Biggest Technology Flops of 2013?

Windows 8 had hype? This is news to me.

Google Glass isn't actually available at retail yet, so I'm not sure what sorts of sales figures you're quoting for it.

Regardless, I'd say Ouya. The hype for that thing, at least in this sort of community, was off the charts. I'm not sure that any of the others had any sort of widespread "hype," though some diehard BB fans might have been hopeful for BB10.

I had major anticipation for the Surface tablet. Remember that table "surface" that you could put a camera on, and it would instantly download the photos to itself, among other cool things? Then, we got this.

Didn't buy one of course.

Ouya

Sure it is.

It was between the Ouya and Blackberry 10 for me, but I never expected much from the Ouya to begin with, so it wasn't as big of a flop for me.

Almost voted for the Surface, but then say the Ouya option. No brainer.

Ouya!

That poor poor little Ouya...

Ouya

Some of those things don't belong there. Google Glass isn't a retail product, Windows 8... No. Ouya got my vote.

Healthcare.gov can't really be a tech flop, as the tech was there to make a working site. It was just done poorly.

Also, I'd say Ouya, but I expected it to be little more than a gizmo to play emulators on your TV with, and it seems like it does an okay job of that, so not that big of a flop. It just had dumb amounts of hype that it could have never lived up to even if it was amazing.

Sort of like The Buggles with "Video Killed the Radio Star". They're a clear one hit wonder, but if the one hit is really fucking good, maybe it's not that bad of a thing?

I dunno, I don't think people really expected that much from the Ouya. I think the amount of money and effort Microsoft pushed into the Surface tablets, to the point of designing their main operating system around it, only to have it go basically nowhere, makes it the biggest flop in my opinion.

Oh, you don't mean technology as in new technology but as in a thing that incorporates technology.

I dunno, The Lone Ranger?

Healthcare.gov being fucked for as long as it was is the winner. That isnt some dumb shitty product that no one bought, its a service some people were required to use, unless they wanted to pay a fee and not have health insurance for a year.

Healthcare.gov was freaking BROKEN when it launched - they did zero stress testing, and they barely did any other sort of testing before it was shoved out the door to meet the deadline. This is a complete embarrassment, especially due to the fact that it was supposed to be the first step to provide affordable healthcare to everyone... Ugh. This seriously makes the launch of Battlefield 4 look playable in comparison.

Though since this is a game site, I went with the Ouya because that was also a big disappointment. I was hoping that it would live up to the hype, but it didn't, and I'm so glad I didn't invest money into that thing.

It depends on whether or not this is new technology or old technology being applied to something new. The latter is Healthcare.gov, hands down. You'd think that the US government would have the resources to make something like that work, especially since it's, y'know, a big part of Obamacare and all. But no, it looked like a bad MMO launch.

For new technology, or rather new devices, it's clearly the Ouya.

As much as I dislike the Ouya, I don't know how you can call it a failure when it's been in the top ten selling videogame products for almost the entire year on Amazon.

I love that the Ouya is beating healthcare.... That's amazing. And really not in a good way.

The Ouya is a piece of shit but at least it works. The US government not being able to get a fucking website functional is beyond hilarious.

It may be a commercial failure (or not... I don't know the numbers it moved), but I definitely wouldn't consider the Ouya a "technology flop". It was always marketed like it was: a budget console running Android, and that's exactly what they shipped.

The whole Healthcare.gov debacle had a much deeper and wider impact, considering what was at stake and the people behind it. From a purely commercial PoV, the Blackberry 10 was (probably) Blackberry's last chance at recovering some market share... a opportunity they didn't manage to take advantage of. The Surface has been only a partil flop for Microsoft: the x86 version seems to be quite good, especially the Surface 2, while the ARM version is being discontinued.

All in all, I'd say that Healthcare.gov was the biggest "flop" this year, at least considering how much resources the American government has to deal with such a task.

how exactly could Healthcare.gov work considering the media is over saturated with talking heads saying "GOVERNMENT DOESN'T WORK, LETS DROWN IT IN A BATHTUB!!" It was an under funded program that was lucky to get an MMO style launch.

My apologies - I thought some form of Google Glass was available in the US. (I'm Canadian).

Did anybody here actually buy a Ouya?

people are buying them just to smash them out of spite

Anybody able to get onto healthcare.gov from their Ouya?

What is it with Americans and health care stuff? Free hospitals are the best thing ever. Literally.

Ouya by FAR what a letdown how did they screw the controller up SO BAD.

Also the surface is a nice piece of tech it just suffers due to the Store being devoid of quality apps. Also when you break it down it is pretty much a $500 Laptop Smashed into a $900 tablet. Dat pen feels nice lol. Also Windows 8 actually works there pretty well to bad working on 8 as a technician BLOOOOOOOOWS!

Ouya? More like OuNO!

Ouya. Hands down

How can it not be the healthcare fiasco?

That Healthcare website man. Obama & the democrats worked so hard to get this law made, and once they finally did, every day was malfunctioning was prime political fuel for their opponents. Oh, and people need to be able to buy health insurance, too.

I would say Ouya because does anyone know who the hell actually bought that thing? While the Healthcare website was pretty bad, it seems a bit odd to be placed here. All the rest of the options are all physical things that people go out and buy while the Healthcare website was more of an event. So even though it was a must for people , it's pretty amazing to hear about millions of people logging into this thing and even being successful enough to sign up for it.

Barnacules Nerdgasm owns a Ouya, thats literally the only person I know of that bought one....I don't think he thinks highly of it either...

I don't understand why the Surface is even here, it was advertised as a portable and powerful laptop/tablet hybrid and delivers on that front. I can see the RT being shitty because well, all tablets are shitty. But definitely not the Pro - absolutely amazing piece of technology.

We've had one since the Kickstarter.

It's been switched on twice, and only one game has ever been played on it (the demo of Final Fantasy III).

lol

The surface is out? I guess that answers it...

lol..how well did it handle the demo???

Healthcare.gov isn't a flop, it just had a rough start.

Noone gives a shit about Ouya, and noone ever will.

It was pretty much fine, bar having to hold that controller in my hands. Yes, I know I could have hooked up another pad. I did not want to.

Healthcare.gov in terms of something that actually matters.

Ouya in terms of what this site cares about.