This product was launched at the wrong moment — right when it hit the market, the financial crisis struck.
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history
The phrase distills a line from the Shijing 《诗经·大雅·桑柔》: 我生不辰，逢天僤怒 ('I was born at no good hour, met with Heaven's wrath') — and was fixed in the modern four-character form by classical commentators.
usage
Sympathetic, slightly fatalistic. Used for people whose talent or virtue went unnoticed because of bad timing, and (by extension) for products, ideas, or movies that flopped due to unlucky timing rather than poor quality.
