To the extent that they could be a somewhat reliable pipeline into a programming job, they made sense for people with reasonable programming skills (or perhaps capacity, if we're generous) and a lack of credentials.

Can do the work, but can't get hired? Find a reasonable boot camp (hard), do the time and get access to their placement assistance. From there, now you've got work experience and will have an easier time getting through hiring pipelines.

I think they were definitely oversold as the solution to everyone's lack of a good job, and some of them were outright scams.

I've hired a couple of quality developers from bootcamps. Especially if you're looking to hire Junior devs, I highly recommend keeping an open mind about these bootcamps if you're a hiring manager.

I went to a 4-yr university for a CS degree. I mean I did learn a lot and I don't regret it, but tbh I didn't learn any web dev languages or most things I use at my job today through my program. I learned C, C++, etc. which was super interesting at the time but it just doesn't translate into JS/React-world super well. I think there's a place for legit bootcamps that focus on what you'll be using in your day-to-day and connecting you with some potential hiring companies. They just need to be careful to not guarantee anything and I think they could benefit from almost an internal hiring round after the program to see if you have the skills to even be recommended for a job. That way hiring managers could build more trust with the bootcamps.