What exactly is White Elephant Technology?

Simply put, any unusual invention past or present that fails in the marketplace despite its innovative nature qualifies as White Elephant Technology, or WETech for short.

Many people are familiar with WETech inventions like flying cars and jet packs, but the majority of inventions we write about are ones you’ve never heard of. From jeeps that fly to tanks that shouldn’t; from a wave-powered boat that takes forever to reach its destination to a jet-powered train that shook itself apart, White Elephant Technology showcases an inventor’s talent for inventing something nobody asked for. Importantly, none of these inventions are speculative. Each one was built, field-tested, and worked more or less as planned (except when it killed its inventor). As we like to think, White Elephant Technology is the purest expression of the human condition.

White Elephant Technology, published by The History Press with text by John J. Geoghegan and lavishly illustrated with more than 50 photographs curated by Photo Editor, Eric Miles, will be published in the U.K. in August 2023 and released in the U.S. on April 16, 2024.

If you’d like to order a copy click here. If you’d like an autographed copy, inquire about bulk book sales, or discuss a speaking engagement, please email us at: WhiteElephantTechnology@gmail.com, or use the Contact form which can be accessed at the top or bottom of this page.

If you’d like to recommend a WETech invention that you know about (or designed yourself), please email us at the above address. Winners will be notified and their invention featured in our WETECH NEWSLETTER along with a finder’s credit. If you’d like to listen to a 50 minute author’s talk about the book, click here.

To receive our WETECH NEWSLETTER, which features a constantly changing gallery of WETECH inventions and inventors not included in our book, please send us an email requesting a FREE subscription.

If you’d like to watch a brief, 2-minute promotional video for our book, click here. If you’d like to watch a funnier, sixty second promotional video, click here. If you’d like to watch a free, hour-long presentation about WETECH inventions to England’s National Museum of Computing CLICK HERE. Or, you can read a brief 5 minute Q&A with me conducted by the University of California, Berkeley HERE.