Biggest Tech Fails This Decade: 12 Epic Product Flops

The past decade has been one of historic technological achievements and massively successful releases in consumer tech.

In the shadow of those triumphs reside the ghosts of the decade's many failed ventures.

While some over-hyped products crashed and burned immediately upon release, others bombed more quietly, while still others seemed fated to flop.

Here are a few of the decade's biggest tech failures. Vote for the most unfortunate, and tell us about products from the last decade that you think deserve to be on this list. Email your suggestions to technology[at]huffingtonpost.com, or upload your picks using the "Add a Slide" button below. Then, take a look through our slideshow of things that became obsolete this decade and our list of the decade's most influential gadgets.

 

Include your nominations for the decade's most epic tech failures.

Click "Add a Slide," upload a picture and description of the product, then click "upload"!

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Windows Vista

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Microsoft's successor to the XP operating system was not a hit with consumers. "For an operating system that took five years to create, Windows Vista’s reputation went down in flames amazingly quickly," writes the New York Times. "Not since Microsoft Bob has anything from the software giant drawn so much contempt and derision. Not every company lives to see the day when its customers beg, plead and sign petitions to bring back the previous version of its flagship product."

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Microsoft's successor to the XP operating system was not a hit with consumers. "For an operating system that took five years to create, Windows Vista’s reputation went down in flames amazingly quickly," writes the New York Times. "Not since Microsoft Bob has anything from the software giant drawn so much contempt and derision. Not every company lives to see the day when its customers beg, plead and sign petitions to bring back the previous version of its flagship product."

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This Flop

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Comments

[R U Sirius]

09:45 AM on 01/02/2011

I've been using Vista for some time now, with no problems. I have a lot more instability problems with Firefox and Internet Explorer. Maybe Vista is disliked only by people who try to make it do things it's not designed to do?

[AntonioVTorres]

10:45 PM on 01/03/2011

The problem I've always found with Windows users in general is that they simply don't know anything about Windows. That's why it's easy for them to switch over to Apple. With Apple, much of the know-how is done for you. If something goes wrong with a Mac, you take it in. Unfortunately, it ends up with most users having to buy a new computer and/or losing all their data. I've never taken a Windows PC to anyone else for help with a problem. I've always been able to fix it myself. I can't do that with a Mac, wouldn't know where to start and wouldn't even bother trying.

When folks were complaining about Vista, I just didn't see why. I knew what to do. I knew how to handle it. It's not like I am some IT person working in some great capacity. I do marketing for a living. If I can do it, others can too. There's no reason for the complaints other than pure laziness on the part of the user.

[305Rider]

03:25 AM on 01/02/2011

As a person who works in retail the falls of the Zune & HD-DVD were particularly interesting.

The main problem with the Zune from a non-technical view is the fact that it looks too much like an iPod. It makes Microsoft look desperate by comparison.

The HD-DVD really was the better product over Blu-Ray to me. It had a faster load time, more user-friendly menus, & it was the first of the two formats to have internet capabilities. All the Blu-Ray had to offer from a technical point was a bigger memory capacity. Sony did have a vice grip on the studios though...

[IsotelusMaximus]

11:52 AM on 02/11/2011

I love my newer Zune HD. It works well with no problems at all. The best thing about it...?... It's not an ipod.

[hagagaga]

11:00 PM on 01/01/2011

Vista may be terrible, but I'd still prefer it over OSX any day. However, I bought Windows 7 today so I won't be using Vista for much longer.

[Tblack]

09:30 PM on 01/01/2011

I was expecting to see my Nexus One on this list. Pity. Whenever people see my phone they rave. It's still THE Android dev phone but since it's not widely popular or known I think I'll throw it in the trash. Cause its all about being hip rather than it's endless functionality.

[littlenoodles]

12:42 PM on 01/03/2011

I mostly agree, except that Google itself seems to be giving the N1 short shrift these days. The Nexus S is out with Android 2.3. Google insiders have had 2.3 on their N1's for months (admittedly in 'eat your own dogfood' mode). So where's the update for the rest of us who bought into Google's concept of 'the Android reference platform'? We got 2.2 first, what's holding up 2.3?

[GearRatio]

09:04 PM on 01/01/2011

Segway certainly belonged on this list. Basic characteristics:

- 2 wheeled vehicle.
- Single passenger / rider.
- Very little cargo space.
- Slow.
- A pain to ride in bad weather.

This is a pretty good design spec.... for a bicycle. You can buy quite a good bicycle for under a grand, or an excellent one for 2 or 3, and get some good exercise riding it as part of the bargain. A Segway costs how much?!?!

[patbit]

07:04 PM on 01/01/2011

I have been using vista for like 4 years. Works pretty well over all. No real complaints.

[AZ-Ed]

11:54 PM on 12/30/2010

Vista did suck, Windows 7 is atleast functional, but I love my Zune! Definitely prefer it over an I pod for just music purposes (no fancy pants apps). Zune's music quality is perfect!

[MaxPowerXP]

02:01 PM on 01/01/2011

What exactly "sucked" about it? You can't claim Vista sucks and 7 is good, considering that 7 is just optimized Vista

[Dave Jones]

09:58 AM on 01/03/2011

Love my Zune, agreed. But no problem with Vista. It may be the difference in usage. I'm not a complicated computer user, I get online, use Excel and Photoshop. That's about the extent of it.

[littlenoodles]

12:49 PM on 01/03/2011

Perhaps, but if all you use is the web, Excel and Photoshop, I'm sure you have (or had) an XP system that was perfectly good for your purposes. Why on earth would you upgrade to Vista - or buy a new computer to get it? The most you needed was a memory upgrade to your XP system.

And, assuming you don't actually *like* pumping money into your 3 computer habits, why not just use Firefox or Chrome for your net browsing and OpenOffice for your spreadsheet needs (I'll stop short of suggesting a Photshop alternative)? Or if you feel you *need* Excel, why buy a new computer and a new copy of Excel (which, along with Office probably cost you another 50% of what you paid for the computer)? Is it a status thing?

[MuchMadness]

11:48 PM on 12/30/2010

This list of "losers" drives home just how lame the "winners" are.

I mean, what is so great about things like the iPod, the iPhone, and the iPad?

None of these will be viewed as a great invention 30 years from now.

[fla kracker]

02:34 PM on 12/31/2010

30 years from now I am not going an iphone that'll show apple

[Dave Jones]

10:00 AM on 01/03/2011

Love your icon! but didn't get your comment.

[temenos]

08:30 PM on 12/30/2010

"Progress might have been alright once, but it has gone on too long. "
Ogden Nash

[R U Sirius]

09:45 AM on 01/02/2011

THAT is a great quote! Fanned!

[temenos]

04:25 PM on 01/02/2011

Thanks R U Sirius. I'm fanning you back for appreciating the wit of Ogden Nash. He's one of my favorite humorists and poets.

[omg wtf lol bbq]

06:39 PM on 12/30/2010

There's lots of flops you guys missed - Windows XP/VIsta/7 Tablets (never hit the market penetration that was expected, but the next decade should be much better for the platform), Nokia NGage video game console phones (also known as the taco phone), Game Boy Pocket, Palm Pre/Pixi, Microsoft Kin, Sega Dreamcast, the first version of AppleTV, and so many things that have come and gone as far as the internet goes....

[MaxPowerXP]

02:03 PM on 01/01/2011

The Dreamcast wasn't really a failure, but it was from last decade anyway.

But I will always hate you for reminding me that the Nokia NGage even existed. Any list like this that doesn't have the NGage somewhere in the top 3 was written by someone with no clue what they're talking about.

[MaxPowerXP]

12:22 PM on 12/30/2010

The Zune was a flop? I wasn't ware being the third-highest selling PMP qualified you as a "flop". As for Vista, the only people who hated it and wanted XP back were people who are terrified of anything ever looking the slightest bit different.

[omg wtf lol bbq]

06:31 PM on 12/30/2010

It was a flop due to it not even coming close to hitting sales expectations. Otherwise, it was a decent player.

[Ronni01]

07:05 PM on 12/30/2010

I myself have a Zune. Its my 2nd one. I love it. And everyone I know that has one loves theirs too. I guess the sales expectations=flops. Apple has a more aggressive ad campaign than microsoft right now, which probably attributes to the lower sales.

[docbungle]

04:03 AM on 01/03/2011

Vista was unusable when it first came out, particularly for business. The list of missing/incompatible drivers went on for miles. It took years for it to be patched significantly enough to be a feasible XP alternative. They released an OS that wouldn't work under current conditions, and expected the market to change for them. Since that didn't happen, we now have Windows 7. And thank God for that.

And Windows 7 is much more than an "Optimized Vista."

[MaxPowerXP]

12:35 AM on 01/04/2011

lol. Driver issues were not a problem with Vista, they were a problem with peripheral manufacturers who didn't bother writing drivers for the new driver model (or, in the case of Creative at least, intentionally did not do so in order to force consumers to purchase newer sound cards).

The idea that it was "unusable" is, pardon the french, a huge crock of s__t. I used it from day 1 until 7 was released to manufacturing, and the only things wrong with it were FUD on the part of people who panic when anything looks the slightest bit different.

Hate to tell you but yes, it is just an optimized Vista. It didn't even get a new major version number.

[dino213aa]

10:45 AM on 12/30/2010

How could anyone, particularly CNET, consider HD DVD a better format?! The adoption of Blu-Ray was one of the few times superior tech bested economics (HD-DVD was supposedly cheaper to make).

[DismayedRepub]

09:23 PM on 12/30/2010

HD DVD was the superior format. The only thing Blu-Ray had over it was a little higher disk capacity. The reflective surface in the HD DVD was a little deeper into the disk than the Blu-Ray making it more resistant to scratches and therefore more reliable. You could also burn a HD DVD a lot faster than a Blu-Ray.

It was also a lot cheaper to buy the HD DVD disks and drive than the Blu-Ray. Sony abused their customers greatly by charging them upwards of $500 for a player while you could buy a HD DVD RW for less than $200. To this day there is no reason they shouldn’t be able to sell these things for $49.

The free market didn’t get a chance to one of these technologies over the other as Sony Electronics owned Sony Pictures, MGM, Columbia and Tri Star. This was too much for the other studios to compete against so they capitulated and joined the Blu-Ray ranks.

People are still holding on to their standard DVD technology. As of last year, Blu-Ray had only about 14% of the market. I think you’ll see them on this list in the near future as the technology is obsolete. Netflix or other streaming HD content is the path to the future.

[DismayedRepub]

09:28 PM on 12/30/2010

Oops,

The free market didn’t get a chance to CHOOSE one of these technologi­es over the other.....

[dino213aa]

10:35 PM on 12/30/2010

I will concede that streaming content will eventually dominate the market, as will standard $300+ TV bills. Shame too because I'm one of the few people that actually watches all the extra content.

As for the tech, all of my friends who care about this say the capacity difference was key. "Slight" is a bit of an understatement, don't you think? We're talking about the difference between 30gb and 50gb. Never heard anybody complain about a lack of reflectivity, and personally I have no sympathy for people who don't treat their discs carefully (regardless of format).

Economically however the retooling of the manufacturing process was more significant for Blu-Rays than HD-DVD. The players themselves are coming down in price each year.

Basically Sony won the battle but will lose the war.

[dino213aa]

10:42 AM on 12/30/2010

I honestly didn't mind the Zune hardware, but it was the software that ruined it for me. Absolutely a hot, gelatinous mess. For media management (particularly music), nothing tops iTunes.

[MaxPowerXP]

12:19 PM on 12/30/2010

You can't possibly be serious. iTunes has to be the most highly respected malware of all time.

[MCJanes]

01:35 PM on 12/30/2010

iTunes is one of the worst pieces of software anybody has ever designed. Just because Apple made something, doesn't automatically make it good.

[dino213aa]

09:44 PM on 12/30/2010

Actually iTunes was initially developed by another company and sold to Apple. You don't know me- don't assume I'm some Apple fanboy just because I speak the truth about one of their products. Sure iTunes has its problems, but it is still better than any other software on the market. Honestly, look at its competitors. Winamp.. weak, complicated, sh***y interface, Windows Media Player: slow clunky, worse interface than Winamp. Songbird: same as winamp.. can't handle large collections. Foobar 2000: too limited in its functionality.

I promise I've tried them all.. for as weak as iTunes is, it's still better than the rest. Now if only the would setup some SQL server backend to handle large collections. I'll admit that at 90k tracks iTunes is a bit clunky.

[GeneralDisarray]

09:05 AM on 12/30/2010

Compaq Ipaq! If they would have made it cellular, it would have been the iphone 3-4 years before the iphone.

[MuchMadness]

11:53 PM on 12/30/2010

The best telephones are the landline ones that you plug into a jack in the wall.
Excellent voice quality, very reliable, and you can count on them in an emergency.

[GeneralDisarray]

12:46 PM on 12/31/2010

" count on them in an emergency"
Umm, unless you're not near a phone jack.

[Nealo]

08:08 AM on 12/30/2010

Proud renter of 2 cablecards here. Love my TiVo and love the cablecards.