Last week we speculated on who would win the coveted Vaporware awards for 2007 like the Optimus Maxiumus keyboard, or Spore – the new game from the Sims creator. The official list is out, and now we know who has officially won an award for “the year’s top technology products promised, hyped and scheduled, but not delivered.” Without further ado, here is Wired’s annual Vaporware Awards for 2007.
10. Steorn Orbo - a magnetic motor device that generates free, constant energy.The scheduled public demo that was supposed to happen in July of this year was canceled.
9. Tesla Roadster – this car is supposed to be turning heads already! It was originally scheduled for a launch in October, but this electric car never did.
8. 802.11n - this new Wi-Fi standard that’s supposed to be much faster has been a work in progress since 2006 and was set to be finalized in January of 2007. It was a no-show, and now it’s not expected until 2009…
7. Diablo III – set to be the follow-up to Diablo II which was launched in 2000, Diablo III hasn’t been mentioned by Blizzard (gaming company) for a while.
6. Windows Mobile 6 for Samsung Blackjack – BlackJack owners have been waiting in anticipation for WM 6 to surface, but it hasn’t.
5. Windows XP Service Pack 3 – while the Release Candidate is out, Windows XP users still haven’t gotten their update!
4. Optimus Maximus – This is one speculation we got right… no Optimus Maxiumus keyboard once again!
3. Chinese Democracy – The Guns N’ Roses album in the works since 1994!
2. Spore – Yet another item we speculated would be on the list is Spore – the new game from the Sims Creator. The earliest we’re expected to see it is April of 2008.
1. Duke Nukem Forever – This one could be on here for life but as Wired says, “long live the king!”
I would argue that Diablo III shouldn’t be in there, as it has never actually been announced by Blizzard. Its assumed to come one day and it probably will but giving it a vapourware award seems like it goes a little too far.
As for the Orbo thing, considering its bullshit with no actual product I don’t really think it deserves an award other than to put pressure on them to either reveal something or stop making false claims. Interestingly they have published financial information though that suggests that in the past six years they’ve made a net loss of about 3m Euros which seems impressive considering they don’t seem to have actually ever produced _anything_
It’s funny that you mention Duke Nukem Forever, I just read about some new progress being made on a Dutch news site.
Here’s what the Wikipedia has to say about this:
“A new video was released on 19 December 2007 made by employees of 3D Realms during their spare time to show at the annual Christmas party. The announcement had also confirmed earlier speculation that composer Jeremy Soule (Total Annihilation, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Prey) had joined the team. George Broussard made clear that the video was a teaser, rather than a trailer. He noted that all other media related to Duke Nukem Forever was no longer relevant, including the trailer released in 2001, and that a brand-new trailer would be released in the coming months. Broussard also confirmed that the video was shot real-time from the game, with the exception of some introduction and ending shots.”
- [en.wikipedia.org]
How about Firefox 3?! May be we will see it next year.
That isn’t exactly vapourware though – we’ve seen continuous progress through nightlies, Alpha and now Beta builds this entire year, and it only started just over a year ago. I think it unlikely that it will fail to come out in 2008.
Vista Ultimate Extras? No mention? Sheesh…
P.S. typo alert – “The Guns N’ Roses album in the words since 1994!”
Should be ‘works’, I’m sure.
You really don’t know what vapourware means, do you? What an embarassing news posts.
With the focus being on Starcraft 2 at the moment, I don’t think any news of Diablo 3 will be released. I do believe Diablo 3 will come along after Starcraft 2. Blizzard has the tendency to work on only one product at the time.
I don’t think it deserves a place on the list quite yet. It was planned to be released this year originally, but that was a little ambitious.
That should have definitely been on the list, but I guess they did release a few of them.
Well, the list was just restated from Wired.