WOF: Biggest tech failures of 2012

[Jos]

When we asked this question a year ago most of you agreed that AMD’s FX brand relaunch, Sony’s PSN data breach, Netflix’s Qwikster spin-off, and HP’s handling of WebOS while almost quitting the PC market were among the worst tech failures of 2011. The threat to freedom of the web through initiatives like SOPA rounded out the top five. Fortunately, the bill was shelved along with PIPA and CISPA this year following a massive Internet blackout that several heavyweights including Reddit and Wikipedia took part on.

On that note, the latter is probably worthy of a mention as one of the biggest tech triumphs of the year, but we’ll keep our champaign bottles corked for now as the idea of legislative action lives on among those in power.

As you’d expect 2012 brought on a fresh batch of tech failures and we’re putting them up for another vote. Among my picks (in no particular order) are the troubled Facebook IPO amid a technical fault on Nasdaq’s system, HP overpaying for Autonomy and taking a multi-billion dollar charge, RIM’s inability to deliver BlackBerry 10 devices on time, and AMD’s continued decline as a serious competitor to Intel.

But there’s plenty more to choose from. There’s the Google Nexus Q that was killed off before launch, Apple Maps, the ongoing litigation over mobile patents, and though it’s too early too tell perhaps even Microsoft’s Surface tablet along with the Metro interface could be worthy of the list.

Cast your votes below (up to three picks) and let us know about any tech failures we've left out.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/51104-wof-biggest-tech-failures-of-2012.html

 

[oldikes]

Hybrid and convertible laptops are amazing. Its a shame they are pretty much forced windows 8 at this point.

 

[Darkshadoe]

Windows 8 itself is a failure. Not for the reason I thought it would be though. It really reminds me of WinME. Sure it has some nifty new features and changes, but overall, the whole OS is pointless other than a new hub just to sell stuff. Once you uninstall all of that stuff..Its Win 7 without a START button.

 

[Randomthom]

If this had been UK-centric I'd have expected to see (and voted for) Everything Everywhere (EE) & their 4g network with no unlimited data plans (& extortionate pricing).

 

[misor]

Windows 8 itself is a failure. Not for the reason I thought it would be though. It really reminds me of WinME. Sure it has some nifty new features and changes, but overall, the whole OS is pointless other than a new hub just to sell stuff. Once you uninstall all of that stuff..Its Win 7 without a START button.

so the team behind windows 8 development just removed the start button of windows 7 and called it windows 8?
all those wasted time for nothing.
/s

 

[Darkshadoe]

so the team behind windows 8 development just removed the start button of windows 7 and called it windows 8?
all those wasted time for nothing.
/s

Don't get me wrong, I know some people really like Win8 and I'm glad for them. In my opinion, however, I really do not believe it is much different than Win 7. I think they just rushed it out the door just for the sake of selling apps and to get a piece of Google's and Apple's pie.

 

[NTAPRO]

Like apple did with the ipad mini? lol

 

[krayzie]

This writer must be an apple fan boy... He forgot to mention apple maps

 

[krayzie]

This writer must be an apple fan boy... He forgot to mention apple maps

With iPhone 5 and ios6 and purple camera

 

[Guest]

You couldn't find room for AMD's Piledriver FX chips? They could have won back to back Tech failure of the year awards with them!

Those chips are about on par with processors AMD was releasing 4 years ago. How is that not worthy of a biggest tech failure of the year nomination?

 

[Jos]

You couldn't find room for AMD's Piledriver FX chips? They could have won back to back Tech failure of the year awards with them!

Those chips are about on par with processors AMD was releasing 4 years ago. How is that not worthy of a biggest tech failure of the year nomination?

Yeah I mentioned AMD on the post but forgot to include it in the poll... my bad

 

[Jos]

This writer must be an apple fan boy... He forgot to mention apple maps

Perhaps you should take another look. Apple Maps is mentioned and so far is the most voted on the poll as well. The iPhone 5 is definitely not a 'failure'. You may dislike the phone, the company, or iOS but that doesn't change the fact that a lot of people do like it and it's selling like crazy.

 

[Business Direct]

I don't see Piledriver as a fail it's a great mid-range chip for encoding video. What is a fail is Intel's mobile market share versus ARM. Intel has spent so much time focused on kicking a 3 legged dog that's it's overlooked the scorpion.

 

[Guest]

hmm, I wonder why "never ending clash between Apple fanboys vs Win fanboys" not included in the poll?

 

[killeriii]

hmm, I wonder why "never ending clash between Apple fanboys vs Win fanboys" not included in the poll?

Seeing as Microsoft and Apple are competing for top spot on this list, I'd say neither has many fans on this forum right now.

 

[davislane1]

How is Zuckerburg et. al. duping people into buying FB on the IPO not at the top of the list?

Apple Maps: Embarrassed Apple, frustrated users.
FB IPO: Embarrassed analysts, FB, the NASDAQ, and took a whole lot of people for a whole lot of money.

 

[Tygerstrike]

The complete and utter fail of RIM is one to certainly take note of. RIM and Apple were the two major developers who rammed smartphones down our collective consumer gullet. They helped spark the smartphone revolution. Now they cant even release a phone. There was a time when BlackBerry was literally EVERYWHERE. This is a tech giant who didnt end with a bang but with a gurgly sigh.

 

[Puiu]

Windows 8. anything else is just small.

 

[TS-56336]

How is Zuckerburg et. al. duping people into buying FB on the IPO not at the top of the list?

Apple Maps: Embarrassed Apple, frustrated users.
FB IPO: Embarrassed analysts, FB, the NASDAQ, and took a whole lot of people for a whole lot of money.

Well said. You have my vote on this one.

 

[MilwaukeeMike]

How is Zuckerburg et. al. duping people into buying FB on the IPO not at the top of the list?

Apple Maps: Embarrassed Apple, frustrated users.
FB IPO: Embarrassed analysts, FB, the NASDAQ, and took a whole lot of people for a whole lot of money.

Well... for one, Zuckerburg didn't want an IPO. It was required from the SEC once FB got enough investors. They got to the point where they needed money, but couldn't continue to get investment without going public. They were also pushed into going public by it's current investors who wanted a return on the money they had given FB. It shouldn't even be on the list... no one thought FB was ever going to be some big money making machine, it's why the stock went down immediately and stayed there.

Part of defining failure should be an element of surprise... like Apple maps. Who would have thought Apple would fall on their face with a piece of software.

Windows 8 should be a failure of marketing. It's so different from Win 7 that it's more of a side-grade than an upgrade. They should have called it Windows Metro or something and marketed it as an option for your desktop if you wanted your computer to act more like a tablet/phone.

I think the patent war is the biggest failure, but it'll go beyond 2012 of course. There doesn't seem to be any end in sight.

 

[veLa]

You couldn't find room for AMD's Piledriver FX chips?

I wouldn't really call Piledriver a failure. They're $100 cheaper than the comparable i5's, add another $100 saved on your motherboard. Then consider that we're only talking about saving over the i5 series, the Core i7's are even more expensive. I've had enough to time to play around with the Vishera chips and I was quite impressed with their overclocking potential and their speeds.

AMD does not have the performance crown but they sure a good deal for the price range. This is coming from an owner of a Core i7 and an FX-8320 by the way.

 

[cliffordcooley]

For the record, I can't for the life of me classify Apple Maps a failure. Now what I do classify as a failure, is Apple dropping Google Maps (and not offering it as an option) in favor of their own unfinished product. As much as I don't care for Apple, I cannot label a new product as a failure until its had enough time to become a failure. If there is still a future in Apple Maps then it can not be labeled a failure.

 

[xdefine1x]

Lol..check the vote now. apple maps in the top list lol

This writer must be an apple fan boy... He forgot to mention apple maps

 

[psycros]

Metro/Modern/WTFever UI has got to be in the top five. Its the interface nobody asked for and nobody likes..well, nobody except Microsoft fangirls (what few there are).

 

[hahahanoobs]

You couldn't find room for AMD's Piledriver FX chips?

I wouldn't really call Piledriver a failure. They're $100 cheaper than the comparable i5's, add another $100 saved on your motherboard. Then consider that we're only talking about saving over the i5 series...

And if you were smart and already owned an i5, you wouldn't have to upgrade your CPU or motherboard as long as AMD CPU's are still being produced.

I agree that we could benefit from AMD being more competitive, but I refuse to make CPU purchases out of pity from a company stuck on releasing stale CPU's and APU's fused to a stale CPU year after year. AMD fanboys are cheapskates. That is a fact. AMD GPU's are solid, but they are marketing their APU's as Intel GPU competitors, and that is just laughable. Pick on someone your own size and then you will get respect. Oh right, you gave up on that (CPU) fight...