“Sometime in the future”—The technology entrepreneur as utopian market hero

Abstract

In this conceptual article, we outline a process through which some technology entrepreneurs come to be viewed as heroes in the public’s eye. We argue that market heroism relies on top-down narratives of imagined future utopias that combine with bottom-up consumer desire for those utopias. While extant marketing theory has typically focused on imagination of products and consumption, we expand the conversation by highlighting the importance of consumer imagination for an idealized future time. The relevance of our process to consumer behavior lies with the potential for products and services to indirectly represent that imagined future time. Synthesizing work in and beyond marketing, we map out a process by which technology entrepreneurs attempt to enlist the participation of consumers, media, and the state into their visions of social and market progress. In doing so, we bring critical attention to the effect of heroic discourses of technological utopias and the ideological ground that supports and enables such discourses.