Technologically speaking, it’s hard to think of a year that was more exciting in recent memory than 2014. We saw a huge wave of new products like the iPhone 6, as well as were treated to upcoming glimpses of products in development like the Apple Watch and the BlackBerry Classic. Unfortunately, 2014 was also a fairly big year in terms of technology-related fails. From quality assurance to testing to security, issues seemed to crop up on an almost daily basis to embarrass some of the biggest tech companies in the world. Even Apple wasn’t immune to large scale fails this year.
The BlackBerry Passport
The BlackBerry Passport is a quality assurance fail at its finest. In theory, the device should have been a success – in a world where mobile device screens are getting larger, it would probably be awhile before a company hit that “too large” area and customers rebelled. BlackBerry found out it was a scenario that would happen sooner rather than later by releasing a mobile device that was essentially unusable with only one hand.
The Sony Hack
The Sony Hack makes the list of the top 10 tech fails of 2014 not due to the fact that it happened, but due to the astonishingly poor security-related practices that it exposed. For one of the biggest technology-related companies on the planet, you would think that they would store passwords and other sensitive information in encrypted files. If they did have to store them in an unencrypted location, you would hope that it wouldn’t be in a folder labeled “Passwords.”
The Amazon Fire Phone
The Amazon Fire Phone makes the list of top 2014 fails due to a huge number of quality assurance fails. Amazon was so excited to rush the phone to market that they didn’t perfect many of the features that it depended on. From sub-par battery life to a 3D screen with a resolution so low it would feel outdated even five years ago, the product was one big fail after another.
Google Glass
Google made a bold step in the direction of wearable technology with Google Glass. The reason it makes the “fail” list is for something that should have been handled during the testing phase – longtime users of the device report everything from awful headaches to vision problems and essentially everything in between.
Android Wear
Android Wear included some of the first true smart watches and other wearable devices to hit the market in a big way. It’s too bad that nearly every aspect of them, including the built-in heart rate monitors, failed to work properly.
The Aereo
No list of 2014 fails would be complete without the Aereo and the unfortunate fact that it turned out to be a revolutionary new product with a business model that even the Supreme Court said was copyright infringement.
Cannibalizing the Tablet Market
Tech companies accidentally cannibalized the tablet market in 2014 by releasing “bigger and better” smartphones with large screens that rivaled devices like the iPad.
Streaming Sony TV
The PlayStation TV initially seemed to be Sony’s answer to the Apple TV set top box. By launching without support for even basic streaming services like Netflix or YouTube, it turned out to be Sony’s answer to essentially nothing.
Microsoft Kinect
Microsoft Kinect 2.0 shipped with the Xbox One gaming console and relied heavily on voice commands that were supposed to revolutionize the in-home entertainment experience – if, that is, they worked the way they were supposed to even half of the time.
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