To Strict and Zoe

[Guest guest]

You two will like this article, methinks.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34751981/ns/technology_and_science-innovation?pg=1 & G\

T1=43001#Tech_PCWorld_Tainted

Quick, what's the most admired technology brand? Maybe you answered Apple. Or

Google. Or maybe even Microsoft. I'm reasonably certain, however, that none of

the brands you're about to read about sprung to mind. They're all damaged goods

–severely damaged goods in most cases.

No brand is guaranteed eternal health. (The two most powerful tech trademarks of

the mid-1980s were arguably Compaq and Lotus; both are still around, but in

greatly diminished form.) The brands in this story haven't just lost a little of

their luster. Most were once among the most respected names in tech, but ran

into financial hardship and got sold (often repeatedly) to new owners who were

usually mostly interested in strip-mining whatever goodwill the brands retained

with the American public.

If you ever loved any of the names in this article – and chances are that you

once had a high opinion of at least a few of them – prepare to feel a tad glum.

Commodore

What it was: Jack Tramiel's groundbreaking computer company. In the 1970s and

1980s, it released one of the first PCs (the PET 2001), the best-selling PC of

all time (the Commodore 64), and (after Tramiel left) one of the best PCs ever

(the Amiga). But post-Tramiel management eventually ran the company into the

ground. It went belly-up in 1994.

What it became: Commodore's golden age may have been a quarter century ago, but

the name remains recognizable enough that multiple companies have acquired it

with giddy visions of using it to launch new product lines. Germany's ESCOM and

the Netherlands' Tulip both did so; both quickly gave up. Most recently, a

company called Commodore Gaming revived the nameplate yet again for a line of

high-end Windows desktops, but its current site is almost entirely devoted to

old Commodore 64 games which are now playable on the Wii. Bottom line: The

Commodore line of computers has now died at least four times.

And yes, I did consider giving Commodore's still-extant Amiga brand its own slot

on this list — but I'm too confused by its current status. Maybe you can explain

it to me?

Heathkit

What it was: I'm too young to have ever built a Heathkit during their glory

days, but I certainly remember wanting to put one together. There was a time

when there was no better way to establish your geek cred than to assemble a

Heathkit radio, TV, stereo system, or other piece of electronic gadgetry–and

doing it yourself saved you money, too. (Among the company's fans: Arizona

Senator Barry Goldwater, who assembled a hundred Heathkits, and the

distinguished literary critic Hugh Kenner.)

When the personal computer revolution came along, Heathkit became a significant

manufacturer of early PCs, too, leading to its 1979 purchase by Zenith. But

increasingly sophisticated, miniaturized electronics made it tough to save money

by assembling a kit rather than buying a ready-made item. In 1992, Heathkit

stopped selling kits.

What it became: Heathkit, which like many of the companies in this story has

gone through repeated changes in ownership, is still around. Its current name is

Heathkit Educational Systems, and it sells training materials for the PC,

telecommunications, and life sciences industries. The vestigial " kit " in its

name serves as a reminder that it's quite literally not the Heathkit it used to

be.

Bell & Howell

What it was: Incorporated in 1907, Bell & Howell was a major manufacturer of

imaging equipment (from Charlie Chaplin's movie camera to the slide projector at

your junior high) as well as microfilm products. This later business eventually

led to it getting into the online services business. Even if you never bought

any of its products, the name rang a bell, and suggested sturdy, reliable

quality.

What it became: The information-services part of B & H is now a perfectly

respectable company called ProQuest. And Kodak owns B & #65533;we Bell & Howell,

which makes scanners. But the once-great brand name has otherwise been turned

over to a licensing company that lets third parties slap it on pretty much

everything except for the products it was once associated with. You can buy

" Bell + Howell " laptop bags, razors, and headphones, as well as a pseudo-hearing

aid hawked on late-night TV and a pest-repellent device. It's undignified, I

tell you.

Westinghouse

What it was: With origins dating to 1886, Westinghouse was one of the greatest

American conglomerates–Pepsi to General Electric's Coke. Among its dizzying

array of businesses: electrical equipment, nuclear power plant equipment,

aircraft engines, air conditioning, elevators, refrigerators and other

appliances, gas turbines, locomotives, and robots. In 1995, however, it bought

CBS, changed its name to CBS Corporation, and began to sell off its

non-broadcasting businesses.

What it became: Bits and pieces of Westinghouse still exist - if you need to

build a nuclear plant, you might want to give it a call, and there are still

White-Westinghouse appliances. But Westinghouse is now primarily a shell company

that licenses its name out to other manufacturers who want a familiar-sounding

nameplate for their products. You can buy Westinghouse TVs and monitors,

doorbells, light bulbs, and photo frames. But there is no real " Westinghouse " -

the once-mighty behemoth of American commerce is now just a logo for rent.

AltaVista

What it was: AltaVista was the first blockbuster search engine -- a a remarkable

piece of technology that began as a Digital Equipment Corporation research

project and became the Google of its era. In fact, when Google came along the

easiest way to explain it was to say that it was like AltaVista, only even

better.

What it became: When brands get sold, they usually get damaged in the process.

AltaVista had five owners in five years: Digital (1995-1998), Compaq

(1998-1999), CMGI (1999-2003), Overture (2003), and Yahoo (2003-present). It

grew less relevant with each change of hands; if you weren't aware it's still

with us today, I'm not surprised. But here it is.

The About AltaVista page boasts that it's " a leading provider of search services

and technology " and that it " continues to advance Internet search with new

technologies and features designed to improve the search experience for

consumers. " As far as I can tell, though, AltaVista results are slightly

rehashed variants of what Yahoo gives you for the same queries. Using it is like

visiting an old friend who's been lobotomized.

AT & T

What it was: A telephone service company founded by the inventor of the

telephone, Graham Bell, in 1875. It went on to become synonymous with

phones and phone service in the United States–and was broken up into a

long-distance company and separate " Baby Bell " local-service companies as the

result of a 1982 agreement after it was sued under U.S. antitrust law.

What it became: AT & T is the current name of the former SBC, the

telecommunications giant which ended up owning half of the Baby Bells. It

adopted the brand when it acquired AT & T in 2005. I thought it was an odd name

change at the time, since the name AT & T brings to mind associations of the

telephone's old, monopolistic, land-line past, not its high-speed wireless

future. The name may be venerable, but it doesn't evoke warm and fuzzy feelings:

I can't prove it, but my gut tells me that the company's current subpar

reputation -- among iPhone owners, at least -- is at least slightly crummier

than it would have been if it had kept the SBC moniker.

But AT & T is also on this list -- despite still being attached to one of the

largest and most successful companies in America -- because its current use

underscores the completely ephemeral nature of branding in the

telecommunications industry. " AT & T " may have been around as a name for 135

years, but it's nothing more than three letters and an ampersand. That was

proven when hundreds of AT & T Wireless stores expensively rebranded themselves as

Cingular stores when Cingular bought AT & T's wireless arm & #65533;and then

expensively re-rebranded themselves as AT & T less than three years later.

Then there's the San Francisco Giants' ballpark. It's sported three different

names in the past six years: Pacific Bell Park, SBC Park, and now AT & T Park. One

more merger, and it may end up as Verizon Park, Comcast Park, or Google Park.

CompuServe

What it was: The dominant online service of the 1980s and early 1990s. It was a

classy operation, but it was eventually overtaken by AOL, and then acquired by

it in 1997.

What it became: AOL plunked down $1.2 billion for CompuServe, but it began

neglecting it the moment the ink on the contract was dry. It finally shut down

CompuServe Classic, the direct descendant of the original service, in July of

2009.

Today, the " About CompuServe " page brags that it " provides complete and

comprehensive products and access for Internet online users at home, in the

workplace and around the globe, " but don't you believe it -- it's really a

budget-priced dial-up ISP aimed at " value-driven adults going online for the

first time. " Depending on which part of the site you trust, the current version

of the service is either CompuServe 7.0, which was introduced back in 2001, or

the even-mustier CompuServe 2000. And the brand has been oddly melded with

another tarnished AOL acquisition, Netscape.

Napster

What it was: The peer-to-peer file-swapping service invented by Boston college

student Fanning in 1999. It did as much as anything else to introduce the

world to digital music, but it terrified the entertainment industry, which

instantly sued. A court order put Napster out of business in 2001.

What it became: In 2002, Roxio bought the Napster name at auction and applied it

to the not-very-successful Pressplay music service, which it had purchased from

Universal Music and Sony–two of the Recording Industry Association of America

members whose legal attack had shut down Napster in the first place. It was as

if a victorious Darth Vader had licensed the rights to rebrand the Empire as the

Rebel Alliance.

Today's Napster is owned by Best Buy, and it's not bad -- and at five bucks a

month for a basic account, it's not pricey, either. But whenever I speak its

name, I still want to surround it with air quotes.

Packard Bell

What it was: A manufacturer of classic American radios–and, eventually,

televisions–founded in 1926.

What it became: Like every other U.S. maker of radios and TVs, Packard Bell

eventually ran into dire straits. In 1986, the brand name was bought by Israeli

entrepreneur Beny Alagem, who applied it to a new line of home PCs. The new

company played up the name's distinguished history with the slogan " America grew

up listening to us. It still does. " It also did nothing to dispel the confusion

of consumers who thought it had something to do with Hewlett-Packard and/or AT & T

( " the Bell System " ).

And it made ... truly dreadful computers, with lousy customer service. Ones that

were so cruddy that people stopped thinking of Packard Bell as a defunct maker

of good radios and began thinking of it as an extant maker of terrible PCs. The

company was eventually bought by NEC, which abandoned the U.S. market but kept

on selling PB computers in Europe. (I'm assuming that they must have been better

than the U.S.-era ones; if they were as bad, there's no way the company could

have stayed in business.)

Packard Bell was in the news again last year when it was bought by bought by

Taiwanese PC giant Acer; it shows no signs of returning to the U.S. market, but

I still know people who shudder when they hear its name.

SCO

What it was: Once upon a time — starting in 1979, to be exact — there was a

software company called The Santa Cruz Operation, or SCO. It sold various

versions of the UNIX operating system. And as far as I can remember, it was both

successful and uncontroversial.

What it became: In 2001, SCO sold most of itself to Linux company Caldera, which

switched its focus to Unix and took the SCO name. In 2003, the new SCO declared

that Linux violated UNIX copyrights, and began suing everybody in sight — such

as IBM (eventually for $5 billion), Novell, AutoZone, and DaimlerChrysler. The

dispute remains mired in the courts and hasn't accomplished much except to earn

SCO the permanent loathing of the entire Linux community. (It certainly doesn't

seem to have made the company more successful.) I can't think of many brands

whose reputations have cratered in the way this one's has — it's a little as if

Ritz did something to deserve the enmity of cracker lovers everywhere.

Netscape

What it was: The company whose Navigator Web browser did more than any other

single product to introduce the world to the Web. Need I say more?

What it became: AOL's $4.2 billion 1998 acquisition of Netscape was an eerie and

depressing repeat of its CompuServe buyout from the prior year: It bought a

distinguished technology company, neglected it, then slapped its name on other,

only vaguely-related stuff. Navigator was never the same under AOL's ownership

and was officially abandoned in 2007; over the last decade, AOL has applied the

Netscape name to a low-rent portal, a cheapo dial-up ISP, and a short-lived

imitation of Digg. Today's Netscape.com is merely AOL.com with the Netscape logo

as wallpaper. I can't imagine why anyone would go there on purpose.

Polaroid

What it was: The company founded by legendary technologist-entrepreneur Edwin

Land in 1937. Its instant cameras, such as the SX-70, are among the most

ingenious, engaging gadgets of all time. (When I was at PC World, we published a

story that ranked the SX-70 as the eighth greatest gadget and the earlier

Swinger as the 43rd.)

What it became: Signs that Polaroid was slipping date to the 1970s -- the

failure of its Polavision instant movie camera eventually led to the ouster of

Edwin Land himself. In the 1990s, digital photography rendered the Polaroid

camera utterly obsolete. The company went bankrupt, then reemerged as a

licensing shell that permitted the once glorious brand to be used for imported

goods that had nothing to do with its heritage, such as portable DVD players. In

the meantime, it stopped making instant cameras and phased out film production.

Then it went bankrupt again, and was sold once more.

Looking at the undistinguished, generic digital cameras and TV sets now offered

under the Polaroid name makes me melancholy. At least the name is also used on

PoGo cameras and printers, which use interesting printing technology developed

by former Polaroid engineers. But if Polaroid can fall this far, no name is

sacred. Apple and Google, take heed -- and give thought to where you might wind

up come 2060 or so if you aren't careful.

Updated: 3:05 p.m. ET Jan. 25, 2010

© 2010 MSNBC.com

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