Top 4 tech flops of all time

Technological advancement has been a success for most, but a few faded away. They came fast out of nowhere and departed even faster. Here is a list of the top 4 which deserve a place in the flop Hall of Fame:

Akimbo (2005): A Hulu concept years before Hulu was even introduced. This was supposed to be a set-top box that would deliver any TV show at any time from the Internet. The pay system was problematic and costly. Not only you had to pay for the box, but also the monthly subscription and for every show you viewed. The American TV companies, who at that time were still suffering from the trauma of how Internet took over the music industry, expected the same for television and refused to acknowledge.

Olympus M:Robe (2004): M:Robe was the short for “Music Wardrobe”. The device in its first year advertised itself with a $5 million SuperBowl commercial where it was revealed that it was both a camera and a music player, but could perform neither efficiently. The device was off the market the following year.

Microsoft Bob (1995): Notably one of Microsoft’s most visible failures. The software provided a non-technical interface to desktop computing operations. Bob was there to help novice computer users but Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer explained its failure as a situation where we decided that we have not succeeded and let's stop.

Vulkano Box (2010): Vulkano Box was supposed to be a do-everything set-top box and was intended to record shows for viewing later and letting you watch recordings over the Internet, normally what TiVo and Slingbox does. However, the box was unable to auto-record shows every week. The box would even get locked if you wanted to scroll the TV guide. Vulkano became a disaster.