Products like the Apple Newton and the Nintendo Power Glove immediately come up to mind when reminiscing about applied science that was before its fourth dimension. Despite their innovative nature and cutting-edge features, even so, virtually are remembered every bit immediate failures for one reason or another. We won't exist concentrating on those here today.

Instead, this article will focus on products, services and ideas of yesteryear that didn't necessarily flop out of the gate. Some were quite popular and are still around today while others were a bit more obscure but all had a vision that helped shape today's technological landscape. Permit's take a look.

AOL Instant Messenger (AIM)

Came before: WhatsApp, Slack, Facebook Messenger, Snapchat

Before mobile devices and social networking, online conversation applications were the go-to advice method for millions of calculator users. Chief amongst them was AIM, a peer-to-peer chat program that originally came baked into AOL'south suite of Cyberspace products in the late '90s.

The app was later released as a standalone download and competed for supremacy aslope other popular chat apps like Yahoo! Messenger, ICQ and MSN Messenger. It remained popular through most of the last decade – an eternity in technology fourth dimension – but AOL'south inability to gain traction with the mobile generation ultimately led to its demise.

AIM is scheduled to shut down on December fifteen although its influence can be felt in many of today's top conversation apps including WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Snapchat.

Digg (news aggregator)

Came before: Reddit, Quora, Flipboard

Reddit, 1 of the most popular Net destinations for millennials, owes much of its success to a social news site that came before it. Digg got its beginning in late 2004 as an experiment to facilitate the discovery and sharing of content from effectually the web. Its creators bolstered the service with new and innovative features over the coming years and were rewarded with a loyal fan base that collection immense amounts of traffic to the site. The concept was like to Slashdot albeit for all types of content, not just tech stories.

Digg was far from perfect, yet, every bit some members figured out how to game the voting organization for political and fiscal gain. The site as well battled with censorship problems only the straw that broke the camel'due south back came in August 2010 with the release of Digg v4, a issues and glitch-ridden overhaul that removed many of the site'southward most love features.

Days later on, disgruntled users staged a "quit Digg twenty-four hours" that resulted in many users defecting to Reddit. Digg managed to survive the mass exodus, merely was somewhen sold for a fraction of its previous value and no longer resembles its former self.

Motorola Atrix 4G smartphone

Came before: Chromebooks, Samsung Dex, potentially other time to come phones

Motorola came to CES 2011 with a doozie of a smartphone. The Atrix 4G was among the first to feature a dual-core CPU which, according to Motorola, was powerful enough to let you use the handset every bit a full-blown desktop computer (except it wasn't).

The Atrix 4G was sold alongside your choice of a desktop or laptop mobile dock. The thought was simple – plug the phone into the dock and utilize its dual-core processor and 1GB of RAM equally the brains of a standalone computer.

Information technology was a novel concept but Motorola was too early to marketplace with information technology. A dual-core SoC from 2011 simply wasn't powerful enough to drive the feel and Motorola asked mode too much for the accessories ($499 for a laptop dock that was useless without the telephone).

Android was withal in its infancy -- the handset shipped with Android 2.2 -- as was the smartphone industry as a whole. Motorola wasn't really committed to the thought, either, peculiarly after the company was sold to Google a few months later.

In Motorola's defense, several others have launched similar efforts in recent years to no avail (Samsung Dex and Microsoft Continuum immediately come to listen). I've included information technology here today because I believe the concept still has legs. It may be a few years out but with adoption of mobile devices skyrocketing, their current and futurity potential performance, and mainstream PC usage transforming in unlike form factors, we could eventually see the two platforms merge.

Sega Game Gear handheld console

Came before: Nintendo DS, PSP, PS Vita, Nintendo Switch

The North American video game manufacture in the late '80s and early '90s was dominated by one proper name: Nintendo. While the company'due south NES and SNES consoles were all the rave at dwelling, it was the Game Boy that drew the assignment in the portable segment.

The handheld didn't go uncontested, however, as arch rival Sega launched the technically superior Game Gear less than two years after the Game Boy'due south arrival.

Codenamed Projection Mercury, the viii-scrap handheld notably featured a total-color backlit display in a landscape format and a pattern that was much more than comfortable to agree for long periods of time. Information technology was too somewhat reasonably priced at $149.99 albeit still more than expensive than the $89.95 asking price of the Game Boy.

Unfortunately, Sega's Game Gear was hampered by poor battery life (about 3.5 hours per six AA batteries) and a lack of third-political party developer support.

Sega sold just over 10 million units during the Game Gear's v-twelvemonth lifespan, far fewer than the Game Male child. Nevertheless, information technology was an of import stepping rock in portable console history equally it helped pave the way for future handhelds like the Genesis Nomad, PlayStation Portable, PS Vita and more than recently, the Nintendo Switch.

Justin.tv livestreaming website

Came before: Twitch (Justin.goggle box's spin off), Facebook Alive, Periscope

The power to circulate alive video over the Internet is easy to take for granted, especially considering the process wasn't virtually as straightforward (or attainable) only a decade ago.

Let'southward set the phase. In early on 2007, BlackBerry and Palm were the predominate players in the "smartphone" industry. The iPhone was notwithstanding a few months out and the commencement handset powered by Android wouldn't be announced until the end of the following year. Cameras congenital into mobile devices were of such low quality that they were practically unusable.

That'southward why, when Justin Kan launched Justin.tv to stream a continuous live feed of his life over the Internet, he did and so using a webcam affixed to a baseball cap that was connected to a cellular network card-equipped laptop in his backpack. Welcome to livestreaming in 2007.

The novelty of the concept, termed "lifecasting," attracted loads of media attending which Kan parlayed into a total-blown video streaming platform. The gaming category took on a life of its own and was eventually spun off as Twitch.Tv set. The original Justin.tv site close downwardly in mid-2014 and a few weeks later, Amazon bought Twitch for $970 meg.

Platforms like Justin.tv pioneered live video on the Internet. Without them, services such as Periscope and Facebook Alive may not exist.

Casio Underground Sender 6000 personal communicator

Came earlier: Danger Hiptop / T-Mobile Sidekick, Blackberry phones (Messenger), WhatsApp

This ane is absolutely obscure and arguably didn't take a tremendous impact on the world of applied science, but that's but because it was a toy that flew under the radar.

The Casio Secret Sender 6000 was substantially a PDA for kids. Launched in the early '90s, it featured a digital screen and a total QWERTY keyboard for data entry and also served as a agenda, an alarm clock, a phone volume, a calculator and more. The standout feature that captured my involvement at the time (and the reason I'm including it hither today) was its ability to send text messages.

The gadget – and rebrands like the Sega IR 7000 – featured an infrared sensor that allowed you to ship short-range wireless text letters between devices, so long as they were in the aforementioned room. Such functionality was mind-blowing at the time with Sega and others advertizing it as a fashion to silently send letters between friends, like during class. Well-nigh a quarter of a century later, text messaging is arguably one of the nigh popular methods of personal advice.

Sony Walkman and Discman

Came earlier: MP3 players, Apple iPod, any modern smartphone + music subscription service

Streaming services identify a near endless supply of music at our disposal. It's a luxury that many of u.s. utilize on a daily footing but you don't have to think back very far to a time when portable music didn't actually be.

Sony co-founder Masaru Ibuka was frustrated past the disability to heed to opera music during trans-Pacific flights without the assist of heavy, expensive audio equipment. In the tardily '70s, he commissioned two audio division engineers to come up with a meaty solution that average consumers could afford. Thus, the Walkman was born.

Although Sony technically wasn't the starting time to invent the portable cassette histrion (that accolade manifestly goes to Andreas Pavel), it was the first to notice success. The Walkman was a game-changer, assuasive people to essentially add soundtracks to their daily lives. The Japanese technology giant rocked the music industry once again in 1984 with the introduction of the world's first portable compact disc player. Affectionately dubbed the Discman, the player helped spark public interest in CDs and further cemented Sony's legacy equally a premiere electronics manufacturer.

Sony may not be equally popular as it in one case was but its contributions to the music manufacture are undeniable.

Asus Eee PC netbook

Came earlier: Chromebooks, Apple iPad, Ultrabooks

Chromebooks are the become-to choice for those needing a portable, full-featured computing solution on the inexpensive. They probably wouldn't exist, yet, if it weren't for a major shortcoming that plagued their predecessors.

Asus at Computex in mid-2007 introduced the Eee PC, a line of ultra-affordable laptops originally intended for emerging markets. Characterized by small screens, compact keyboards, low-capacity storage drives and underpowered hardware, the machines quickly caught on with mainstream consumers and helped spawn a new category of portable computers known as netbooks.

The majority of netbooks shipped with versions of Windows that were designed for more than powerful hardware. As a result, well-nigh offered a subpar user experience that ultimately contributed to their downfall (the emergence of tablets didn't help the cause, either).

Google's Chrome OS, however, is far less resource-intensive. It also helps that mod hardware is much more powerful than the Intel Atom chips that struggled in early netbooks and of course, the cooling tablet marketplace tin't be overlooked.

TechSpot Series: The Win/Neglect series continues next week

This feature is part of a TechSpot content series rolling out this month, encounter what's next:

  • Week ane: The x Biggest Tech Fails of the Terminal Decade
  • Week two: Precursors to Today'south Technology: These Products Had the Right Vision
  • Calendar week 2 (bonus): Technology Before Its Fourth dimension: nine Products That Were Too Early on to Market place
  • Calendar week 3: xi Tech Products That Were Supposed to Fail... But Didn't