Miss #6: Newton

The thing to remember here is that while some of these were in fact duds, most of them where just so far ahead of their time. The newton was ahead of the curve on PDA, Lisa was a run at the GUI, the mac TV, etc. These are all important flops and very innovative.

Their biggest problem wasn’t the handwriting recognition; it was the syncing.

Wait the minute, this is not a miss, Newton was ahead of it’s times, people and technology were not ready for it.
Besides, most of Newton people ended up in Palm, remember them?
Yes, the PDA people.

not a miss at all… not sure how u measure success, but from an innovation standpoint it was ahead of its time and it was a tremendous success because so many others copied it.

who comes up with this anyway? is there an editorial panel that judges these or just some dude out of his apartment picking on random things?

If it’s such a miss then why do they still go for $$$ on ebay?
The world’s first PDA was not a miss.

Agree with graphicwise. Reality is that there are only one or two lame horses in Apple’s entire stable, not anywhere near enough to justify an article.

Hm, can it really be considered a “miss” when — how many years later is it? — you’re posting five times a day and live-blogging an event to announce a modern version of the same product?

This is a tough one. I don’t consider the Newton a miss. Granted, it had problems, but it was so far ahead of anything else out there that it’s pretty unfair to call it a miss. Look at what the Newton did back in the early 90s and yet today we’re clamoring for devices with similar functionality, ie: smartphones. I understand why the Newton was shelved, but also can’t help but feel that had it received more attention at Apple, it would have matured into a very robust product line.

It’s crazy that all these people are defending this junk. I use a ton of different products and you can call anyone of them junk and I really don’t care, as long as I get use out of them, it doesn’t matter what you thinks. These Apple people screwed up. Something is considered a miss if it is not embraced by the majority of the people that use that type of product. IPOD is a hit as most of the market uses it. Windows computers are used by over 90%, hit. Mac computers, less than 8 percent of the market…. MISS! I will never be loyal to a brand. I use what works and what makes me happy.

That’s a very narrow way of looking at things, snowski. By your logic, the only great art is whatever is consumed by the masses? If the majority of people don’t embrace Picasso, it’s a miss, right? Ferraris aren’t “hits” either, right, because only a few people buy them? And Windows is a hit because 90+% of the world uses it, never mind the BILLIONS of dollars spent each year on support for a totally inferior, bug-ridden operating system? How much has Windows’s lack of security cost business and consumers? Every time the virus du jour hits, how much is lost?

You say you use what works? Well, what do you think Apple customers do? And they’re spending a lot less money and time on problems, security issues, viruses, blue screens of death, etc. than any PC user I’ve ever known. But, sure, keep using what works for you.

By my book I have no way to know if the Farrari is a hit cuz I can’t afford one, never drove one either. So to me, it is a miss. How can I say it is a hit if I never have used it. Correct by your logic, Picasso would be a miss. A song that doesn’t sell is a miss. A movie that doesn’t sell is a miss. You didn’t mention the millions that Apple is spending in updating their bug ridden system. Windows is so inferior that I made 7 figures last year with my windows based software. Apple doesn’t cost anyone money due to viruses and lack of security because NO one uses it. If I was writing viruses, I would write them for the masses, not the 5% market share of mac users. Apple said their system was secure out of the box for about a week. Remember that commercial that they pulled after like 1 day. All of the hackers converted their virus for the masses (windows users) to the 5% mac users and all hell broke loose. Mac needs to worry about advertising it’s features, instead of always telling people how bad the competition is.

Apple customers spend less time with issues because there isn’t any software for their computers. It’s like having a car that you don’t drive and bragging about it never breaking down. If Microsoft restricted software’s use before their approval, like Apple, there wouldn’t be any issues either. There also wouldn’t be any software available (like Apple) and people like me wouldn’t be in business. The reason you know of all these people with issues is because most people don’t use Apple. I personally know like 2 people and no business that use Macs. People that have Macs won’t ever admit that their systems are trash.

Apple wish they could be like Microsoft. Do your research, if it wasn’t for Microsoft, Apple wouldn’t even exist. Back in the early 90′s, Microsoft purchased $10′s of millions in Apple stock to keep them from going under. Microsoft was under scrutiny by the SEC because of their dominance in the computer world and was forced to help Apple.

A market flop because it was too early, Apple didn’t have the market clout to get people to adopt to new ways of doing things. Palm took everything the Newton was and made it mainstream.

Newton was an innovation, not a miss.

snowskiman, you are a blithering idiot… Let me count the ways.

“Apple wish they could be like Microsoft. Do your research, if it wasn’t for Microsoft, Apple wouldn’t even exist. Back in the early 90′s, Microsoft purchased $10′s of millions in Apple stock to keep them from going under. Microsoft was under scrutiny by the SEC because of their dominance in the computer world and was forced to help Apple.”

You don’t get it do you? Microsoft made a deal to buy $150 million of non-voting stock in trade for being able to continue shipping Office for Mac which is a VERY lucrative product for MS. In exchange, Apple bundled IE as the default browser helping MS kill off Netscape as being viable competition in the original browser wars. Since that point, MS has never lost the lead. Also, MS made a LOT of money (275% return on investment if I remember correctly) on the stock they purchased. This was a deal that Steve Jobs made with With Bill Gates and with it, Steve took back control of Apple, fired the board of directors, cleaned house and turned it into the power-house it is today.

Now, on to your next bit of “huh?”; “By my book I have no way to know if the Farrari is a hit cuz I can’t afford one,” But I thought you made 7 figures last year! In downtown Seattle, you can buy a F430F1 Spider for only $185,000 so that would be less than a quarter of your last year’s supposed income alone! Wait a minute, you meant 7 figures like this: $xx,xxx.xx not $x,xxx,xxx I see now, it all makes sense. In that case I made 8 figures off of OSX systems last year so it looks like one of us will enjoy better cars than the other. ;)

Says it all.

While I agree with snowskiman that you should never be loyal to a brand because over years companies have ups and downs I would disagree that the iMac is a miss at only 8% of total computers. Mac long time ago learned it lost the war against IBM/Microsoft. So now their model for computers is to capture the market that find Microsoft and PC’s boring, lame, unfriendly…whatever and they cater a product that sells to them. And Mac fans are very loyal as you can see from the reactions here. I myself was an Apple hater. As an artist I resisted the call from others to join the cult. However a combination of factors happened, I discovered the iPOD and loved its functionality, and I discovered how unfriendly Vista was. Its like Microsoft took workflow concepts from its development programs like Sharepoint and dropped them into Office among other programs. Windows was becoming more restricted, more click happy, and not fixing problems like viruses, and glitches that made XP a flawed (although durable) OS. So I decided to give the iMac a try because…1. I’m an artist and others had been telling me for years that I didn’t know what I was missing (Adobe runs like a dream). 2. I liked my iPOD and iTunes a lot. 3. I liked the design and functionality of iMac when I got to play with one. 4. Their commercials were funny. “I’m a Mac.” (Windows…I’m a PC add are generally lame retorts by the bigger bully on the block.) So now I have an iMac. I love it. Knock on wood but after two years my iMac still runs great. The only thing I wish for and arguably Apple should have gotten to it by now is a Blu-Ray player for them. Its these smaller obvious omissions that often go unnoticed by Apple. Still that being said I can play HD videos on my HD monitor through ITUNES and various other sites. So Apple at this moment in my humble opinion is the better deal. From what I heard Windows 7 is better but what little I’ve seen hasn’t attracted me back. BTW I’m not a PC hater (Dell still makes great affordable machines) and upto XP I defended Microsoft more than criticized.

So ahead of it’s time. but it is on the miss list because it made Apple no $$$$

OK kids, the definition of something “ahead of its time” is a product that functions as it should but no one uses it or can think of a use.

All the “Rolls Royce” and fine art metaphors are wrong in this instance.

This thing was crap.

as snowski pointed out, apple dont get as many viruses because they’re less of them out there. I’m currently an IT student studying network technology and computer programming and all my teachers say the same thing. it’s like saying ” you should live in new jersey instead of africa, cause you are least likely to get eaten by a lion” the problem here is that these comments are being written by users with no IT experience. all they know is that apple made the mac so apple rules. get your facts people. 95% of the ITs that I know own a pc and hate apple computers. If thats not enough than what is? now watch how many people are going to comment about how much of an idiot i am and i dont know what im talking about even though i dedicated my life to computers

I find this rather entertaining, I dont really prefer any OS or manufacturer – but these are misses, for the day they were far ahead of there time but so was the oldsmobile – far ahead of its time but still a flop.

Its true that sales define a success just as a lack of them define a flop, regardless of how when we look back now they really defined the future. The original Iphone was a marginal success – many people handed them back the 3Gs however is a true success this first gen technology is normally either a fail or mild success until either bugs get worked out or it folds into insignificance.