All articles tagged with #tech history
Netbooks, ultra-cheap and lightweight laptops popular from 2007 to 2013, vanished as smartphones and tablets offered better portability and performance. Manufacturers like Acer and Asus exited the market by 2013, leaving standard notebooks as the primary affordable laptop option.
Joanna Stern traces the MacBook Air’s journey from the 2008 envelope reveal to Apple’s Silicon era, showing how its slender, port-scarce design and vertical integration sparked industry-wide imitation and reshaped what a laptop could be.
Over 14 years of testing, the author highlights the weirdest phones that dared to be different—BlackBerry Passport’s square keyboard, YotaPhone’s rear E Ink display, HTC ChaCha’s Facebook button, Sirin Labs Finney’s crypto wallet, Planet Computers Gemini PDA, LG G5’s modular concept, Galaxy Note’s giant phablet edge, Nokia Lumia 1020’s 41MP camera, LG G4 leather and curved screen, Moto X with Moto Maker, and the original Galaxy Fold—showing how offbeat designs can either fade away or push the industry forward.
BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) revolutionized mobile communication by eliminating carrier costs and introducing a comprehensive 'everything app' that included features like music sharing and social posting, but ultimately declined due to device lock-in and changing industry dynamics, leaving a lasting legacy in messaging history.
The article discusses various tech projects and products that were abandoned or failed prematurely, including operating systems, programming languages, web standards, and hardware, often due to market forces, corporate decisions, or technological limitations, highlighting how some innovations were lost despite their potential.
The article argues that despite the hype around AI, history shows many technologies, including electric vehicles, cloning, and space exploration, have been halted or failed after initial promise. It criticizes the myth of unstoppable AI progress, highlights past AI winters, and warns that the current AI bubble may burst, leaving a significant cleanup. The author suggests that society can and should learn from history to contain and regulate AI before it causes more harm.
Perl, once a dominant and versatile programming language used in web development and bioinformatics, has fallen out of favor, leading to a decline in humility among programmers who no longer code in it.
Yahoo's missed opportunities to acquire Google and Facebook early on, combined with poor strategic decisions and management, contributed to its decline and the rise of these tech giants, which could have been different if Yahoo had acted differently. The article discusses the importance of innovation, leadership, and timing in the tech industry, highlighting how Yahoo's focus on short-term revenue and mismanagement led to its downfall.
After nearly 28 years, the pioneering messaging service ICQ will cease operations on June 26. Created by four Israeli developers in the late 1990s, ICQ laid the groundwork for modern direct messaging and social networking. Despite its early popularity, it eventually lost ground to competitors like AIM and MSN. Acquired by AOL and later by Russian company VK, ICQ has been kept alive as a niche service. The announcement has prompted nostalgic memories from users who recall its unique features and early online social interactions.