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What a totally weird list. They clearly didn't stop to consider what a technology is before writing this list. There are technologies that belong on a list like that, like virtual reality and voice recognition, but most of their items aren't technologies at all, but specific products. That's a very different thing.
Like listing the Apple Lisa. Yes, the product was a failure, but the technology it attempted to market was the graphical user interface. Yeah, like that never caught on! As all of us who follow tech things know, the first implementation of a new technology is not always successful. Sometimes it take several tries to get it right.
Or 10GB Ethernet. The technology is Ethernet and this just happens to be one speed variant of it. So innovation passed by this particular level of implementation and we'll be moving straight from 1GB to 100GB. In my book, that's not a technology failure, that's a technology success. The technology is progressing faster than the market.
The Itanium may be a failure as a product (though I'm just taking their word for it), but for the technology to be a failure, you have to say that 64-bit computing is a failure. That's the technology. The fact that Intel didn't build 32-bit compatibility into the chip was a marketing failure, but I seem to be hearing more and more about people running 64-bit versions of Windows now and that sounds to me like a technology that's just about to take off, not one that has failed.
In other places, they seem schizophrenic. Like with Ed's favorite whipping boy, Bluetooth, which at least is a technology. They list it as a failed technology, then end their discussion by telling us that their BT microphone is "incredibly useful and reliable". That's just bizarre. When I have something that is incredibly useful and reliable, I generally tend to think of the technology that drives it as successful.
The Vista problem was a failure in marketing, not a failure in technology. As code-frog pointed out, Windows 7 is just a refinement of all the same technologies and is getting great reviews.
Anyway, I guess it's food for thought, but I wish they had actually done the thing they said they would instead of just making it a list of 'ten things they wish were better.'
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