25 Worst Tech Inventions

I had one of the Iomega 100MB zip drives. Worked flawlessly. Used it to transfer files from my friends computer which had cable internet, back to my computer, dial up. Bought a dvd burner and gave him my old cd burner. Zip drive no longer used since.

Great article. Though, I do disagree with a few of their items on the list.

1. IE6. IE6 was/is a damn good browser in terms of functionality. I think the reason ppl think it sucks is it has been significantly updated in 5 years. We're still using the same core version of IE6. At the time, IE6 was considered the best and most compatible browser on the market. Now it's just outdated... IMO, that's hardly a reason for "worst tech product." And yes, CERT did recommend that no one use IE6, but CERT has always been full of semi-doomsday bulls*hit. I have NEVER gotten a virus infection with IE6. And I'm sure 500 million other people haven't either.

2. Zip Drive. Zip Drives were incredibly popular when they debuted. It was the thing to have back then. (Floppies sucked and Tape Back Up was too slow). The only thing that really held it back was the price of media and the fact that CD-R drives were beginning to take off. Again, at the time it was an excellent product that a LOT of people used. Hell, it was standard on some HP and Dell product lines for a long time. They mention the lawsuit, but that only affected less than <1% of all the drives manufactured and wasn't really a big deal back then.

3. PointCast. Pointcast was f*ucking awesome and WAY before its time. RSS does nothing more now than PointCast did in the late 90's. In some instances, PointCast was a hell of a lot better than RSS.

4. Divx. Are they f*ucking retarded? Need I explain myself on this one? I like how the author doesn't even mention that Divx/xvid is probably the most widely used codec (aside from MPEG) ever. Yeah, the retail version of Divx failed, but we all know how popular divx is now.

OK- let me school you right quick on this. Internet Explorer runs on over 90% of the world's computers. Firefox and others run on less than 10%.

As a hacker, why the fuck would you bother hacking and cracking a browser that has so few users? The idea here is spreading worms and infection.

What I'm getting at is this: if firefox ran on 90% of the world's computers, there'd be just as my bugs, exploits, adn security flaws.

hackers simply do not focus on firefox simply because it isn't widely used. if they paid as much attention to firefox as they did IE6, things would be a lot different.

that's my logic on the whole situation. now, one could (and should) blame M$ for all the problems because of their monopoly. and logically, that's the right argument. if M$ didn't have a monopoly on web browsing, hackers would focus on other stuff equally.

make sense?

Well that works nicely in theory but apache has 68% market share and well I'm sure you know the rest.

Tru Dat Homey.

Hackers go for the biggest splash they can find.

Case in point. Windows and Linux. Why would anyone want to hack the OS they claim to be better? It's 'better' because they're not hacking it.

Last year, an advanced computer class looked at a version of the Linux kernel. Within 24 hours they were able to find over 30 exploits, all being new to this.

IE gets slammed on everything from hackers. I'd go as far as saying it is probably more secure than other browsers.

IE was built as a mainstay, everything is built around it. Other browsers appear to be build around avoiding already existing flaws that hit IE.

Anyhow, I babble. I agree with you, IE6 shouldn't be on that list. I don't recall seeing the Game Cube on the list or half the stuff that should be there.

No, I'm just pointing out the higher market share = less secure and more attacks reasoning is flawed.

Indeed but it doesn't take away from the fact that IE6 is the sux.

That’s a great list, but they forgot my favorite:

Remember, right about the time Duke Nuke ‘em 3D came out companies started selling VR goggles?! It was two tiny LCDs and some sort of motion tracking.

They video was HORRABLE and they caused sea sickness. That was my favorite.

You got to me kidding me!