I don’t see how it’s obvious people wanted a Segway. Cost is one problem. They’re also large, making them difficult to store at either end of a destination. They’re a nuisance and safety risk for pedestrians. Riders kept toppling them. They’re an even bigger problem than scooters when the battery dies mid-journey. I’ll grant some people were really enthusiastic about them, but I don’t see that translating into mass market appeal.

Even if I’m dead wrong and there’s a throng of people just waiting for a Segway fire sale, it doesn’t invalidate my point. If your product solves the problem by ignoring the economics of your target customer base that’s just as problematic as building the wrong product.

Electric scooters have seen a lot more traction. Both teams can’t use the supposed Henry Ford quote to say the customer doesn’t know what they want. Or, rather they can, but that doesn’t mean they have any more of a clue than the customer does.

My point is maybe we should stop being so antagonistic to the customer. You’ll find no shortage of instances where the customer is wrong. But there’s plenty of others where the customer is right and the product team is wrong. I’m tired of dealing with products that think they know better than me because they think they’re inventing cars.