Jan. 6, 2026
Inventions That Flopped
Inventions That Flopped: Google Glass, Betamax, and tech predictions gone wrong.
You may also like ODD ONE OUT. a new podcast with Mark Ellison! Mark gives you 4 words, you decide which word does not belong. Three rounds daily, quick and fun,
Portions of today's trivia podcast were made with the help of AI.
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Calarrogus Shark Media. I am Mark Ellison, and today's theme
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is inventions that flopped, Google Glass, Beta Max and tech
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predictions gone wrong. Question one. Google Glass sparked excitement and
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anxiety and equal measure What specific onboard feature of the
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headset provoked bands in bars, movie theaters, and even some
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workplaces because of privacy concerns? Question two. In the nineteen
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seventies home video format, war Sony's Beta Max was lauded
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for picture quality, yet it lost the mass market. What
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early practical advantage of jbc's VHS format most swayed consumers?
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Question three, which Tech Leader infamously declared in two thousand
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and seven that there was no chance the iPhone would
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gain significant market share, a prediction contradicted by the smartphone
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revolution that followed. Question four. A nineteen ninety five Newsweek
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column titled the Internet Bah argued online shopping, ebooks and
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telecommuting would never take off. Who wrote this? Now famous
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skeptics take question five. Around two thousand, a cat shaped
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USB scanner was mailed by the millions to link printed
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barcodes in ads directly to websites, but the idea fizzled
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amid privacy concerns and clunky software. What was this gadget called?
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We'll be right back with these answers after this break,
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welcome back. Question one? What glass feature caused privacy backlash? Answer?
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It's built in camera. The tiny camera made it easy
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to record photos and video discreetly, raising fears of surveillance
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and unauthorized recording. Many venues responded with policies prohibiting glass
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to protect patron's privacy. Question two. What advantage helped VHS
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beat Betamax? Answer? Longer recording time? First generation Betamax tapes
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held about an hour, while VHS offered two hours or more,
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enough to capture a full movie or game. That convenience,
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combined with broader licensing, pushed VHS to dominance. Question three.
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Who said in two thousand and seven the iPhone wouldn't
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gain market share? Answer Steve Balmer, the then Microsoft CEO,
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dismissed the iPhone's prospects shortly after its unveiling. Within a
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few years, iOS and Android reshaped the mobile industry, leaving
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that forecast as a classic miss. Question four. Who wrote
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Newsweek's nineteen ninety five The Internet Bah column? Answer Clifford Stole,
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astronomer and author Clifford Stole underestimated the Webb's potential in
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that essay. He later acknowledged how dramatically the Internet proved
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him wrong. Question five, What was the cat shaped barcode
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gadget that flopped? Answer? QCAT. Digital Convergence's QCAT partnered with
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magazines and radio shack to drive web traffic by scanning
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codes from print. Few consumers adopted it, and the program
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was discontinued after heavy losses. That concludes today's five daily
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Trivia Questions. I'm Mark Ellison, and today's questions were crafted
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with the help of AI technology. See you tomorrow.
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