It is a widely adopted practice for firms to announce new products well in advance of actual market availability, especially in the computer industry. In this article, a firm makes pre-announcements on its product, which are "cheap talk." We develop a reputation model of "vaporware" where the...

It is a widely adopted practice for firms to announce new products well in advance of actual market availability. The incentives for pre-announcements are stronger in markets with network effects because they can be used to induce the delay of consumers’ purchases and forestall the build-up of...

In markets with ongoing technological progress, buyers must choose when to buy. These buy/wait decisions may have a significant impact on innovators’ and buyers’ surpluses. In making these decisions, buyers often rely on information provided by firms. For instance, it is a common practice...