# better technologies that failed (i.e. BetaMax) **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 2, 2014, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178 "2014-10-02T12:49:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/21 "2014-10-02T22:43:50Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > The question is, “In what way was Beta better than VHS?” Well, no, the OP’s question is “what tech war example can I use to illustrate the topic that’s newer than 1990?” 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/22 "2014-10-02T22:54:08Z")
[VHS was better than Beta in the ways that mattered](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2003/jan/25/comment.comment): To wit, it had longer recording time and the quality difference was imperceptible on home gear of the era. Beta’s supposed improved quality didn’t make up for a lot of other things the format and the company pushing it got wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/23 "2014-10-02T22:58:56Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > So you’re under the impression that Sony put a new, relatively unsupported and proprietary drive system in the PS3 for engineering reasons? Partially, yes, they did. The PS3 was meant to be a showcase for Sony’s “Cell” processor. Unfortunately, it was difficult to develop for and the company dropped plans to get others to license the “Cell.” Sony themselves then reworked the processor for the PS4 to make it more PC-like. But the PS3 was never given a Blu-ray drive for “marketing” purposes. The Blu-ray drive was added to make it superior to Microsoft’s Xbox 360, which only used a standard DVD drive. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/24 "2014-10-02T23:23:26Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > But the PS3 was never given a Blu-ray drive for “marketing” purposes. The Blu-ray drive was added to make it superior to Microsoft’s Xbox 360, which only used a standard DVD drive. Could you please send me a new irony meter to replace the one you just busted? ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/25 "2014-10-02T23:40:12Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Could you please send me a new irony meter to replace the one you just busted? Isn’t this whole thread about devices that are competing where one is technologically superior? The PS3 was superior to the Xbox 360 due to the Blu-ray drive and it still lost (though didn’t fail). I don’t get why you’re trying to hoist that all off on “marketing.” ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2014, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/26 "2014-10-02T23:52:46Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Isn’t this whole thread about devices that are competing where one is technologically superior? The PS3 was superior to the Xbox 360 due to the Blu-ray drive and it still lost (though didn’t fail). I don’t get why you’re trying to hoist that all off on “marketing.” I find it interesting that you jump into many threads where marketing is being discussed and completely fail to grasp any of the issues. I suggest that you don’t really have a clue what marketing is, nor how it works, nor its place in the consumer product industry. Hint: it’s not the advertising campaigns that made you want a PS3 or an Xbox 360. The PS3 would have shipped with an 8-inch floppy drive if Sony’s marketing department determined that’s what would sell. Engineering, both people and product, is almost wholly at the mercy of the marketing team responsible for driving demand for a company’s products. The world’s landfills are full of products that were superior in every engineering and technical way, but effectively obsoleted and outsold by products that had superior _marketing_. The PS3 was shipped with a then-expensive, -fragile, -unproven drive because Sony’s marketing department said, “We are going to win the fucking HD disc war at any cost.” Engineering considerations and hand-waving about disc capacity issues were completely secondary… as the success of the “inferior” XBox proves. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/27 "2014-10-03T00:09:59Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > I find it interesting that you jump into many threads where marketing is being discussed and completely fail to grasp any of the issues. I suggest that you don’t really have a clue what marketing is, nor how it works, nor its place in the consumer product industry. > > Hint: it’s not the advertising campaigns that made you want a PS3 or an Xbox 360. Explain it to me like I’m four, what “marketing” decisions are you talking about? Because you just seem to be babbling about stuff that doesn’t make any sense. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/28 "2014-10-03T00:13:50Z")
As you cut the part where I did explain it, I think it’s just time to move on. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/29 "2014-10-03T00:19:51Z")
Fine, but reducing the complex reasoning behind the decisions of massive companies to “MARKETING!” is a bit of a cheat. If you’re going to look at it that way, everything comes down to marketing. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/30 "2014-10-03T01:05:37Z")
The CBS spinning disk color TV system of the early 50s was considered technivally superior to NBC’s NTSC (“Never The Same Color”) system. The FCC even recommended it as the standard. But it was incompatable with all existing B&W TVs; NTSC was. NBC argued against making all then-current TV sets obsolete and the FCC changed its mind and NTSC was accepted ---
**Author:** ![wedgehed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wedgehed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wedgehed)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/31 "2014-10-03T01:30:16Z")
I’d like to vote for the Kodak Brownie. My mom took the most wonderful family photos with her Brownie back in the 40s & 50s. In the early 60s she replaced it with some sort of Kodak instamatic. Sure, it was smaller, easier to carry around, had a flash, & could take color photos. But the photos were crappy. ---
**Author:** ![Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/do_not_taunt/32/2968_2.png) [@Do\_Not\_Taunt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Do_Not_Taunt)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/32 "2014-10-03T03:19:42Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The CBS spinning disk color TV system of the early 50s was considered technivally superior to NBC’s NTSC (“Never The Same Color”) system. The FCC even recommended it as the standard. > > But it was incompatable with all existing B&W TVs; NTSC was. NBC argued against making all then-current TV sets obsolete and the FCC changed its mind and NTSC was accepted I’m not at all familiar with the origins of NTSC, but it sounds like you’ve just made a compelling argument that it was technically superior to this spinning disk thing in an extremely important way. ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/33 "2014-10-03T03:36:14Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The CBS spinning disk color TV system of the early 50s was considered technivally superior to NBC’s NTSC (“Never The Same Color”) system. The FCC even recommended it as the standard. > > But it was incompatable with all existing B&W TVs; NTSC was. NBC argued against making all then-current TV sets obsolete and the FCC changed its mind and NTSC was accepted look at the massive change that replaced NTSC (analog) with ATSC (digital). lots of years at lots of costs requiring subsidies in a better economics lower cost electronics time. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/34 "2014-10-03T05:06:46Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The CBS spinning disk color TV system of the early 50s was considered technivally superior to NBC’s NTSC (“Never The Same Color”) system. The FCC even recommended it as the standard. > > But it was incompatable with all existing B&W TVs; NTSC was. NBC argued against making all then-current TV sets obsolete and the FCC changed its mind and NTSC was accepted I think you mean RCA developed NTSC. Although RCA did own NBC at the time and NBC did benefit directly from the FCC’s decision to approve NTSC over CBS’s system. Another factor in favor of NTSC was that it was all-electronic. CBS’s broadcast system required a spinning color wheel at the receiver end. And the motor that spun the wheel was noisy. It often drowned out the audio from the set. NTSC receivers had no such problem. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/35 "2014-10-03T08:21:27Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I’ve heard cookware made of the [original material](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroceram) that Corningware was made of being used as an example of a technology that failed because it was superior. It was so durable that people who bought it seldom needed to buy anything new; so it was discontinued and a more fragile product using the same brand name was produced instead. > > The original versions of nylon stockings went the same way. They lasted too long, so a more fragile version was introduced and an advertising campaign promoting “sheer” stockings was launched to successfully persuade women that an inferior product was in fact more desirable. AKA [planned obsolescence.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence) ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/36 "2014-10-03T11:39:15Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > I always thought MiniDisc was pretty cool. Smaller and better-sounding than tapes but more durable than CDs. No skipping. But they came at a time when “naked” discs were coming down in price and I suspect the cheapness of discs with no shell helped the CD/DVD format win out. I have a first gen metal shelled mini disc recorder/player. Expensive as fuck, but it came with a case of the discs, the microphone, the patch cord to jack it into other equipment and a leather case. I ended up with a dozen or so pre-recorded minidiscs [oddly enough including Vivaldi 4 seasons and Tomita The Planets.] I really wish the project hadn’t died, it really was better than CDs [at the beginning] - I could fit it easily into a pocket, and carry around 5 or 6 discs, and a blank one for impromptu recording. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/37 "2014-10-03T12:18:51Z")
How about [APS film](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Photo_System)? It was a neat technology that addressed so many of the annoyances of 35mm film. To be fair, the frame size was smaller, so that is one strong point against APS film, but most consumers were not doing fine art photography and wouldn’t have noticed the difference. The newer format was easier to load in the camera, supported mid-roll changes (without wasting the rest of the roll), had date information recorded in the film, and the film was designed to remain stored in the can after development. The cartridge was smaller and enabled making much smaller cameras than 35mm would have allowed–I remember when I bought the first Canon Elph camera how amazingly compact it was: it was said that the big boss at Canon pulled out a pack of cigarettes, tossed them on the table, and said “Make a camera that fits in that.” Kodak and Fuji stopped making the film in 2011; And if you look for hardware for scanning film, you will find plenty of 35mm scanners, but no APS scanners. > [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I’ve heard cookware made of the [original material](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroceram) that Corningware was made of being used as an example of a technology that failed because it was superior. It was so durable that people who bought it seldom needed to buy anything new; so it was discontinued and a more fragile product using the same brand name was produced instead. > > The original versions of nylon stockings went the same way. They lasted too long, so a more fragile version was introduced and an advertising campaign promoting “sheer” stockings was launched to successfully persuade women that an inferior product was in fact more desirable. Would this be intentional planned obsolescence, or could it be that they were dialing in the product quality? I imagine that stronger stockings are more expensive to make (thicker material or different weave perhaps), so if I were running the factory I would start with good product and then dial back the quality (and expense) until I hit the sweet spot determined by the market. ---
**Author:** ![Sigene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df788c/32.png) [@Sigene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigene)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/38 "2014-10-03T13:39:13Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Well, no, the OP’s question is “what tech war example can I use to illustrate the topic that’s newer than 1990?” 🙂 This is what I’m trying to find. ---
**Author:** ![Arcite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/67e7ee/32.png) [@Arcite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arcite)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/39 "2014-10-03T14:03:47Z")
Not sure this is exactly the type of thing the OP had in mind, since it’s not a “tech war,” but after this year, plasma TVs are going the way of the dodo, despite the fact that home theater enthusiasts and reviewers still find them to have superior picture quality to even the latest LCDs. [Here’s an article](http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-mh-bigscreen-plasma-tv-20140707-column.html) that specifically compares the death of plasma to the death of Betamax. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2014, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178/40 "2014-10-03T14:07:48Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I’ve heard cookware made of the [original material](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroceram) that Corningware was made of being used as an example of a technology that failed because it was superior. It was so durable that people who bought it seldom needed to buy anything new; so it was discontinued and a more fragile product using the same brand name was produced instead. That’s more of a market segmentation and product positioning failure than anything else. They should have marketed it and priced it similar to pots and pans (which last for a lifetime, or nearly so) instead of alongside regular glassware. The biggest problem with APS film was that it was released in 1996, which was not long at all before digital cameras became ubiquitous, and there wasn’t ever really any time for the marketing or word of mouth to really take hold. Most people thought “Huh… that’s interesting.” and stuck with their 35mm camera until they got a digital camera (exactly what happened to me actually). Only a very few people probably thought “Hey… my 35mm broke. This APS stuff looks cool.” Also, how big of annoyances were the issues with 35mm film? I can’t say I ever heard anyone gripe about how much of a pain it was- I suppose they knew they could have gone and got a 110 film camera if they wanted something easier. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/better-technologies-that-failed-i-e-betamax/700178.md?page=3)