Sometimes, the hype is real. Every so often, something comes along that’s promoted as the “next big thing,” and it actually really does live up to the label. For example, when Apple unveiled the first iPhone in 2007, it promised to change how we communicate, listen to music, and access the internet. Less than two decades later, it’s hard to imagine life without it.
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However, there are also times when a new product, idea, or technology comes along and it does not live up to the hype and just fizzles out. Recently, redditor Few_Football4342 was curious about those products when they asked: “What was supposed to be ‘The Next Big Thing’ but totally flopped?”
The thread got a ton of responses. Below are the top and most often repeated things people said:
1.“Segway”
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“They did a huge reveal on Good Morning America, advertising, ‘What is IT???’ Only for it to be a Segway.”
2.“The Microsoft Windows Phone.”
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3.“Google+ was supposed to be Facebook’s big rival.”
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“For about two days in 2011, thousands of users announced they were leaving Facebook for Google+ – and one week later, they were right back on Facebook.”
4.“Virtual reality, like two or three times.”
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“I wouldn’t say it flopped. It comes in waves, with each wave bringing progress.”
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5.“Google Video was supposed to rival YouTube, and then they bought YouTube.”
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6.“Microsoft Zune!”
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“My mom has a pink Zune THAT SHE STILL USES to listen to music. Obviously, she can’t add new music, but it’s like a time capsule, and it still charges and plays.”
7.“Before FaceTime and cellphone video tech was as advanced, there was a multilevel marketing company called ACN that was pushing these handheld desk phones with video screens for video calls. They were supposed to be HUGE. This was around 2006. I had friends who joined the company peddling these phones. Within a couple of years, the tech was obsolete.”
8.“Olean oil was supposed to be the future of healthy potato chips.”
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“It caused a lot of people to💩 themselves.”
9.“Sony MiniDisc. They came out before CD burning did. They had a slightly shorter run time and were fully rewritable with track skipping. It was a great idea that got shafted when rewritable CDs became a thing.”
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“In their defence, I had an MP3 player during the MiniDisc days. It cost $500 and had 32MB of storage. It was clearly the future, but not really the present at that time.”
10.“3D TV…my buddy had one, it was horrible (no good content), and everyone looked like idiots wearing those stupid glasses.”
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“I’m still disappointed this didn’t take off. I still have 3D Blu-rays and a 3D projector home theatre at home — and Jurassic Park kicks ass in 3D. It’s basically the only way you can watch 3D movies at home (unless I’m mistaken). And the only way you can watch a 3D movie is when it’s in theatres. Which is kinda disappointing.”
11.“Augmented reality glasses.”
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“I still think those are going to breakthrough but the technology isn’t there yet for them”
12.“HD DVD lost out to Blu-ray pretty spectacularly.”
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“HD DVDs, they lost the format war with Sony’s Blu-ray format. I had a friend who bought as many HD DVDs for ultra cheap when Blu-ray won, he still has his old Xbox 360 HD DVD player, he has a good collection.”
13.“Curved screen TVs. I thought I was in the future the first time I saw one of those.”
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14.“Facebook’s MetaVerse.”
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“They changed their company name to it, lol.”
15.“3D movies. A few of them were very well done, but most studios either did a cheap job as an afterthought or made an awful movie and expected the 3D to save it.”
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16.And lastly, “MySpace. It was, until it wasn’t.”
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You can read the original thread on Reddit.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
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