
Crunchpad renamed "JooJoo" will cost $499 on sale Dec. 11 - maudineormsby
http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/07/fusion-garage-crunchpad-video-conference-liveblog/
======
dbreunig
I bet the IP TechCrunch owns is simply the brand "CrunchPad." Good luck with
that suit.

Fusion Garage's story is infinitely more believable than Arrington's. After
both sides have spoken, I imagine it went down like this:

They show him their OS in hopes of getting press and subsequent funding.
Arrington loves the idea and wants in on the concept. Fusion Garage goes and
actually builds the thing. Meetings take place with Fusion Garage probably
passively hoping for funding through Arrington's connections and Arrington
monopolizing the conversation with "product ideas" that are more pie-in-the-
sky thinking than actual engineering.

In the meantime, tablet fever grips the nation and a Fusion Garage with a
working prototype has no trouble scoring VC meetings. They probably had to
fight off the cash being thrown at them. Suddenly they don't need Arrington
and those that actually came through with funding demand they end the charade
of him being a participant. All they have to do is come up with a new name
(Joojoo? Come on...)

What remains to be seen is how TC's audience will react. The idea that
Arrington apparently tried to glom onto the project with no engineering
contributions perfectly fits the tropes discussed on HN: MBA-types make a buck
off the back of those who actually built the thing. I wonder if this tale will
actually hurt his rep?

Who here will approach TC and Arrington differently after today?

~~~
ryanwaggoner
_The idea that Arrington apparently tried to glom onto the project with no
engineering contributions perfectly fits the tropes discussed on HN: MBA-types
make a buck off the back of those who actually built the thing._

The fact that you already have so many upvotes just perfectly illustrates how
so many people _still_ don't get that sales and marketing are just as
important to product success as engineering. Maybe more. Characterizing
Arrington's involvement as an attempt to "glom onto the project with no
engineering contributions" is both unwarranted idle speculation and
irrelevant, as there are many other contributions to be made beyond just
engineering.

~~~
cowmoo
Thank you for your $0.02; this might be really obvious to you, but could you
be kind and enlighten the oblivious engineering crowd on this forum and be
more specific as to what kind of value-add does sales and marketing add to a
early-stage hardware startup or any consumer-oriented tech startup in general?

~~~
aikiai
I disagree with your assumption that this is an engineering crowd. I would say
entrepreneurship is at least as important to the HN culture as engineering.

You ask a huge question, which is discussed every day all around the internet.

But to take a high level stab at it:

Marketing is crucial to an early-stage hardware startup to start to determine
if anyone actually wants to buy what you're proposing to build. Good luck
getting money from a VC, much less a customer, if you can't talk intelligently
about your target market, and demonstrate an ability to connect with it.

Sales becomes paramount after Version 1.0 is released, when you have to
demonstrate that your business is actually profitable. Many engineers are
under the impression that, if the quality is high enough, the product will
sell itself. While this is true for the (tiny) subset of your market that
cares enough to really investigate your product, it seems that a great sales
team with a mediocre product will outsell a mediocre sales team with a great
product more often than not.

------
allenbrunson
So, here it is: Fusion Garage's side of the story. And what do you know, it
doesn't exactly match up with Arrington's version. Best bit: "There are no
contracts between Fusion Garage and TechCrunch."

Holy crap. I _knew_ there was going to be more to this.

~~~
joshfinnie
I have to agree with you. With Arrington's resent openness about the whole
issue, you'd think he'd slap those contracts up on TechCrunch as fast as
possible to refute any claim like this.

He put up the lawsuits that were filed, but I haven't seen any contracts which
lead me to believe they never existed.

This is definitely a story of botched communications, but don't be so quick to
believe this guy. I think when the dust settles, the truth will be somewhere
in the middle of the two stories we are hearing.

~~~
mechanical_fish
_you'd think he'd slap those contracts up on TechCrunch as fast as possible_

IANAL, but I suspect that from a legal standpoint his best plan is to say
nothing. Even what has been said so far is much too much. If TC hadn't made
such a big public push for the product that it was impossible to just let it
quietly fade from view while the court battle was fought, I suspect TC
wouldn't even have published what we've already seen, let alone _more_
internal contracts and communications.

What a clusterf __k.

The other obvious point that even a non-lawyer can make is: The absence of
paper is not the same thing as the absence of contract.

------
maudineormsby
Ultimately, I think $499 is too much for a device that essentially browses the
web, and that's it.

My netbook will do the web and lots of other things. Like let me play Civ II.

~~~
conflux0
Many people said the same thing about netbooks, when they first came into the
picture. In any case there might be a market for it, and it might be too early
to decide the usefulness of the device.

~~~
wvenable
Yes, but now netbooks exist. I got mine for $279 and I can comfortably run
Visual Studio on it. This device is significantly less powerful, not
particularly more portable, and costs _more_. For the right price, I'd buy one
-- this is not the right price.

~~~
smokinn
Try using a netbook standing up on the metro on your way to/from work.

Tablets work fine for that though. (I have an Archos 5 I do exactly that
with.)

~~~
wvenable
So you're saying that single convenience is worth purchasing a significantly
less powerful device for significantly more money? For what I can do standing
on the metro, I have a smartphone and it still does more and is cheaper than
this device.

~~~
anigbrowl
I'm guessing that your smartphone probably comes cheap but locks you into an
expensive service contract. Not that this obviates your point, but it modifies
it. For that matter, the iPhone was very expensive at launch compared to now;
I thought that would kill it straight out of the gate, and boy was I wrong.
Similarly, I doubt your smartphone has such a large screen - perhaps an
advantage when you're on the move (this tablet won't fit in your pocket) but
more desirable when sitting down.

I'm a little perplexed at how this device seems to generate such strong
opinions and armchair quarterbacking. It seems to me that there is a lot of
pent-up demand for a decent-sized tablet but people have been disappointed so
many times they're a bit paranoid about it.

~~~
wvenable
My smartphone contract isn't ridiculously expensive -- and lets face it, if
you've got an Internet tablet you're still going to need that service contract
to get connectivity.

The small screen is an advantage when on the move. The small footprint as well
-- it's pretty hard to even remove a large device from your bag while standing
on transit. If I can sit, I can use my netbook.

I work an web startup that provides business software for users who are
typically not at their desks. An affordable tablet would be a huge boon for us
-- we could distribute them to our users (or just recommend them) and they
would _love_ it. But at this price it won't work for us. I fully expect that
Chrome OS is built entirely for this market and we'll see a lot of tablets
from netbook manufacturers next year.

------
ErrantX
I get a feeling this is going to become a case study in how not to develop a
product.

It's looking more and more like Arrington has totally screwed up contracts,
agreements etc. And then it looks like this Fusion Garage CEO has a complete
lack of understanding why the CrunchPad was a great name (etc)....

Im willing to bet we never actually see a product - either that or it will
bomb.

~~~
seiji
It looks like they have no marketing or branding experience. Their logo is
astonishingly confusing considering their name:
<https://thejoojoo.com/images/logo.jpg>

"Let's call it JooJoo and have the logo read iooioo even though it's supposed
to be spelled JuJu![1]"

[1]: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juju>

~~~
mattmcknight
And they don't even have joojoo.com How can you pick a gooft name like that
and not even own the domain? It's a Korean site...

~~~
elblanco
That's what happens when you pick a name at the last minute without doing
proper market research. At least it's not called "JooPad".

------
jeremymims
You typically want to buy hardware from a trustworthy company. Whatever the
truth is, I'd have trouble trusting Fusion Garage after this mess.

~~~
ivankirigin
Indeed. You only need the appearance of impropriety to erode trust. Just
because they can win a lawsuit doesn't mean they have a chance at making it.

Also, I love how the camera made the screen green. It's pretty much the worst
possible thing you could do in unveiling a product. I wouldn't buy it unless I
saw it in real life, but I find that unlikely.

------
vaporstun
I am most intrigued at how Michael Arrington, a former attorney,
[<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Arrington>] would have failed so
miserably at doing anything to protect his interests. No contract? No formal
IP? Nothing?

That's quite an indicator that he likely had little to do with this device as
Fusion Garage claims. If he'd actually done more to bring it to fruition, he
would probably have taken the appropriate steps to safeguard his investment.
For anyone else I may attribute a lapse like this as simply a mistake, but for
an attorney to drop the ball this badly sounds quite suspicious...

~~~
rbanffy
He may be an incompetent attorney. That could explain why he writes about
technology in the first place ;-)

------
forensic
Why does it only browse the web? How hard can it be to throw a desktop on
there?

You make all that hardware and then cripple it with limited software? Whateva.
I would pay $499 if it had bluetooth and could run a normal OS.

Also, these Fusion Garage guys need to hire a marketing/PR firm STAT.
Fingerprint-marred green screen and scary looking nerd glowering at the camera
is bad for business.

~~~
netcan
You can already get a tablet that does that. I never understand these kinds of
comments.

"I wouldn't buy that. Why didn't they make it into a completely different kind
of product." It's like looking at a motorbike & saying "They should have given
it four wheels & aircon."

~~~
forensic
I guess I just don't understand wtf the point of this thing is when the Archos
9 is on sale for $499

~~~
netcan
I'm not saying this is a good product. I'm not sure it is. That is besides the
point.

I think the point is that it is a different approach to what the Archos 9, a
Windows tablet. This is a browser in a box. Maybe browser in a box isn't a
good idea. Maybe it will bomb.

There are two main features/bugs to this: Browser in a box & tablet. Saying
"why does it only browse the web?' is like saying 'Why doesn't it have a
keyboard.'

~~~
forensic
Not having a keyboard is a good idea. The keyboard is a waste of space.

It should just have bluetooth so you can hook up a keyboard if you want.

They have all this hardware... it wouldn't be hard to turn it into something
good. That's why I said what I said. Because all they need is an OS and
bluetooth and IMO it would be worth the price they set.

~~~
netcan
Sure. You want a Windows/Mac/Linux tablet, not what this thing is. Those are
also available.

------
mbreese
I find it interesting that this all apparently happened so quickly, but the
timing still seems off.

The domain "thejoojoo.com" was registered on Nov 10th.

They told TechCrunch about the split on the 17th, and that day TechCrunch
applied for the trademark.

I mean, who was running this show? Domain names and trademarks are supposed to
be lined up and checked much further in advance. (Not to mention contracts...)

On a side note: this is the tech equivalent of celebrity gossip... I'm sure
that much worse has happened in the past, but never this publicly.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
Don't you have to actually use a trademark before you can register it? This
might have prevented them from doing so earlier?

~~~
roc
In the US you can file based on "Intent to Use".

------
ryanwaggoner
It's hard to tell exactly what's going on here, but clearly Arrington was an
idiot if he didn't have any contracts in place.

That said, I find fusion garage's side of the story pretty suspect, and even
if it's true, I highly doubt they'll succeed. They seem way too focused on the
product and the technology and seem to think it will market and sell itself.

I hope TechCrunch sues. Even without a written contract, there must be heaps
of verbal and written evidence as to exactly what the relationship here was.
Letting the courts sort it out might be the only way to get close to the
truth.

------
pavs
The only thing I liked about the whole webcast/interview is that fact that he
said it the way it is, "Techcrunch is just a blog". Not only that, its a tech
blog with authors that has little to no tech knowledge about the underlying
technologies they write about.

A tech news blog is itself a subject of news because of its hunger for drama.

~~~
seiji
It's still possible this entire debacle is just a marketing grab and will be
"resolved" amicably.

~~~
kierank
I get the feeling Techcrunch is doing a whole "Tomorrow Never Dies" thing here
both with the "Twitter Leaks" and now this "argument about the Crunchpad"...

------
ajaimk
So, why did they name it "penis" in chinese again?

~~~
rbanffy
Because it has a 12 inch screen?

------
david927
I'm surprised at the vitriol here. This was clearly a joint project that got
hijacked out of greed.

I was looking forward to buying several Crunchpads, but it will be a cold day
in hell before I ever buy a JooJoo, just from principle.

~~~
CamperBob
I seem to recall hearing a lot of people say the same thing when the
Revolution became the "Wii."

------
jsz0
My theory, which is pure speculation, is that Fusion Garage misinterpreted
Arrington's support. He promotes many companies on his blog, TC50 and
elsewhere. It seems entirely plausible that FG thought Arrington was simply an
enthusiastic supporter trying to help a small company bring a product to
market. Maybe they figured he would buy a bunch of units OEM and rebrand them
as CrunchPads while they were free to sell the design to other companies or
market a device at retail themselves. The fact that Mr. Arrington, who is a
tech savy lawyer, apparently did not enter into any formal contracts supports
this theory. He should know better. It's very suspicious that he would not
clearly define the terms very early in the process. This suggests to me he
wanted to swoop in and take control of the product only when it was nearing
its completion. FG takes most of the risk -- he jumps in at the last second if
they pull off the engineering side of things. The big question is who was
paying the bills?

Mr. Arrington originally said the CrunchPad was not about profit. So what's
the problem with Fusion Garage selling their own device? Or even selling the
design to other companies? Again this strikes me as being very suspicious.
Wouldn't more manufactures competing against each other be true to his
original vision? Was FG unwilling to sell him this hardware to be re-branded
as CrunchPads or were they unwilling to give him _exclusive_ access to it?

------
sandee
It looks like FusionGarage was looking at initial funding (or acquisition)
from techcrunch early in product development cycle. And techcrunch (i believe
intentionally) avoided commiting anything earlier itself since they thought it
as too risky. Techcrunch thought that they would bring in world class
investors and team later around the product development ( few months before
launch) and get a good stake in the product for that. And FusionGarage
investors were frustrated that TC can come around later (when the risk is too
low) and take a major bite of it.

In between, TC claims that they did initial marketing for the product.
Technically it may be correct. But From risk factor, what was at stake here
for TC ? Actually TC biz model works on buzz factor. More Buzz equals more
readers and Revenue. So at worst (if product fails), they made some money out
of the whole buzz. But for FusionGarage (and their investors), everything was
at stake.

Arrington might be correct, they could have negotiated on the product stake. (
How about : 2% for initial idea discussion, 2% for initial marketing, and 2%
bring in new investors and team .) I guess such a 5-6% offer would have still
led to such a breakup. (But can u give a 30% stake just for blogging about a
product ?)

To me, Arrington is a Bad (Scary) Startup-Investor here (keeping the startup
in guessing game till end ..), and FusionGarage has a bad CEO who could not
anticipate what was to come. And those investors are smart to bring the whole
stuff out before the product is actually launched.

------
wheaties
Looking at what he's holding versus what I saw in the hype pictures is a
starkly different product in terms of size. I don't care if the green is a
trick of the camera light or not Arrington was right if he wanted it priced
topping in at 300-400. Netbooks are a much better deal.

------
johngalt
Smartphones/netbooks have pretty much filled the niche for this device. You
could add a radio to the cruchpad and it would be a bad cellphone. Even if
there was any kind of success here, Quanta would zip in and build a netbook
with a touchscreen and put them out of business fast.

The flap over who owns it doesn't matter, it's already dead. The whole
advantage of a "small team" development is to avoid issues like these all
together. If Fusion and Arrington had both put everything into this project,
it might have gone somewhere. But mediocre product + fractured team = failure.

Best bet now would be to open the platform and hope someone with an open OS
looking for hardware saves you.

------
BigZaphod
It says the weird green screen effect in those photos is a trick of the
camera, but it's remarkably consistent given the different camera angles. What
would cause that?

~~~
maudineormsby
A low light filter on the webcam would do it consistently. I turn yellow on
most webcams for some reason.

------
shabda
Zoozoo is also the name of Vodaphone's India mascot, and has proved very
popular. Not sure how that affects this, buts its not a terrible name, IMO.
[http://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&ei=NrMdS6-xGo3u7AP3...](http://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&ei=NrMdS6-xGo3u7AP3wOTXDw&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&ved=0CAgQBSgA&q=zoozoo+vodafone&spell=1)

------
datums
So it was a fairly recent decision.

thejoojoo.com

Created: 2009-11-10

Expires: 2011-11-10

Updated: 2009-11-10

To ditch crunchpad or to go with joojoo

------
julio_the_squid
Well, they've certainly received a lot of publicity out of this. I read Tech
Crunch an average amount and I actually wasn't aware at all of this device
until recently. The device looks fairly average to me, and I can't image
spending that much on a limited tablet style computer.

The racism in the comments over at engadget sure is unpleasant. Also, the
green screened pictures is certainly doing them a disservice!

------
jrockway
Someone posted a comment that says:

 _Hasn't the Archos9 existed already at that price point?

<http://www.archos.com/products/nb/archos_9/>

Possibly with more features? Or is it vaporware?_

But it seems to have been killed. I think he is right, though; the Archos is a
much nicer device that's already shipping and that's cheaper.

------
mike9999
I'm betting this is a publicity stunt. This has all been too public for a real
lawsuit. They have gotten much more mindshare from all the blogs due to their
"fight" then if they had just announced the product in a normal way.

------
elblanco
Pricepoint sounds more realistic yet still reasonable, glad to see it's still
moving forward. Sad to see all the ugly behind the scenes business stuff
(which is usually hidden from view, but all too common) airing in public.

------
tlrobinson
No contracts? That seems like a newbie mistake I wouldn't expect from
Arrington...

------
tfh
I wonder how all this story will affect the sales of the "joojoo" and of
Apples coming Tablet. I was actually planning to get me a crunchpad but now
I'll wait until all this settles down...

------
zaidf
Wow, all I can say is if they had nothing signed, Arrington committed a pretty
amateur mistake. As a lawyer, he should have known better. That's assuming we
know everything.

------
minalecs
the only way i can see this thing succeeding, is if its extremely hackable.
Allowing users to run any os.. would be the first start. Otherwise as web
client - could be ok , but again, netbooks are much cheaper, and does possibly
the same. I would like it mainly as an e-book reader as the 10" from amazon is
around the same price point, but with no pdf reader, no sd slot, or any idea
of internal memory its a fail as a reader.

------
khangtoh
Even touchpad, webpad or cloud-D sounds way cool then joojoo and I just
thought of those while in bed and typing this on my iPhone.

------
asciilifeform
Might someone explain to me why this device was ever considered interesting?
In just what way is it unique?

~~~
jodrellblank
Because there's nothing like it out there?

It's not a cheap netbook with a small screen and a small keyboard, and it's
not an expensive tablet PC with PC laptop innards - it's a cheap netbook
innards/tablet PC form factor/touch screen browsing device.

Because despite the price they were aiming at sounding too good to be true,
everyone went "oh that sounds too good to be true ... but they say it so it
must be true! I'll buy two!".

~~~
nl
I've posted it before & I'll post it again:

[http://wholesale.alibaba.com/product-gs/268088826-touch-
scre...](http://wholesale.alibaba.com/product-gs/268088826-touch-screen-umpc-
wholesalers.html)

[http://wholesale.alibaba.com/product-
gs/268087366-10-2-inch-...](http://wholesale.alibaba.com/product-
gs/268087366-10-2-inch-touch-screen-panel-pc-wholesalers.html)

10" touch screen, Atom Processor, standard netbook specs in a touchscreen
tablet, prices from $288 in bulk. (I suspect it isn't a capacitative
touchscreen but it's still inaccurate to say there is _nothing_ like it out
there)

~~~
asciilifeform
> tablet PC with PC laptop innards

plus mass and and power consumption.

------
Readmore
It's an interesting story but at $499 I don't see it selling all that well.

I'll continue to wait for the Apple Tablet.

------
jonursenbach
joojoo: "karma. bad luck."
<http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=joojoo>

------
herval
Is it just me or that guy looks a lot like a Klingon?

------
rms
What a clusterfuck.

~~~
tfh
indeed, that term describes it very well.

------
pibefision
Comments at engadget are really funny

------
c00p3r
Did they still want their custom OS instead of port of the Chrome OS? It seems
that they should think again.

------
gregking
$499!? -- I'll wait for Apple.

