Here's an example I witnessed a few years ago. As a result, they decided the market would want the ability to manipulate nontraditional data. The trouble of course was that no one at Informix was interested in exploring potentially disconfirming evidence that major companies may not be interested in this product at all. For example, banks want to store text data, not pictures. With so much compensation tied up in Internet stock options and so little time to execute, management has every reason to remain convinced that their company is fulfilling a real need in the market, even when there is paltry evidence to support it.
Analogies are the lifeblood of Internet predictions.
After all, if you feel the world is moving fast and unpredictably, it helps to come up with some analogies to rely on. But lots of these analogies aren't very good. Of course, if you're committed to an e-business built on anecdotes and groupthink, analogies will morph themselves into a perfect match. Many companies now use it as part of their pitch. I'm not convinced new Internet companies possess the necessary marketing knowledge.