50 years of Apple
We’re celebrating Apple’s 50th birthday with a week of content about the tech giant. It covers everything from personal recollections from our writers to the greatest — and worst — Apple gadgets as voted by you, and you can read it all on our 50 years of Apple page.
This week marks Apple’s fiftieth anniversary, and the company has been a core pillar of the tech landscape for much of that time.
We’ve already rounded up Apple’s worst-ever gadgets (and, for balance, its best gadgets of the past half century). But the moments below represent its biggest lapses in judgement across software, services and baffling product decisions.
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We’re big fans of Apple when it gets things right – which happens more often than not – but even the most hardened fan has to admit that the company has dropped some huge, and sometimes hilarious, tech clangers…
1. MobileMe — or should that be ‘MobileMess’?
Unfortunately, it quickly earned the nickname “MobileMess” because it was too unreliable to be used by just about anyone. Syncing was unreliable, often dropping out right when you needed access to your most important files, and many users complained about missing emails.
This embarrassing launch infuriated Steve Jobs, who reportedly rounded up the development team and told them: “You’ve tarnished Apple’s reputation. You should hate each other for having let each other down.”
After debuting in 2008, it was taken offline in 2012 and paved over with the much more reliable iCloud. If you’ve ever cursed an iCloud sync issue, count yourself lucky you’re not using MobileMe instead.
2. That ‘hockey puck’ mouse
Ever seen an iMac G3? They have a great, retro quality today, but back in 1998, they were the future — a brightly-colored look at the computing future of tomorrow.
The trouble was that the mouse that came with it, the Apple USB Mouse, was circular. If you’ve ever used a mouse (and there’s a very good chance you, the discerning TechRadar reader, have), you’ll know that holding onto a circular mouse is hardly conducive to a strong grip or getting much done.
Combine that with a short cable, and you’ve got a rounded recipe for hand cramp. The worst part? Apple persevered with it for two years.
3. The great Apple Maps fumble
While Apple Maps has become a very reliable mapping service, its launch was a thing of legend — and not for positive reasons.
Apple was keen to remove Google Maps from its devices and began work on its own maps app. It launched in September 2012, and just about everything that could go wrong went wrong. It was an Apple Park-sized fumble.
Incorrect location information, unreliable directions, and Apple’s inability to read the room when it comes to geopolitical tensions were all criticized by users. Incredibly, new CEO Tim Cook actually told users to look at rivals while iOS Maps was being fixed.
“While we’re improving Maps, you can try alternatives by downloading map apps from the App Store like Bing, MapQuest and Waze, or use Google or Nokia maps by going to their websites and creating an icon on your home screen to their web app,” he said at the time in an open letter on Apple’s website.
While Apple Maps is now a much better product — some would argue, even better than Google Maps — for some it’ll always tainted by this launch.
4. The rise and rapid fall of Ping
Whether you were an iTunes die-hard or using another service entirely, there’s a good chance the removal of iTunes Ping was something you didn’t even realize happened.
Pitched by Steve Jobs as a crossover between the likes of Facebook, Twitter, and iTunes, the idea was to make it easier to share music with your friends and family, see what they were buying, and was accessible across the iPhone and iPod Touch.
Sadly, Ping was short-lived: Apple released it in September 2010, and it was gone just two years later.
Tim Cook, who didn’t take over as CEO until after Ping launched, summed up Ping’s lackluster reception with characteristic understatement. “We tried Ping and I think the customer voted and said this isn’t something that I want to put a lot of energy into… Will we kill it? I don’t know. We’ll look at that,” he said.
A month later, Apple did indeed look at that — and pulled the plug on poor Ping.
5. The unforgettable U2 blunder
Do you like U2? Back in September 2014, it didn’t really matter what your answer was to that question because Apple beamed Bono and Co’s Songs of Innocence album straight into your iTunes library.
All 500 million iTunes subscribers found the album waiting for them, whether they wanted it or not. For some, it caused storage space issues, and it wasn’t particularly easy to remove, either.
It also led to deeper conversations about the value of music and raised suggestions that U2 had devalued the art form. Just wait until you get to streaming services, guys…
6. The butterfly keyboard fiasco
Nothing sums up Apple’s focus on form over function — and the occasional lapses that can create — better than the Butterfly keyboard fiasco of 2015.
The MacBook 12-inch was already grabbing the wrong kind of headlines for switching out USB for USB-C (which at the time was still an emerging technology), but the keyboard’s ‘butterfly’ hinge system was a huge issue for Apple — especially since it came to MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models, too.
From repeating keys to keys simply detaching themselves while in use, the whole thing cost Apple millions to fix. The free repair program expired in 2024, so if your keyboard fails now, you’re out of luck.
7. The iTunes Phone that made iPods looks amazing
If you were looking for a way to take your iTunes library on the go back in 2005, your only option outside of Apple’s own iPod was the Motorola ROKR E1.
Not heard of it? We don’t blame you. Billed as the phone that let you take your iTunes library anywhere, there were two major downsides.
For one, its USB 1.1 speeds meant moving files to and from the device was glacially slow. The other issue was that it would only allow users to download 100 songs to it in order to protect iPod sales.
That’s not exactly a great sales pitch — and it’s incredible to think that just 15 months after the video above, Apple would introduce the iPhone and immediately make all ‘music phones’ look like ancient history.
8. The charging port is where?
Every now and then, Apple makes a decision that feels like it could have been avoided by asking just one person outside of the design room what they thought.
One of those was burying the Mac Mini power button under the otherwise amazing mini PC. But the most famous example is the Magic Mouse (Second Generation). On the top half, it’s everything Apple does so well — it’s a great mouse, comfortable in the hand and stylish, while supporting slick gestures. On the bottom? The charging port.
That means that, if you want to use the computer while charging the mouse (hardly an unreasonable use case), you need to plug it in and use an alternative mouse while it powers up.
Apple then stunned the computing world by doubling-down on this decision with a redesigned Magic Mouse in 2024, which is a rare example of a consumer product also being an immaculate piece of rage-bait.
9. RIP AirPower, gone too soon
Apple’s ‘Let’s meet at our place’ September 2017 event would be remembered for many things, including the iPhone X — which is a good thing, given that one of the announced products never actually shipped.
The iPhone 8 and 8 Plus were overshadowed by the reveal of the iPhone X, the first iPhone to remove the home button and go for an all-screen display. Its $999 price tag got a lot of attention, but so too did AirPower.
A charging mat intended to charge your phone, AirPods, and Apple Watch all at once, regardless of where you lay them, was almost a no-brainer for a company releasing all three in the same year.
Sadly, manufacturing issues with the prototype meant AirPower never made it to market, with some reports suggesting that Apple’s early units struggled to dissipate heat and also melted the plastic — oof.
10. Antennagate, or how to dig yourself a bigger hole
The iPhone 4 debuted in 2010 with a new design that made your iPhone 3GS look hokey by comparison, but the new metal frame that doubled as the antenna was holding a secret — or, more specifically, those holding it would find that its signal would drop out.
Apple initially claimed users were, in a way, ‘holding it wrong’. Well, Apple didn’t exactly say that, but it did say in a misguided statement: “Gripping any mobile phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for every wireless phone. If you ever experience this on your iPhone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases.”
It soon became a widespread enough issue to prompt Apple to eventually issue a formal apology and offer free bumper cases to affected users.
Thankfully, the iPhone 4S, which launched the next year, shared the same visual design but fixed the antenna issue.
11. Apple Intelligence, Or lack thereof
With the rest of the tech world foaming at the mouth for AI products and services, Apple was seemingly caught in a standing start and struggling to make up ground.
Siri was behind the curve (to put it politely) when pitted against other assistants, and while Apple had partnered with ChatGPT to solve some issues, it was clear it needed a quantum leap to catch up.
The company faced lawsuits based on false advertising for the promised features, and is now seemingly partnering with Google Gemini to supercharge Siri to get even close to what was promised.
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