7 Botched Technological Inventions

Ah, technology, one thing we can’t get out of our minds nowadays. And yet, even though humanity has made some extraordinary inventions that propelled us to the future, this article is going to showcase the bad bunch of the tech industry. That’s right, there’s the good and the bad after all.

That’s way more interesting than trying to figure out the answer to the ‘how long is an essay’ question. History has gifted us some hilariously bad examples of technological progress. From fraudulent non-existent miracle blood tests to Nokia’s own gaming device, here’s our list of 7 botched inventions: 

1. Theranos 

At the top of our list has got to be Theranos. What is it? For those who are not in the know, Theranos was a company that claimed to have created a revolutionary blood test that could apparently be used by anyone, and that could show results immediately.

The logistics behind it may not be immediately apparent. Especially to non-medical professionals and students. But it should have been. You can visit Studyfy reddit for some useful academic advice. This will help you do better as you study, hopefully preventing such a grand scam from appearing ever again.

Theranos had a net worth of $9 billion at one point until everyone found out that it was all just an enormous scam. That’s right, the CEO and founder of Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes, had managed to collect billions in funding by lying to a bunch of investors, executives, and customers.

Evidently, Theranos was shut down in 2018, after everyone found out it was all fake and the blood test never even existed. Crazy right? Holmes has since been charged for fraud among other things. From the most recent press releases on her court procedures, she could be facing 20 years of imprisonment.

1. Google Glass

In 2012, Google introduced Google Glass, a device users could wear like sunglasses. Its purpose? To record and transmit everything that a person looks at. Shortly after its release, it got banned. Well, not too surprising, that’s a hard breach of privacy even for Google.

Most public establishments banned the use of Google Glasses, and for the good of humanity, Google gave up Google Glasses in the year of 2015. Don’t get your hopes up though, Google still knows everything about you.

Even so, the concept wasn’t completely bad. Users would get these smart glasses which could basically display information overlaid over the surroundings. No hands ma. Moreover, users could reportedly communicate with the Internet via voice commands.

We don’t rule out the possibility that Google just might revive this one in the near future.

1. Nokia N-gage

We know that just the name itself is probably invoking some bad and deeply repressed memories but Nokia N-gage did exist. Nokia, the center of two generations worth of memes, was actually the phone of the new millennium. We bet your uncles, aunties, and even parents had one at one point.

Nokia might be infamous, but we bet that most people don’t know about N-gage. N-gage was designed to be a cell phone and a handheld gaming device. It was supposed to compete with Game Boy Advance and was released in 2003. Unfortunately, N-gage didn’t reach its sales target and had not successfully crushed their competition.

Apart from its hilarious design, we will never know why it flopped so hard. On the other hand, Nokia hasn’t really been having much luck in the market for a while. It seems like a case of bad luck.

1. Firephone

One of the many business ventures of CEO/entrepreneur Jeffrey Bezos was the Firephone. Yes, that’s right. It was called the Firephone. Why was it botched? Who knows, maybe they rushed the product development, maybe they didn’t have enough coffee.

Most tech critics and reviews claim that the smartphone ran on bad software and it was an obvious byproduct to promote Amazon. Reportedly, Bezos directly supervised Firephone’s creation. Well, even Bezos has one or two things he can’t do right.

1. Virtual Boy

Way back in 1995, Nintendo gave the public Virtual Boy. The design was questionable. It was extremely heavy and chunky, and only red and black colors could be supported by the screen. It caused eye pain.

Nintendo really did risk it all for Virtual Boy, unfortunately, it flopped. The silver lining in this technological failure? It probably paved the way for other companies to take on the virtual reality route. Now we have the Oculus. Bless the technology gods.

1. Pebble

What’s better than a good smartwatch? Pebble, we suppose, isn’t really a botch more so than the ‘right product at the wrong time’ kind of deal. Pebble existed before Samsung and the big Apple dominated the smartwatch market. The original Pebble raised $10 million dollars in funds in the year 2012!

Unfortunately, the smartwatch market just wasn’t big enough in recent years for good old Pebble to survive. The company sold Pebble over to Fitbit. If the company had held its ground during its dark years and re-introduced and remarketed its product, it would have probably found success. Either way, they pioneered and paved the way for the smartwatch market of today. Kudos. 

1. Samsung Galaxy Note 7 (2017)

In the beginning, Note 7 was idolized by supporters, claiming it was the best of the best. Not long after, the Note 7 started catching fire. Yep, the little Note 7s exploded in kitchens, airplane rides, cars, and so on. Pretty dangerous.

The cause of this? Lithium-ion batteries. The worst part? Samsung is one of the largest manufacturers of batteries on Earth. We don’t have any information on their bases on Mars yet.

2017 was a bad year for Samsung, and their reputation was never the same after this disaster. Samsung tried releasing replacement devices but they caught fire as well. In the end, they had to completely give up on Note 7. 

Final words

We hope you had a good laugh at the rich history of humanity’s tech inventions. Failure is the mother of success after all. We only credited the failed inventions throughout time, but humans have made enormous and impressive strides in the technological sector. Maybe Musk and Bezos will make commercial space flight available before we have our first grandkids.