Mastering The Hype Cycle

I recently stumbled on a BusinessWeek article from May 2008 with the great title “Bluetooth Comes of Age.”

This is a classic example of news sentiment giving you a little indicator of the status of a technology. Here’s an international business magazine suggesting the technology is now prime time – on the plateau of productivity. Yet when you think back to the beginning of the decade, most news articles about Bluetooth were in the specialized technology press, started with an explanation of where its strange name originated and were often highly skeptical about its prospects. In fact, many had turned against it before it was launched – propelling it very quickly into the Trough of Disillusionment. For example, take a look at how the New York Times viewed it in 2001.