Phantom Finally Releases A Product... And It Sucks

from the we-waited-five-years-for-this? dept

Thu, Aug 28th 2008 2:32pm — Mike Masnick

Remember the Phantom? Depending on your perspective, this mysterious gaming console, first announced in 2003, was either a too ambitious product that could never get off the ground (living up to its "phantom" name in that it was almost never actually seen) or a big scam to part investors with money. Over the years, the company made many announcements, almost none of which it lived up to. The company was even sued by its own investment bank for fraud, and the company's founder was charged as part of a stock scam. At one point, people were shocked when the company hired a real gaming industry veteran as CEO, but once he left pretty much everyone thought the company was dead.

But... not so fast. A few years back it announced that it was ditching the gaming console concept, but was still going to come out with a neat keyboard that could be used for gaming. Of course, it promised that keyboard would be out years ago, and in true Phantom fashion, many delays followed. To be honest, I had thought the company had finally gone completely out of business, but Wired is reporting that it really honestly has a keyboard in production -- and it completely sucks. As Wired notes, it certainly wasn't worth the long wait. The only redeeming factor that Wired can find in the keyboard is the chance to own a piece of vaporware history. Just don't expect to actually use it, because you'll be wishing you didn't.

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Filed Under: keyboard, phantom, vaporware
Companies: phantom

6 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 28 Aug 2008 @ 3:44pm

This comment has absolutely nothing to do with the article. It is merely to note that over at the Volokh Conspiracy is a discussion that may be of interest:

http://volokh.com/posts/1219950400.shtml
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- Heywood, 28 Aug 2008 @ 7:35pm
  
  Re:
  Wow. Are you fucking kidding me?
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- Mike (profile), 28 Aug 2008 @ 11:27pm
  
  Re:
  MLS, if you want us to look at something, rather than posting an off-topic comment, you might want to try the button at the top that says "submit story."
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Jake, 28 Aug 2008 @ 4:41pm

Good Idea, Bad Execution
This would have been a logical extension of the Media Centre PC concept; all it had to involve was a more capable SFF motherboard with ample RAM and a high-end graphics card with a SCART and/or HDMI adapter. The latter and something like the Phantom Lapboard only with fewer design issues.
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Michael G,, 28 Aug 2008 @ 5:53pm

Who are these people...
Even their website looks as if a three-year-old made, who do investors get fooled by thing like this when it more the obvious. Well anyway, that bridge in Brooklyn that was being sold is for sale again and I own it. The first $25.00 gets it.

http://www.phantom.net/content/products/index.html
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Aug 2008 @ 7:49am

Why cant I . . .
Find some suckers to give me millions to squander on a lifestyle while I take 8 years designing a keyboard? Is there a list somewhere of these VCs?
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