John Robb: Mark flames me for calling Open Source a “Flop of 2001.” Hey, the reason it is a flop is this: it didn't live up to the hype. I don't dismiss the value of open source, but rather the bombastic rhetoric of its proponants. A lot of stuff was said by open source zealots in the last five years that doesn't hold together today.
For my flops list, I picked areas of technology that were most greatly impacted by the deflation of their hype balloon. Portals and 3G where the other two areas cited. All three were masters of the universe in 2000. Firms and individuals poured billions into them. They are now merely players on a larger landscape of technology. Portals aren't going away entirely and certainly not open source. 3G may be dead. [John Robb's Radio Weblog]