent of ViewMaster's.

I was really flabbergasted when I 3Discovered that a "cartridge" was not
just something like a film cannister, but the whole front element with
diffuser.  Here's why I think this is such a big deal.  To have a long-
term successful business, you have to have a *recurring* income stream.
Automobile and appliance manufacturers make products that break down and
become obsolete and must be replaced, thus ensuring their future income
stream.  I imagine Kodak never had any ambition of making a killing on
cameras they made, they wanted the recurring income stream from film
sales.  And VM's biggest reason for making viewers was probably to get the
recurring income stream from sales of reels.  So, think about your VM
collection.  How many reels do you have?  How many reels does the average
VM collector have?  How many does the world record holder have?  How many
did a retailer carry in inventory when they were popular?  Now think about
buying the same number of images in 3Discover format.  Now consider this:
Where would you put them??? You would almost have to rent a wharehouse
to hold them all!  And what mass retailer can afford to devote that kind
of shelf space and inventory storage space to the proddduct?

I do not know for sure, but I would speculate that: a) during its heyday,
20% of VM owners probably bought 80% of VM reels (or maybe even 10/90);
b) when the boom faded, the way VM chose to assure itself the all critical
*recurring* income stream was to position VM as a toy for children: there
is a new "crop" of children becoming potential customers year after year.
For the 3Discover to ever reach the "cash cow" phase of the product life
cycle, they will have to rely on: 1) the collectors who must have every
new cartridge; or 2) on turnover in their target market like VM does.
The current cartridge design makes 1) impractical; and option 2) forces
them right into the toy category like VM.  Or perhaps Wrebbit has some
other business approach I have not thought of. ;)

This is not to say that Wrebbit *can't* make a tidy little profit by
selling viewers to people who ultimately buy only one or two cartridges.
When there are 250 million people just in the U.S., you can collect a
pretty good hunk of cash even if only 1 out of every 1,000 people buys
your product.  But if you don't get them to the point of buying something
from you over and over again, sonner or later it will all fizzle out.
With the current design of 3Discover, I think it will inevitably be sooner;
the product will have little chance of ever being more than a gee-wiz
novelty.  I know my future purchases of cartridges will be limited to
the occasional one that is just too compelling to miss.

Disclaimer: no assurances are given that the above free business analysis
is worth anything more than you paid for it.

I have no affiliation with any *competitor* of Wrebbit's.

See next post for suggested solution.

Paul Talbot


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