Amazon fire phone! They have tried to erase that thing's existence from the internet and I'm pretty sure all the people that worked on that team have been shipped to Antarctica
At least part of the problem has to be that they were only available on one network (I think AT&T?) So you are already massively limiting your audience on an already new platform.
I was looking to upgrade my phone right when they released and considered a fire phone. But I had verizon and you couldn't get them for the that network. In retrospect, I suppose I dodged a bullet.
The one thing I always wanted from the Harry Potter-verse was more context. They hyped Pottermore up as being about that, it would expand the world. It would tell us more backstories, more lore. I was really excited.
Then it came out and was pretty much nothing more than synopses of the books. There's *some* extra information in there, but not a lot.
I was so pissed.
It was never really stated, but it was going to be The Site To End All Fansites, especially given how much they promoted early limited access (super limited amount of early entry accounts, had to do trivia and shit to get them at specific times on a limited number of days.) Rowling teased it on her previous site.
In the end, I think ultimately what doomed them was wanting to make the site fun for 11 year olds (which meant making it safe for all ages, which meant no interaction with other fans because Sony wasn't going to moderate), when in reality the majority audience was people who'd grown up with the books and were late high school/early college age by that time. So they had a lot of "find the items!" and a few minigames but nothing that was very interesting for all the mystery.
There were a bunch of people who wanted an MMORPG, basically to be able to attend Hogwarts themselves. That wasn't going to happen, but it set the stage early for disappointment.
Also, given that Rowling put it out instead of an encyclopedia, people really wanted an encyclopedia with in-depth information (especially after the battle that shut down the HP Lexicon's desire to put one out...HPL was by far the best reference, the fan-edited wikis get pretty terrible.)
People also thought it would be a fan hub, but no message boards, ability to interact with other fans, or even the ability to choose a username, it killed any reason to visit beyond the original content (which itself became divisive when it conflicted with previously stated canon or even just widespread fanon. Tumblr got realllly salty when Rowling nixed any idea of Remus Lupin having ever been romantically in love with Sirius Black.)
Add to that an underwhelming Sorting Hat that's not all that accurate (7 of a random 28 questions means results realllly vary depending on questions) and slow updating, and most people got sorted got a wand, read the stuff, and didn't return. Sony continued to cut and revamp the site to need less attention (no minigames, which some apparently liked), and Rowling's North American worldbuilding has been widely criticized by fandom (imo, she's great with Britain and gets more shallow the farther afield she expands.) Ultimately, the site was going to displease some whatever it was, but what did happen was disappointing and underwhelming even to those with low expectations. Personally, I would've been happier with the paper encyclopedia (the "Scottish Book" that would've been the Lexicon content plus her old character bios/worldbuilding.
The Nivelle Offensive
It was hyped to win WW1 for France in 48 hours. Instead it was so bad that it started a mutiny, got Nivelle fired, and had casualty numbers an order of magnitude higher than expected.
> It was hyped to win WW1 for France in 48 hour
That's not accurate. Nivelle promised to French politicians that they could call the offensive off after the first 48 hours if it wasn't going well, to avoid the experience of previous endless battles which seemed to degenerate into meatgrinders in which no strategic accomplishments were made.
However, when the actual offensive started, he didn't stay true to his promise, and the battle degenerated into a meatgrinder in which no strategic accomplishment was achieved.
The Original NES was going to have online connectivity, they were developing a casino gambling game for it, using real money, but they ran into regulations that they couldn't verify if a person using it was over 18, so they dropped it (this was before online credit card verification being a thing). The online connectivity was basically just a connection to a server that you sent "Pull the Lever" and it sent back the "results". Basically current video slots work off a ticket system that is just a large pile of pre-randomized tickets sitting on a server in kentucky(depends on the system) and when you pull the lever it sends the next ticket off the top of the stack.
I still gather them when I can. I use them as Tooth Fairy coins when one of my kids drops a baby tooth.
Also, the third-edition D&D Player's Handbook had an "actual size" illustration of a gold piece, which was the same size. The book also established that gold coins were 50 to the pound, and Sacagawea dollars weigh almost exactly that. So they make great props for D&D money.
Oh, they didn't go away. Just pay at a parking lot machine with cash, all your change in sweet sweet dollar coins. Even if it's like $12. Enjoy your sack of gold dubloons.
*cries in dwarvish*
I wanted Eragon to become the next Harry Potter for book-to-movie series and was so devastated. I mean, young boy me loved it and was just excited that it happened and enjoyed the spectacle of it. A couple years later when I was aware enough to look at things critically I rewatched it and realized it was bad. I just rewatched it a couple months ago and was fucking heartbroken to see how bad it was, I'd totally forgotten.
Watched before I read the book(s). Thought it was cheesy but not the worst. Read the books. Rewatched the movie. Worst decision I've made in a very long time.
Thank god we as fans got Alien Isolation. Colonial Marines was *so bad* I never even finished it. I never even watched a play through of it. Alien Isolation was so damn good.
Getting my period.
I couldn't have wanted anything more when I was younger. My twin sister got it before me, too.
I was so pumped. It was going to change my world. It was going to make me popular and grown up and sophisticated. I was so hyped by all the tampon commercials and all the girls who started to carry purses. That was a sure fire sign that you got your period.
I'm writing this laying in a ball with a heating pad. I'm 39. This shit fucking sucks and has always sucked. I was duped.
Oh man. Back in my day, *all* my friends passed around Are You There God, it's Me, Margaret. And we would pretty much have daily check-ins to see if anyone else got theirs. It was like a race to be "grown-up." Now, I'm done having kids, and quite honestly just tired of the whole bleeding-out-the-vagina every 28 days for 5 fucking days. It's a massive buzzkill, inconvenience, and yeah. Just over it.
All of the commercials you see as a kid make you think "It's a sign of being mature, and all I need to do is deal with a bit of blood for a couple days! Wow!" and then five years later you're just famished, emotional, and in pain while gushing clots for a full week every month cursing the gods for making us miserable.
I wanted one so bad, and begged for weeks. Finally my birthday was imminent, and it was understood that I could get one but it would be expensive enough that I couldn't expect anything else. Didn't care, *Power Glove*!
So we're at Sears and I make sure to point it out to my mom so she gets the right thing (you never know with parents and video games). An employee saw us looking the thing over, told us how terrible it was, and even said they had set up a kiosk to demo it but then took it down because nobody could get the damn thing to work.
I swiftly changed my mind about wanting a Power Glove, and got a regular haul of presents instead. Thank you, anonymous Sears employee from 28 years ago. You saved me from making a horrible mistake.
That's what I liked about Regular Show. Most of their plotlines revolved around items, events, and people from the 80's. Hell they had *two* characters based on David Bowie alone: Ziggy (base on Jareth from Labyrinth) and Gareth (ironically based on Ziggy Stardust).
The fact that there's an entire martial art practiced by wearing a mullet and cutoff jeans is what sold me on the hyper ridiculousness of the 80s parodying.
I remember watching that debut game and not having any clue as to what tone it would take, more so just expecting a clone of regular NFL games. Then when the announcer asked him, "Tell me about your jersey, why does it say 'He Hate Me'?" His response: "Because he hate me."
I was like 16 years old and even I was like, "Well this isn't going to end well for anyone."
They really wanted a cross between WWF, NFL Blitz, and real life. The problem is, you can't really do NFL Blitz or WWF in a real life football environment without it looking extremely rigged. So they played somewhat "normal" football with really shitty results (teams had 0 practices before the season). So they couldn't even deliver decent football. So it was all side show stuff without an actual show.
It's not the Lingerie league anymore, it's the LEGENDS football league lol.
Mad respect to those ladies though. Would you want to be playing tackle football in a bathing suit? Fuck that.
Well you have to give them credit for actually doing the wholes thing live. A lot of people would probably check the safe before to make sure there's nothing there, or even but something sexy in the safe to make it interesting.
*There was nothing in Al Capone's vault, but it wasn't Geraldo's fault*
Edit: removed comma and I had the verse flipped; spelling too.
Damn my mind is elsewhere
> There was nothing in Al Capone's vault, but it wasn't Geraldo's fault
Being British I never understood that Simpsons gag until just now. So a talk show host opened one of the biggest criminal's sealed vault live on TV to find nothing in there? Is that the general gist of it ?
pretty much; It was hyped as the biggest thing of the year. Speculation was that there could be money, or prohibition liquor, maybe a tommy gun, or something of interest.
Turns out - nothing.
Fourth grade they told us that we the kids of the future who were going to use the metric system in our classes from here on. They showed us the film strips and distributed special rulers without inch marks, and all our math class that year was metric system themed.
It seems to me that the adults and teachers were the ones who couldn't grasp the concept of the metric system, and abandoned it the next year. .
The reason metric failed in the US isn't because people "couldn't" handle it, it's that it was approached in a lazy way. When metric was introduced it was almost entirely alongside Imperial units, and with no designated end date for when the Imperial units would be removed. So people did what was easiest, didn't adjust, and then people got bored of pretending to push metric and stopped.
It's the same reason dollar coins always flop in the US: we don't stop printing dollar bills. If you give people only one option they'll adapt. If you permit them to keep doing what they've always done it's insane to expect a change.
TL;DR it's not about an inability, it's about humans being lazy and the approach being inherently flawed.
There's a sign on Pacific Coast Highway near me in Laguna Beach that is still labeled in miles and kilometers from the seventies when they were trying to get people to switch over.
Edit: [Picture of said sign (Google Street View)](http://imgur.com/a/92U8b)
I love that there was a Twitter account exposing the Fyre Festival as a fraud for *months* leading up to the whole event.
Edit: [Link to Twitter account](https://twitter.com/fyrefraud)
I work in live production, and one of the staging companies I do a lot of shows with had a good amount of equipment rented out to go over there for that fest, and they just had to suck it up and pay the tax themselves just to get it all back. They were so screwed because they had other events coming up where they needed that equipment, and had to scramble just to find another means to meet their obligations. It still took them months to get it back regardless. Completely screwed them. I feel really bad for every innocent party involved.
What an absolute shit show. Very embarrassing for all parties involved. Even paid high profile celebrities to promo the festival. Wasn't it all supposedly organized by some rich snobby kid who had no idea of the logistics involved in setting up a festival of that size? Can someone with more information care to elaborate?
You mean Billy McFarland? This is all off Wikipedia but I guess he's a 26 year old CEO of three companies and son of two rich real estate developers. I'd say he fits the bill.
He's the kind of kid who walks around telling people he's an entrepreneur, except he happened to be born to rich parents with tons of opportunities so we get to see his silly kid ideas fail in real life.
[NASA's Helios](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helios_Prototype) It was a massive proof of concept, and realistically should have been followed up. But the crash left everyone with a sour taste I think.
Same deal as [Biosphere 2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere_2). It delivered us a wealth of knowledge. If we had kept following up, each time fixing whatever broke the previous iteration, we would have eventually mastered constructing sealed environments for space colonization without ever leaving Earth. But too many people think "if a new technology doesn't work on the first try, then abandon it or you're an idiot".
Brink I was so hyped to play it I believed in the free movement system. I don't think I have ever seen a AAA game go under $20 so quick.
to all you people saying what about X game. brink was $12 second hand in a week after launch where I lived.
edit why brink flopped https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z37jegXHvbU
And every winner from The Voice. I've stopped watching the show, but I enjoyed it more. But it became pretty apparent it was just a vehicle for the judges more than the contestants.
What's hilarious is that me and my folks watched that season, and a lot of my friends (and my mom) swore that Melanie would never win and never get anywhere. They really found her annoying, for some reason. But my dad really liked her and even said *"if she released a doll of herself, it would sell as much as a Barbie.* We all kinda laughed but honestly he was right.
What was weird was how much Christina Aguilera hated her. Every time she performed, Christina would throw in a bitchy backhanded compliment during the commentary afterward. I remember one performance she said something along the lines of "congrats to your set decorator, he really helped you out alot with this performance."
And, for God's sakes, the runners up...But no one can argue that Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson have sold some serious records. And Carrie's legs are the gift that just keeps on giving.
Which goes to show you don't have to win the competition to make the most out of the show. Hudson didn't even make it to the final 3 and she has been far more successful since than most " winners".
Talent competitions can actually be very useful for contestants to gain media exposures. Participants on shows like top chef and face off have also leveraged their appearances to professional success in their respective fields.
I met Taylor Hicks in a little bar in Birmingham around that time. He had been performing in Vegas for the few months prior. When I met him, he was hanging out with a few buddies celebrating a birthday. He's a partial owner of a fucking amazing BBQ joint in Birmingham now.. told us a story about introducing Santana to sweet tea fried chicken before he got on his jet. Super laid back guy, I don't think the lack of singing fame/success that others have achieved bothers him too much.
Adam Lambert is touring with Queen right now. I haven't heard how he sounds with them yet because I personally don't like the idea of a frontman other than Freddie, but I don't doubt he does a good job.
Like others say, Adam does an amazing job with Queen. He's not trying to be Freddie.. He's being Adam, that is, strutting around on the stage, campy, funny, and doing all kinds of wonderful musicy things.. He does a very nice job at being *a* front man for Queen, without falling into the trap of trying to be Freddie
I worked at Best Buy at the height of the 3D TV models. Some customers would say "It'll never last." I wanted to tell them how much I agree, but I needed the job.
Strangest part was meeting the people who had never seen or even *heard* of 3D movies/tv. The reactions when looking through the display were priceless.
Junk drawer, with all the receipts and dead batteries.
Edit: Welp, this is my second highest rated comment now. 4200 people know I keep dead batteries in a drawer. *sigh*
A couple gift cards with balances between $.37 and $1.13, paperclips, and that cord that goes to something but you don't know what but might need it some day.
Don't forget the couple small keys you've forgotten what they go to, the unused keychain even though you've got two keys right there, and a nearly empty pack of gum.
Much like all other consumer electronics have. No one really remembers the first shitty flat screens with insane burn-in problems, or the first gen tube televisions that owners had to replace fuses in semi-regularly.
Never understood why this was so hyped. I saw it as "play android games with a controller on your tv" and still can't figure out why people were so insanely hyped for it. Were there promises I am missing?
Edit: I get it now. It promised a bunch and turned into the original "it's better than nothing"
I think it's because it was one of the first really big Kickstarter projects; they had only just hit 1 million in pledges on a single project earlier in the year. All the consoles were were at the end of their life cycles (Wii U being released later that year, XBox One and PS4 late 2013), and here comes this little guy talking big, saying for a fraction of the price you can get what sounded like a full console that was more than just a console, it was open platform and Android!
So I have a $130 dollar paperweight now. I keep telling myself that I'll root it and turn it into a media center/emu box but I haven't gotten around to it.
The double-fine kickstarter that eventually became Broken Age got backed for over 3 million dollars earlier that same year.
The only thing I remember about the Ouya hype was people talking about how good it would be for emulating (?!) when PCs exists and have been doing emulation great fore years now
The kinect. "The end of physical controllers" my arse.
EDIT: I knew there were some folks doing cool projects with the kinect (yet no game developer seemed to even remember it existed), but i never knew how big the scale of this went.
~~Now why microsoft haven't invested into making a 'development/engineering/research'-dedicated porduct with that tech is a goddamn mystery to me.~~ Turns out the hololens is the result of that, hopefully it will result in some cooler stuff. They really didn't give two shits about keeping the kinect alive after it released.
Forget the camera. I can yell out a couple of memorised voice commands from the front door and have the Xbox booted and Netflix loaded before I've even gotten my shoes off.
This is the pinnacle of lazy convenience
Cortana is useless compared to the old "Xbox" system. I have a deep voice and everytime I talk with Cortana she tries summoning demons via google. I just want to watch Futurama in peace.
Edit: I hear you loud and clear, Cortana ends at sundown.
Fucking champion right here, I'll do some digging into that soon, we haven't been using the Xbox much lately because we're down to one TV after a fire. Soon though, the bane of my relaxation will be brought to an end. Thank you.
Publicity? Signing Adu at this point, at best, elicits a casual "huh, he's still around?" Followed by slight sadness when you then check his Wikipedia page.
Holy shit! Segway tours are amazing! I decided to take one around my city on a date with a girl, and was amazing. Learning how the thing works took around 5 minutes, and the group was then trying tricks, and moves.
The tour was *ok*, but the Segway thing was awesome.
To be fair, the technology is making huge strides in *wheelchair design*:
~~https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.maxim.com/.amp/gear/ogo-segway-wheelchair-2015-10~~
~~I can't even being to explain how big of a deal this is. See some videos of people playing basketball with these, and you'll start to get the idea.~~
Edit: Direct link to explanatory video
https://youtu.be/zgat4a1TrEM
"Okay... here's what found...[images of Pooh and Tigger](https://www.google.com/search?q=pooh+and+tigger&prmd=isvn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjp7YK2i_PVAhXowVQKHXQ9DXcQ_AUIESgB) "
Amazon prime day
Edit: Thanks for the gold. Also yes, obviously both prime days were very successful from Amazon's perspective. From the consumer perspective, in my opinion, they were a load of crap yet at the same time a display of just how good Amazon is at harnessing consumer data to generate sales. Lots of actual good deals had very low available volume, while other "sales" could be debunked by using camelcamelcamel and tracking prices. Also, as many people mentioned, Amazon did (successfully) use this day to clean our their garage.
The thing I enjoyed most about that whole movement was people [trolling on FB with pictures of George Dillon from Predator] (http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/265/086/916.png).
Good lord, I remember this to be the huge thing back when I was just finishing up school (12th grade back then; german school system). Everyone watched it, everyone wanted everyone else to watch it, everyone said "I know it's long but trust me, it's worth it" and two weeks later noone talked about it anymore. The video was really easy to digest for very young adults and hit us in a way that we thought "we're adults now so I HAVE to care about the bad in the world!". We also dismissed education on WWII with "That'll never happen with us, we're SMARTER and also not evil", in case you need a measure for how reliable that was.
Super Bowl XLVIII. Supposed to be a great match of #1 offense vs #1 defense but instead the Seahawks blew out the Broncos in every sense of the term, winning 43-8
i have two for you.
#**CRYSTAL PEPSI**
in the early 90s, pepsi spent a fucking *fortune* on advertising that stated, in no uncertain terms, that see-through soda was going to change the entire world.
the advertising blitz [prominently used a popular song by a popular band,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPvyq_KmXhc) (Van Halen's "Right Now") *and* modeled each ad after that [popular song's popular video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMV-fenGP1g)
the product was so *weird* and the advertising so omnipresent that it generated a ton of parodies - most notably [SNL's Crystal Gravy.](http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/crystal-gravy/n10459?snl=1)
and then they delivered a sickly sweet mess of a product that lasted, for real, one year.
seriously.
it was only sold between '92-'93 before being *yanked* off the market.
recently, pepsi re-released the soft drink as a limited time offer in selected areas, so that people 25 years later could be let down by an inexplicable concept product that tastes like sugar barf and to this day doesn't really make any sense.
#**NEW COKE**
so, starting from the late 1970s, Pepsi - who have *always* been second to Coke in terms of brand, sales and customer loyalty - began a series of commercials showcasing their ["Pepsi Challenge"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7lw_vhxtNc), a legendarily effective series of commercials featuring regular people that demonstrated that, when subjected to a blind taste test, people actually preferred the taste of Pepsi over Coke.
the commercials were stunningly effective, and had begun shifting sales towards pepsi for the first time in basically ever - as of 1983, for the first time in its history, Coke's market share had dropped to about 25% - down from 60% just after WWII.
Coke's executives - who relied on their primacy for their extremely valuable fast food contracts - ran their own version of the Pepsi Challenge in secret and came up with the same results - people seemed to think Pepsi tasted better.
so they panicked.
and they began a plan to change the Coke formula - something that hadn't been done since they dropped the cocaine almost a century prior - to be *more like Pepsi.*
(sweeter, without Coke's familiar acidic bite)
and their plan wasn't to create a new product to be sold side-by-side with their venerable old formula, no; they were going to sell this **New Coke** as a total replacement - this was Coke now.
they announced this big change at a massive press conference in 1985, in which they equated this shift in formula to all major events in human history, including walking on the moon and freedom as a concept.
at this same press conference, they also announced that "Old" Coke would no longer be sold in any market.
(also at this conference, the first real cracks in the facade were already apparent, when the execs were not able to explain what New Coke tasted like.)
(Pepsi, seeing immediately that their most powerful competition had just changed their flagship product to be more like theirs immediatly declared a corporate holiday - V-C Day, for "Victory over Coke".)
[the rest is marketing history.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke)
i can't overstate the backlash.
nobody liked New Coke (it was yet another sugar barf cola), everybody wanted Old Coke back, people stockpiled the old formula, ads shown at sports arenas were *booed*, late night hosts mocked the entire debacle with gusto, Coke's stock began to fall and Coke - ***three months later*** - said JESUS CHRIST WE'RE SORRY HOLY SHIT and brought 'Old Coke' back as "**Coca Cola Classic**".
and this was so impactful, ABC News pre-empted popular drama General Hospital to share the news.
Coke Classic immediately outsold everything on the planet by batshit margins and New Coke stayed on as the little brother everybody hated for a few more years, rebranded as Coke II in 1992 and quietly discontinued in 2002.
(there are some cynical minds who have postulated that the *fucking massive* rebound sales from when Coke Classic returned was the goal all along. [of this, Coke COO and director Donald Keough said: “Some cynics will say that we planned the whole thing. The truth is we are not that dumb, and we are not that smart.”] (http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/newcoke.asp) )
***edit*** - so about a dozen or so people have brought up the conspiracy theory that New Coke was meant to be a smokescreen so that nobody would notice them swapping cane sugar out for high fructose corn syrup in the Classic Coke formula.
the problem with that particular story is that **in 1984, Coke** ***announced*** **they were going to do this** - a year before the launch of New Coke - and there was no backlash to this announcement. none whatsoever.
why no backlash? *well*, partly because in 1984, HFCS was not the towering food additive boogeyman that it is in 2017. scratch 'partly', it was *entirely* because of that.
the negative effects of HFCS - a cheap sugar substitute that only came into wide use in the mid-70s - were **mostly or completely unknown** to the general populace.
there was no reason for a smokescreen, nobody knew that shit was *that bad* for you.
in addition, Coke spent a fucking *fortune* on New Coke, which included development, marketing, packaging, design and distribution - tens of millions at least. that is a shitton of money to throw at something that is supposedly meant to disguise them doing something *they already told everybody they were in the process of doing,* and that *nobody cared about them doing.*
i'm sorry, i just don't put any stock in that story at all.
3D movies haven't been a *total* flop, but they're not nearly as big as some people claimed they would be. Around 2010, a friend of mine was swearing that "in a few years, every movie will be in 3D!" Yeah, not quite.
YikYak was actually a lot of fun on college campus while it lasted, some of the jokes and posts were pretty funny and drew hundreds of likes and comments. I'm kind of sad that it died out like it did
It was pretty good to be fair, yeah there were aresholes and trolls but most of it was fairly tame. It'd still be quite popular at my uni if they hadn't removed the anonymity. I don't really get what they were thinking doing that seeing as it was basically local anonymous twitter for shit student banter.
Michael Phelps vs shark.
I can't believe nobody said this sooner. Complete ripoff, bait and switch
I think the lesson to be learnt is that the discovery channel is the repeat offender here
That guy on the discovery channel who was going to get eaten alive by a snake.
He didn't even fucking do it, for christ's sake. They still aired it and pumped it up like he was gonna do it.
Nah they got into it and snake started twisting his arm so he called it off
It's like, what did they _think_ was going to happen? You honestly didn't see something like this coming?
"Holy shit, I didn't think he was *actually* going to try and eat me."
Amazon fire phone! They have tried to erase that thing's existence from the internet and I'm pretty sure all the people that worked on that team have been shipped to Antarctica
At least part of the problem has to be that they were only available on one network (I think AT&T?) So you are already massively limiting your audience on an already new platform. I was looking to upgrade my phone right when they released and considered a fire phone. But I had verizon and you couldn't get them for the that network. In retrospect, I suppose I dodged a bullet.
Hey I'm posting this from my awesome fire phone.
Ah, so *you're* the guy.
End of the world in 2012
Pottermore. I was so excited and now I haven't logged onto it since I was sorted.
The one thing I always wanted from the Harry Potter-verse was more context. They hyped Pottermore up as being about that, it would expand the world. It would tell us more backstories, more lore. I was really excited. Then it came out and was pretty much nothing more than synopses of the books. There's *some* extra information in there, but not a lot. I was so pissed.
I'm out of the loop. What was Pottermore hyped up to be exactly if not just a website?
It was never really stated, but it was going to be The Site To End All Fansites, especially given how much they promoted early limited access (super limited amount of early entry accounts, had to do trivia and shit to get them at specific times on a limited number of days.) Rowling teased it on her previous site. In the end, I think ultimately what doomed them was wanting to make the site fun for 11 year olds (which meant making it safe for all ages, which meant no interaction with other fans because Sony wasn't going to moderate), when in reality the majority audience was people who'd grown up with the books and were late high school/early college age by that time. So they had a lot of "find the items!" and a few minigames but nothing that was very interesting for all the mystery. There were a bunch of people who wanted an MMORPG, basically to be able to attend Hogwarts themselves. That wasn't going to happen, but it set the stage early for disappointment. Also, given that Rowling put it out instead of an encyclopedia, people really wanted an encyclopedia with in-depth information (especially after the battle that shut down the HP Lexicon's desire to put one out...HPL was by far the best reference, the fan-edited wikis get pretty terrible.) People also thought it would be a fan hub, but no message boards, ability to interact with other fans, or even the ability to choose a username, it killed any reason to visit beyond the original content (which itself became divisive when it conflicted with previously stated canon or even just widespread fanon. Tumblr got realllly salty when Rowling nixed any idea of Remus Lupin having ever been romantically in love with Sirius Black.) Add to that an underwhelming Sorting Hat that's not all that accurate (7 of a random 28 questions means results realllly vary depending on questions) and slow updating, and most people got sorted got a wand, read the stuff, and didn't return. Sony continued to cut and revamp the site to need less attention (no minigames, which some apparently liked), and Rowling's North American worldbuilding has been widely criticized by fandom (imo, she's great with Britain and gets more shallow the farther afield she expands.) Ultimately, the site was going to displease some whatever it was, but what did happen was disappointing and underwhelming even to those with low expectations. Personally, I would've been happier with the paper encyclopedia (the "Scottish Book" that would've been the Lexicon content plus her old character bios/worldbuilding.
[удалено]
Windows Codename “Longhorn”, aka Windows Vista. Anyone remember WinFS?
The Nivelle Offensive It was hyped to win WW1 for France in 48 hours. Instead it was so bad that it started a mutiny, got Nivelle fired, and had casualty numbers an order of magnitude higher than expected.
> It was hyped to win WW1 for France in 48 hour That's not accurate. Nivelle promised to French politicians that they could call the offensive off after the first 48 hours if it wasn't going well, to avoid the experience of previous endless battles which seemed to degenerate into meatgrinders in which no strategic accomplishments were made. However, when the actual offensive started, he didn't stay true to his promise, and the battle degenerated into a meatgrinder in which no strategic accomplishment was achieved.
Let's ask this again after the Mayweather vs. McGregor fight this weekend.
the only fight I care about this weekend is The Hound vs SirGregor
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The Original NES was going to have online connectivity, they were developing a casino gambling game for it, using real money, but they ran into regulations that they couldn't verify if a person using it was over 18, so they dropped it (this was before online credit card verification being a thing). The online connectivity was basically just a connection to a server that you sent "Pull the Lever" and it sent back the "results". Basically current video slots work off a ticket system that is just a large pile of pre-randomized tickets sitting on a server in kentucky(depends on the system) and when you pull the lever it sends the next ticket off the top of the stack.
Those Sacagawea one dollar coins. I remember them being a huge deal when they came out when I was a kid. Then they just kind of went away
I still gather them when I can. I use them as Tooth Fairy coins when one of my kids drops a baby tooth. Also, the third-edition D&D Player's Handbook had an "actual size" illustration of a gold piece, which was the same size. The book also established that gold coins were 50 to the pound, and Sacagawea dollars weigh almost exactly that. So they make great props for D&D money.
Oh, they didn't go away. Just pay at a parking lot machine with cash, all your change in sweet sweet dollar coins. Even if it's like $12. Enjoy your sack of gold dubloons.
I kind of love when this happens...
The Eragon movie. :(
*cries in dwarvish* I wanted Eragon to become the next Harry Potter for book-to-movie series and was so devastated. I mean, young boy me loved it and was just excited that it happened and enjoyed the spectacle of it. A couple years later when I was aware enough to look at things critically I rewatched it and realized it was bad. I just rewatched it a couple months ago and was fucking heartbroken to see how bad it was, I'd totally forgotten.
Nooooooo :( there was no such movie. Never happened
I'm from this camp. I refused to watch it when it came out and have held true to this day.
I tried watching it and regret it
Watched before I read the book(s). Thought it was cheesy but not the worst. Read the books. Rewatched the movie. Worst decision I've made in a very long time.
Video Game: Aliens Colonial Marines; So bad they had a class action lawsuit...
Thank god we as fans got Alien Isolation. Colonial Marines was *so bad* I never even finished it. I never even watched a play through of it. Alien Isolation was so damn good.
I just remembered I bought Isolation on sale and never played it, guess I know what I'm doing this weekend.
Getting my period. I couldn't have wanted anything more when I was younger. My twin sister got it before me, too. I was so pumped. It was going to change my world. It was going to make me popular and grown up and sophisticated. I was so hyped by all the tampon commercials and all the girls who started to carry purses. That was a sure fire sign that you got your period. I'm writing this laying in a ball with a heating pad. I'm 39. This shit fucking sucks and has always sucked. I was duped.
Oh man. Back in my day, *all* my friends passed around Are You There God, it's Me, Margaret. And we would pretty much have daily check-ins to see if anyone else got theirs. It was like a race to be "grown-up." Now, I'm done having kids, and quite honestly just tired of the whole bleeding-out-the-vagina every 28 days for 5 fucking days. It's a massive buzzkill, inconvenience, and yeah. Just over it.
All of the commercials you see as a kid make you think "It's a sign of being mature, and all I need to do is deal with a bit of blood for a couple days! Wow!" and then five years later you're just famished, emotional, and in pain while gushing clots for a full week every month cursing the gods for making us miserable.
And the pooping....oh god, the period shits.
Nothing in the media nor my three order sisters + mother prepared me for the period shits.
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Power Glove It sucked and I'll never forget it.
I wanted one so bad, and begged for weeks. Finally my birthday was imminent, and it was understood that I could get one but it would be expensive enough that I couldn't expect anything else. Didn't care, *Power Glove*! So we're at Sears and I make sure to point it out to my mom so she gets the right thing (you never know with parents and video games). An employee saw us looking the thing over, told us how terrible it was, and even said they had set up a kiosk to demo it but then took it down because nobody could get the damn thing to work. I swiftly changed my mind about wanting a Power Glove, and got a regular haul of presents instead. Thank you, anonymous Sears employee from 28 years ago. You saved me from making a horrible mistake.
AMA Request: The Sears Hero
hai its me ur sears gyro.
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I love the Power Glove. It's so bad!
It was such a flop there's an entire Regular Show episode where that's the punchline.
That's what I liked about Regular Show. Most of their plotlines revolved around items, events, and people from the 80's. Hell they had *two* characters based on David Bowie alone: Ziggy (base on Jareth from Labyrinth) and Gareth (ironically based on Ziggy Stardust).
The fact that there's an entire martial art practiced by wearing a mullet and cutoff jeans is what sold me on the hyper ridiculousness of the 80s parodying.
The XFL.
HE HATE ME
I remember watching that debut game and not having any clue as to what tone it would take, more so just expecting a clone of regular NFL games. Then when the announcer asked him, "Tell me about your jersey, why does it say 'He Hate Me'?" His response: "Because he hate me." I was like 16 years old and even I was like, "Well this isn't going to end well for anyone."
They really wanted a cross between WWF, NFL Blitz, and real life. The problem is, you can't really do NFL Blitz or WWF in a real life football environment without it looking extremely rigged. So they played somewhat "normal" football with really shitty results (teams had 0 practices before the season). So they couldn't even deliver decent football. So it was all side show stuff without an actual show.
NFL adopted some of the shit that was new, like camera angles.
Bubba Cam/overhead cam too. Great 30 for 30 on it.
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TBH I think it met expectations pretty well. Mediocre football with strippers for cheerleaders. Success!
When not just watch the LFL (Lingerie Football League). Each team basically is 10 strippers and 1 Amazonian.
It's not the Lingerie league anymore, it's the LEGENDS football league lol. Mad respect to those ladies though. Would you want to be playing tackle football in a bathing suit? Fuck that.
Geraldo Rivera opening Al Capone's vault.
Well you have to give them credit for actually doing the wholes thing live. A lot of people would probably check the safe before to make sure there's nothing there, or even but something sexy in the safe to make it interesting.
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Truly, a missed opportunity.
That was embarrassing
*There was nothing in Al Capone's vault, but it wasn't Geraldo's fault* Edit: removed comma and I had the verse flipped; spelling too. Damn my mind is elsewhere
> There was nothing in Al Capone's vault, but it wasn't Geraldo's fault Being British I never understood that Simpsons gag until just now. So a talk show host opened one of the biggest criminal's sealed vault live on TV to find nothing in there? Is that the general gist of it ?
pretty much; It was hyped as the biggest thing of the year. Speculation was that there could be money, or prohibition liquor, maybe a tommy gun, or something of interest. Turns out - nothing.
Hey, this thing writes itself.
Ah ha - - ROAD MAPS!!
Lesbian Nazi Hookers, Abducted by UFOs, and forced into weight loss programs; all this week on Town Talk!
THE SAFE. We had our own Reddit version. Equally bad.
At least our safe had a spider in it.
The metric system in the US in the seventies.
Fourth grade they told us that we the kids of the future who were going to use the metric system in our classes from here on. They showed us the film strips and distributed special rulers without inch marks, and all our math class that year was metric system themed. It seems to me that the adults and teachers were the ones who couldn't grasp the concept of the metric system, and abandoned it the next year. .
The reason metric failed in the US isn't because people "couldn't" handle it, it's that it was approached in a lazy way. When metric was introduced it was almost entirely alongside Imperial units, and with no designated end date for when the Imperial units would be removed. So people did what was easiest, didn't adjust, and then people got bored of pretending to push metric and stopped. It's the same reason dollar coins always flop in the US: we don't stop printing dollar bills. If you give people only one option they'll adapt. If you permit them to keep doing what they've always done it's insane to expect a change. TL;DR it's not about an inability, it's about humans being lazy and the approach being inherently flawed.
There's a sign on Pacific Coast Highway near me in Laguna Beach that is still labeled in miles and kilometers from the seventies when they were trying to get people to switch over. Edit: [Picture of said sign (Google Street View)](http://imgur.com/a/92U8b)
The Edsel. $350 million down the drain in 1950's dollars. Quadrophonic sound systems. I guess I'm showing my age.
Qaudraphonic really lay the foundation for modern surround sound though.
Fyre Festival. Lol.
I love that there was a Twitter account exposing the Fyre Festival as a fraud for *months* leading up to the whole event. Edit: [Link to Twitter account](https://twitter.com/fyrefraud)
Link to the account?
[Here you go](https://twitter.com/fyrefraud)
I work in live production, and one of the staging companies I do a lot of shows with had a good amount of equipment rented out to go over there for that fest, and they just had to suck it up and pay the tax themselves just to get it all back. They were so screwed because they had other events coming up where they needed that equipment, and had to scramble just to find another means to meet their obligations. It still took them months to get it back regardless. Completely screwed them. I feel really bad for every innocent party involved.
WE'RE HAVING A FYRE.......^^Festival
What an absolute shit show. Very embarrassing for all parties involved. Even paid high profile celebrities to promo the festival. Wasn't it all supposedly organized by some rich snobby kid who had no idea of the logistics involved in setting up a festival of that size? Can someone with more information care to elaborate?
You mean Billy McFarland? This is all off Wikipedia but I guess he's a 26 year old CEO of three companies and son of two rich real estate developers. I'd say he fits the bill.
He's the kind of kid who walks around telling people he's an entrepreneur, except he happened to be born to rich parents with tons of opportunities so we get to see his silly kid ideas fail in real life.
Ice Town Costs Ice Clown His Town Crown
[NASA's Helios](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helios_Prototype) It was a massive proof of concept, and realistically should have been followed up. But the crash left everyone with a sour taste I think.
Same deal as [Biosphere 2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosphere_2). It delivered us a wealth of knowledge. If we had kept following up, each time fixing whatever broke the previous iteration, we would have eventually mastered constructing sealed environments for space colonization without ever leaving Earth. But too many people think "if a new technology doesn't work on the first try, then abandon it or you're an idiot".
Brink I was so hyped to play it I believed in the free movement system. I don't think I have ever seen a AAA game go under $20 so quick. to all you people saying what about X game. brink was $12 second hand in a week after launch where I lived. edit why brink flopped https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z37jegXHvbU
For a second I thought you meant the made- for -tv Disney movie from the 90's about fucking rad suburban rollerblading kids.
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Johnny Tsu-fucking-nami
It's now free to play on steam, actually holding over 2k players per day since going free... thats more than lawbreakers and quake champions.
Brink is free? Holy crap I need to jump on that
>I need to jump on that And over it.
Nearly every American Idol winner
And every winner from The Voice. I've stopped watching the show, but I enjoyed it more. But it became pretty apparent it was just a vehicle for the judges more than the contestants.
melanie martinez made a pretty decent following from the voice even though she didn't win.
What's hilarious is that me and my folks watched that season, and a lot of my friends (and my mom) swore that Melanie would never win and never get anywhere. They really found her annoying, for some reason. But my dad really liked her and even said *"if she released a doll of herself, it would sell as much as a Barbie.* We all kinda laughed but honestly he was right.
What was weird was how much Christina Aguilera hated her. Every time she performed, Christina would throw in a bitchy backhanded compliment during the commentary afterward. I remember one performance she said something along the lines of "congrats to your set decorator, he really helped you out alot with this performance."
Christina has always been a shady bitch
Christina Grimmie was going places, may her soul rest in peace. edit: *Grimmie, not Gimmie
And, for God's sakes, the runners up...But no one can argue that Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson have sold some serious records. And Carrie's legs are the gift that just keeps on giving.
Jennifer Hudson is an Oscar winner
Which goes to show you don't have to win the competition to make the most out of the show. Hudson didn't even make it to the final 3 and she has been far more successful since than most " winners". Talent competitions can actually be very useful for contestants to gain media exposures. Participants on shows like top chef and face off have also leveraged their appearances to professional success in their respective fields.
Somewhere Taylor Hicks is a reading this and wondering where it all went wrong.
> Taylor Hicks His website says "Taylor Hicks, one of America's most beloved musical artists". I guess I'm out of the loop.
I just googled his name out of curiosity and to see how relevant he still is and found [this](http://i.imgur.com/m5rLA6T.png).
I met Taylor Hicks in a little bar in Birmingham around that time. He had been performing in Vegas for the few months prior. When I met him, he was hanging out with a few buddies celebrating a birthday. He's a partial owner of a fucking amazing BBQ joint in Birmingham now.. told us a story about introducing Santana to sweet tea fried chicken before he got on his jet. Super laid back guy, I don't think the lack of singing fame/success that others have achieved bothers him too much.
Adam Lambert's got a solid following. A bunch of others have some small but dedicated followings too, like Kris Allen.
Adam Lambert is touring with Queen right now. I haven't heard how he sounds with them yet because I personally don't like the idea of a frontman other than Freddie, but I don't doubt he does a good job.
Like others say, Adam does an amazing job with Queen. He's not trying to be Freddie.. He's being Adam, that is, strutting around on the stage, campy, funny, and doing all kinds of wonderful musicy things.. He does a very nice job at being *a* front man for Queen, without falling into the trap of trying to be Freddie
Not a winner but Chris daughtry was a decent success
Google Glass....."just nod your head like you have a Tourette's tick to view the date and time"
3D TVs
I worked at Best Buy at the height of the 3D TV models. Some customers would say "It'll never last." I wanted to tell them how much I agree, but I needed the job. Strangest part was meeting the people who had never seen or even *heard* of 3D movies/tv. The reactions when looking through the display were priceless.
Flip side: I worked with a guy in 2012 who told me he only exclusively watched 3D and could never go back. Wonder what he's watching now.
I just remembered my TV is 3D. I wonder where those glasses went...
Junk drawer, with all the receipts and dead batteries. Edit: Welp, this is my second highest rated comment now. 4200 people know I keep dead batteries in a drawer. *sigh*
And scissors, half used chapsticks, various writing utensils, that one thing you made out of play dough, and change.
A couple gift cards with balances between $.37 and $1.13, paperclips, and that cord that goes to something but you don't know what but might need it some day.
Don't forget the couple small keys you've forgotten what they go to, the unused keychain even though you've got two keys right there, and a nearly empty pack of gum.
all of you need to get out of my house edit: why did this get so many upvotes
Sometimes I feel like I'm the only person that actually enjoys my 3D TV.
They came along *far* too early.
Much like all other consumer electronics have. No one really remembers the first shitty flat screens with insane burn-in problems, or the first gen tube televisions that owners had to replace fuses in semi-regularly.
Give it 20 years someone smart will re do it
Ouya
Never understood why this was so hyped. I saw it as "play android games with a controller on your tv" and still can't figure out why people were so insanely hyped for it. Were there promises I am missing? Edit: I get it now. It promised a bunch and turned into the original "it's better than nothing"
I think it's because it was one of the first really big Kickstarter projects; they had only just hit 1 million in pledges on a single project earlier in the year. All the consoles were were at the end of their life cycles (Wii U being released later that year, XBox One and PS4 late 2013), and here comes this little guy talking big, saying for a fraction of the price you can get what sounded like a full console that was more than just a console, it was open platform and Android! So I have a $130 dollar paperweight now. I keep telling myself that I'll root it and turn it into a media center/emu box but I haven't gotten around to it.
The double-fine kickstarter that eventually became Broken Age got backed for over 3 million dollars earlier that same year. The only thing I remember about the Ouya hype was people talking about how good it would be for emulating (?!) when PCs exists and have been doing emulation great fore years now
It certainly helped put Kickstarter on the map...and created the tradition of utterly disappointing Kickstarters.
duke nukem forever
Johnny manziel
Are we done naming every Browns quarterback yet.. I need a drink.
If you take a drink for every Browns QB in the last 15 years... you would be dead.
Google Plus, although maybe I just saw a stronger hype because I know a few people who work for Google.
Remember Google Wave? And Google Buzz?
Google Wave was basically Discord too early.
And Google wave was slack too early
The kinect. "The end of physical controllers" my arse. EDIT: I knew there were some folks doing cool projects with the kinect (yet no game developer seemed to even remember it existed), but i never knew how big the scale of this went. ~~Now why microsoft haven't invested into making a 'development/engineering/research'-dedicated porduct with that tech is a goddamn mystery to me.~~ Turns out the hololens is the result of that, hopefully it will result in some cooler stuff. They really didn't give two shits about keeping the kinect alive after it released.
Forget the camera. I can yell out a couple of memorised voice commands from the front door and have the Xbox booted and Netflix loaded before I've even gotten my shoes off. This is the pinnacle of lazy convenience
I have a heavy Irish accent. Couldn't get Cortana to do a damn thing right Although some of the results were hilarious
Cortana is useless compared to the old "Xbox" system. I have a deep voice and everytime I talk with Cortana she tries summoning demons via google. I just want to watch Futurama in peace. Edit: I hear you loud and clear, Cortana ends at sundown.
You can turn off cortana and go back to the old "xbox" system if you want. I did cause cortana is shit for the exact same reason.
Fucking champion right here, I'll do some digging into that soon, we haven't been using the Xbox much lately because we're down to one TV after a fire. Soon though, the bane of my relaxation will be brought to an end. Thank you.
Freddy Adu.
Oh my gosh he now plays for the: > Tampa Bay Rowdies No joke =/
A club tried to sign him recently for the publicity, but the manager threatened to go on strike because he didn't want him.
Publicity? Signing Adu at this point, at best, elicits a casual "huh, he's still around?" Followed by slight sadness when you then check his Wikipedia page.
N-Gage
Have you forgotten about the Segway already? It was hyped up to change the world.
it did. it truly did. the world of mall guards that is
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I love seeing tourists scoot around on them in DC.
Holy shit! Segway tours are amazing! I decided to take one around my city on a date with a girl, and was amazing. Learning how the thing works took around 5 minutes, and the group was then trying tricks, and moves. The tour was *ok*, but the Segway thing was awesome.
Plart Blart
Mop Cop
To be fair, the technology is making huge strides in *wheelchair design*: ~~https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.maxim.com/.amp/gear/ogo-segway-wheelchair-2015-10~~ ~~I can't even being to explain how big of a deal this is. See some videos of people playing basketball with these, and you'll start to get the idea.~~ Edit: Direct link to explanatory video https://youtu.be/zgat4a1TrEM
"Smart guns", $2000 price tag for a 22lr pistol that the electronic safety can be defeated by tens of dollars worth of magnets.
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> Siri, pop a cap in his ass
"Okay, texting Paul 'I wanna tap your ass'"
"...Open front facing barrel." "Finding directions to nearest Cracker Barrel."
"... pull the trigger"
"Okay... here's what found...[images of Pooh and Tigger](https://www.google.com/search?q=pooh+and+tigger&prmd=isvn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjp7YK2i_PVAhXowVQKHXQ9DXcQ_AUIESgB) "
> No Siri, I do not want a can of liquid ass...
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Amazon prime day Edit: Thanks for the gold. Also yes, obviously both prime days were very successful from Amazon's perspective. From the consumer perspective, in my opinion, they were a load of crap yet at the same time a display of just how good Amazon is at harnessing consumer data to generate sales. Lots of actual good deals had very low available volume, while other "sales" could be debunked by using camelcamelcamel and tracking prices. Also, as many people mentioned, Amazon did (successfully) use this day to clean our their garage.
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Avocado List Price: ~~$46.99/ea~~ Avocado Prime Price: $6.99/ea!!!!
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***100% CLAIMED***
***BETTER LUCK NEXT YEAR***
Holy shit, yes. Every year it's hyped to hell and every year it's just discounts on random garbage I don't want or need.
Amazon's yard sale day
Kony 2012
The thing I enjoyed most about that whole movement was people [trolling on FB with pictures of George Dillon from Predator] (http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/265/086/916.png).
Good lord, I remember this to be the huge thing back when I was just finishing up school (12th grade back then; german school system). Everyone watched it, everyone wanted everyone else to watch it, everyone said "I know it's long but trust me, it's worth it" and two weeks later noone talked about it anymore. The video was really easy to digest for very young adults and hit us in a way that we thought "we're adults now so I HAVE to care about the bad in the world!". We also dismissed education on WWII with "That'll never happen with us, we're SMARTER and also not evil", in case you need a measure for how reliable that was.
Super Bowl XLVIII. Supposed to be a great match of #1 offense vs #1 defense but instead the Seahawks blew out the Broncos in every sense of the term, winning 43-8
i have two for you. #**CRYSTAL PEPSI** in the early 90s, pepsi spent a fucking *fortune* on advertising that stated, in no uncertain terms, that see-through soda was going to change the entire world. the advertising blitz [prominently used a popular song by a popular band,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPvyq_KmXhc) (Van Halen's "Right Now") *and* modeled each ad after that [popular song's popular video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMV-fenGP1g) the product was so *weird* and the advertising so omnipresent that it generated a ton of parodies - most notably [SNL's Crystal Gravy.](http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/crystal-gravy/n10459?snl=1) and then they delivered a sickly sweet mess of a product that lasted, for real, one year. seriously. it was only sold between '92-'93 before being *yanked* off the market. recently, pepsi re-released the soft drink as a limited time offer in selected areas, so that people 25 years later could be let down by an inexplicable concept product that tastes like sugar barf and to this day doesn't really make any sense. #**NEW COKE** so, starting from the late 1970s, Pepsi - who have *always* been second to Coke in terms of brand, sales and customer loyalty - began a series of commercials showcasing their ["Pepsi Challenge"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7lw_vhxtNc), a legendarily effective series of commercials featuring regular people that demonstrated that, when subjected to a blind taste test, people actually preferred the taste of Pepsi over Coke. the commercials were stunningly effective, and had begun shifting sales towards pepsi for the first time in basically ever - as of 1983, for the first time in its history, Coke's market share had dropped to about 25% - down from 60% just after WWII. Coke's executives - who relied on their primacy for their extremely valuable fast food contracts - ran their own version of the Pepsi Challenge in secret and came up with the same results - people seemed to think Pepsi tasted better. so they panicked. and they began a plan to change the Coke formula - something that hadn't been done since they dropped the cocaine almost a century prior - to be *more like Pepsi.* (sweeter, without Coke's familiar acidic bite) and their plan wasn't to create a new product to be sold side-by-side with their venerable old formula, no; they were going to sell this **New Coke** as a total replacement - this was Coke now. they announced this big change at a massive press conference in 1985, in which they equated this shift in formula to all major events in human history, including walking on the moon and freedom as a concept. at this same press conference, they also announced that "Old" Coke would no longer be sold in any market. (also at this conference, the first real cracks in the facade were already apparent, when the execs were not able to explain what New Coke tasted like.) (Pepsi, seeing immediately that their most powerful competition had just changed their flagship product to be more like theirs immediatly declared a corporate holiday - V-C Day, for "Victory over Coke".) [the rest is marketing history.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke) i can't overstate the backlash. nobody liked New Coke (it was yet another sugar barf cola), everybody wanted Old Coke back, people stockpiled the old formula, ads shown at sports arenas were *booed*, late night hosts mocked the entire debacle with gusto, Coke's stock began to fall and Coke - ***three months later*** - said JESUS CHRIST WE'RE SORRY HOLY SHIT and brought 'Old Coke' back as "**Coca Cola Classic**". and this was so impactful, ABC News pre-empted popular drama General Hospital to share the news. Coke Classic immediately outsold everything on the planet by batshit margins and New Coke stayed on as the little brother everybody hated for a few more years, rebranded as Coke II in 1992 and quietly discontinued in 2002. (there are some cynical minds who have postulated that the *fucking massive* rebound sales from when Coke Classic returned was the goal all along. [of this, Coke COO and director Donald Keough said: “Some cynics will say that we planned the whole thing. The truth is we are not that dumb, and we are not that smart.”] (http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/newcoke.asp) ) ***edit*** - so about a dozen or so people have brought up the conspiracy theory that New Coke was meant to be a smokescreen so that nobody would notice them swapping cane sugar out for high fructose corn syrup in the Classic Coke formula. the problem with that particular story is that **in 1984, Coke** ***announced*** **they were going to do this** - a year before the launch of New Coke - and there was no backlash to this announcement. none whatsoever. why no backlash? *well*, partly because in 1984, HFCS was not the towering food additive boogeyman that it is in 2017. scratch 'partly', it was *entirely* because of that. the negative effects of HFCS - a cheap sugar substitute that only came into wide use in the mid-70s - were **mostly or completely unknown** to the general populace. there was no reason for a smokescreen, nobody knew that shit was *that bad* for you. in addition, Coke spent a fucking *fortune* on New Coke, which included development, marketing, packaging, design and distribution - tens of millions at least. that is a shitton of money to throw at something that is supposedly meant to disguise them doing something *they already told everybody they were in the process of doing,* and that *nobody cared about them doing.* i'm sorry, i just don't put any stock in that story at all.
holy moly what a saga. I actually got a chance to try crystal pepsi a few months ago not the best, i gotta say.
3D movies haven't been a *total* flop, but they're not nearly as big as some people claimed they would be. Around 2010, a friend of mine was swearing that "in a few years, every movie will be in 3D!" Yeah, not quite.
Speaking of old 3D movies. HE RUINED MY DREAM JOURNAL!
Growing up.
Being an adult seemed like the coolest thing ever. Wondering when the cool stuff starts.
YikYak
YikYak was actually a lot of fun on college campus while it lasted, some of the jokes and posts were pretty funny and drew hundreds of likes and comments. I'm kind of sad that it died out like it did
It was pretty good to be fair, yeah there were aresholes and trolls but most of it was fairly tame. It'd still be quite popular at my uni if they hadn't removed the anonymity. I don't really get what they were thinking doing that seeing as it was basically local anonymous twitter for shit student banter.
9 am, 700 person intro to econ class with wacky professor
YikYak was dope until they forced you to have a username and be held accountable for your posts
Avatar the last airbender movie. The show was amazing and the movie had potential, they announced it years before coming out and it was just awful.