Reviews of Failed Tech Products that Prove they Were Doomed From The Start

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Reviews of Failed Tech Products that Prove they Were Doomed From The Start

By Joe Burgett - August 25, 2022

Nintendo Virtual Boy

Product Type: Virtual Reality System

No, Nintendo did not get some random boy off the street and put him into a virtual world. They only do that with Italian plumbers and gorillas. In the 1990s, many felt that virtual reality was going to be the next big thing. Of course, it did not quite feel as realistic due to the artwork being nowhere near as perfect as today. That did not stop Gunpei Yokoi from developing the “Virtual Boy,” released by Nintendo in 1995. This uncomfortable helmet was put on your head, putting you into what was essentially a tabletop version of what we’d normally see with glasses at a 3D movie. At least they made the world start talking about true VR years ago!

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The Segway

Product Type: Personal Transportation Device

The biggest question we have for the makers of the Segway is, well, why? Launched in 2001, the Segway did not make “headway” for a bit. Initial tests for the public went well, and many were interested in the novelty of this device. Not to mention, the appearance was kind of out there. It seemed futuristic, which essentially made it seem like something you’d see everywhere in major cities. The real problems were clear though. The high price for the item made it hard to afford. Another issue was its practical application. Where would it be used? It seemed to only have a few speeds, and body weight essentially allowed it to move faster as you moved forward. This only made larger users harder to accommodate, and the potential accidents that could happen were abundant.

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Apple PiPP!N

Product Type: Video Game Platform (kinda-sorta)

Marketed as the Apple PiPP!N, the device was supposed to be an “integral part of the consumer audiovisual, stereo, and television environment.” Honestly, it was hard to know what it was for as the platform was supposedly capable of various things, as it ran in classic Mac OS. Apple attracted enough attention to see Bandai take it into the video game sector while Katz Media used it on vertical markets. Bandai pulled out of everything by 1997, due to a crowded video game space at the time and possible merger discussions with SEGA. Steve Jobs was not a fan of it and upon his return to the company, shut down all PiPP!N development. Putting it among Apple’s failed tech products.

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Microsoft’s “Tay” Chatbot

Product Type: Chatbot

Microsoft should have seen this coming. A lot of tech companies were interested in developing chatbots that could handle most business for clients, removing the need for human customer service. Yet this did not really go over well for the most part. In 2016, Microsoft found that out the hard way as they began trying to make them. Things went sideways with their “Tay” Chatbot. Initially, Tay did as hoped and learned by speaking to users… but this was the problem. Within 24 hours, Tay was taught to repeat numerous racist, sexist, and Anti-Semitic statements. Needless to say, Tay never really made it and is now in the hall of Microsoft’s failed tech products.

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Lily Drone

Product Type: Drone

Developers at Lily Robotics promised the Lily Drone would be a fully waterproof drone that could follow you anywhere. It would take off as you toss it into the air and automatically take your picture too. Starting from a crowdfunding campaign in 2015, hype and anticipation were huge by 2016. Finally, the company released a promo video that seemed promising but was actually just footage from a GoPro carried by a DJI drone. The company never released a single drone, in spite of 60,000 pre-orders. This led to a lawsuit from the San Francisco District Attorney’s office. The company racked up $34 million from backers and another $15 million from investors. Sadly, most claim to have never been given a refund. This is easily one of the biggest failed tech products of all time.

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Napster

Product Type: P2P Music Sharing System

Honestly, we hate to put Napster on this failed tech products list because they literally helped to change music distribution for the better. Rather than having to buy full albums, you could download single songs for free through Napster’s peer-to-peer sharing system. As the digital age began in the late 1990s/early 2000s, Napster entered the music space at just the right time. Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker started up Napster to make music distribution easy in this new age. Yet this was a huge issue for Napster. They were sued for copyright infringement by many music studios. After ceasing operations in 2001, Napster filed for bankruptcy in 2002. Just after this, a little company named Apple came up with a legal model to do exactly what Napster was doing. They called it iTunes.

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Coolest Cooler

Product Type: Tech Cooler

The Coolest Cooler seemed like an awesome product at first. It was marketed as a “portable party” cooler that could do everything. The cooler had impressive wireless speakers, USB Chargers, a bottle opener, and even a blender. It would see huge support on Kickstarter, bringing in $13 million from 62,000 backers. The Cooler was supposed to be shipped out to investors by February 2015 and then go on sale for just $185. Then the date was pushed to July 2015… and then again to 2016. At least 20,000 backers did not see their cooler. The Oregon Dept. of Justice then got involved and a settlement was reached in 2017. The remaining coolers never shipped out, and those that did get coolers were not satisfied. The CEO then said that customers could claim $20 of the $200 they invested! Oh, how nice of them.

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Apple Maps

Product Type: GPS Map Service

Apple should not be let off the hook for their own failed tech products just yet. Apple had to deal with one of its main competitors, Google, for all of its mapping services for years. They felt they could avoid this by developing their own version simply called “Apple Maps” in 2012 as it moved into iOS 6. The result was a massive failure for Apple. Their mapping service was horribly bug-filled, lacked any public transit information in many countries, and mostly offered blank voids. On top of that, you’d get misplaced landmarks too. Just under 10 years later, they tried again. Yet Apple Maps only offers detailed transit directions in a select few cities worldwide. Google, meanwhile, can allow us to see our house from space.

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WeWork

Product Type: Co-Working Space (Virtual & Physical)

Oh, where do we start with WeWork? Basically, the company was started by Adam Neumann who seemed to be great at charming people into investing in his commercial real estate and shared workspace company. He somehow charmed them for a decade by giving them major projections. He even managed to sway SoftBank and others that WeWork was not just some real estate company. Oh no, it was a tech platform just like Uber or Airbnb. It was worth billions, he claimed. As he raised his money, he used a private jet to illegally transport cannabis too. The value randomly went from $47 billion to $8 billion by 2019. Now running out of cash, WeWork fired 2,400 employees and Adam left the company to get out while he could. WeWork still exists today but it is losing money more and more.

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Quibi

Product Type: Streaming Service

The idea for Quibi made “some” sense in theory. It revolved around short-form content that would ideally blend well into a world where people seemed compelled by 5-minute videos on YouTube. The issue is that for a paid streaming service, this does not make a lot of sense. It was started in August 2018 as “NewTV” initially and was led by founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman as CEO. It even raised just under $2 billion from investors, so when it launched in April 2020, everyone seemed excited about its prospects. Yet it shut down by December 2020 and by January 2021, Quibi sold its entire library to Roku.

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The “Secret” Social Network

Product Type: Social Network

Back in 2014, a “Secret” social network popped up that people were initially very interested in. Secret showed you messages from your friends or even friends of friends, but no one was identified by their real name. This gave everyone a safe space to talk about some very problematic things that would get them kicked off of normal social networks. Secret managed to raise around $35 million after seeing 15 million users. Yet anonymity never really works out long-term. After all, this is the internet, people. The identities did not stay secret and this meant that the entire concept was moot. The co-founder pulled the plug and Secret became one of the most notable failed tech products in history.

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PalmPilot

Product Type: Personal Digital Assistant (PDA)

It is sort of wrong to say that the PalmPilot deserves to be among the failed tech products we listed here. Considering it actually did end up selling pretty well for Palm Inc. They were known for digital assistants that were quite helpful to people in businesses as well as your regular college student. They offered people a way to truly stay on task. PalmPilots were also not crazy expensive, which is probably why the company sold 1 million units by 1998. It then was succeded by Palm III that very same year yet Palm Inc. as a company began to go downhill as the PC and MAC markets began to grow. By the time early smartphones showed up, they were done.

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Nike FuelBand

Product Type: Wearable Technology

Nike has never really been known for making hardware or software products. However, if they were going to get into the tech world, the FuelBand was the way to do it. The Nike FuelBand was an activity tracker that measured one’s physical activity, steps taken, and the amount of energy one burned. The information was measured in “fuel points” and integrated into the Nike+ online community and application. It gave people a chance to keep track of their exercise progress while also helping others stick to their goals. The problem was that Nike, unwise to the tech world, did not comprehend the public’s interest in wearable tech. Plus, the Fitbit among others made competition difficult along with the fact that the Apple Watch launched shortly after.

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Google Glass

Product Type: Smart Glasses

At one point, Google marketed its Google Glass device like it was going to be the “next big thing.” In a way, it seemed like it could be. At a 2012 Google event, they showed a live stream of skydivers wearing the Google Glass in the air and as they landed on top of the convention center the event was held. This seemed awesome, but then Google being Google, freaked people out. Many did not know if the camera would stop or could be turned on by anyone at any time. Not to mention the idiocy of wearing glasses as “fashion” that isn’t protecting them from the sun. This became one of the most infamous failed tech products ever, but Google has since tried to make it work through the newer augmented reality sector. Therefore, they might not be gone just yet.

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Theranos

Product Type: Nonexistent

Theranos was built on the back of its CEO and Founder, Elizabeth Holmes. She is a sociopathic liar who duped investors out of millions. In fact, Theranos was once valued at $9 billion. What was Theranos? They were supposed to be a medical tech company that figured out a way to do blood tests that required very small amounts of blood to work. They would still be accurate and results would come back rapidly. Best of all, it was done using a small automated device. This was all BS, as it did not exist but Holmes managed to sucker $700 million from investors anyway. As a result, Holmes faced numerous lawsuits from the SEC, CMS, State Attorney General, her business partners, and many more. Holmes was found guilty of fraud and conspiracy on 4 counts in January 2022. She didn’t even pay her lawyers for months.

Where Do We Find this Stuff? Here Are Our Sources:

Wall Street Journal

New York Times

The Washington Post

The Verge

Vox Media

Amazon

Google

Apple

Microsoft

Meta

Nike