Was the VM a failure?

[Bernd]

To be clear, we cannot tell if the VM served its intended purpose, but the method of creation itself neither spread nor was it ever re-invented and then spread to a point that knowledge about it was preserved until today. Fundamental break-throughs often pop up independently within a small time-frame when the necessary prerequisites are met. This makes it dubious whether the creation method has a broader practical use like encipherment.

Furthermore we neither know of similarly complex intellectual finger exercises nor hoaxes, which again narrows the circumstances under which the VM was created. It was likely a highly unusual freak-event but most probably no technological break-through.