Newton --> iPad And you can't tell me those products aren't successful. But that's beside the point -- I'm not here to lay the blueprint for the Next Big Thing or argue the particulars of what might have been. My point is that you can't isolate a handful of failed executions of an idea and then conclude that the whole concept is doomed to obscurity or failure.
The Newton was never intended as anything but a business organizer. Comparing it to an iPad simply illustrates your ignorance of the platform. MY point is that VR isn't "a handful" of failed executions of an idea. MY point is that a whole bunch of clever people have been devoting their lives to it for decades and its adoption is no higher now than it was when Reagan was president. Kind of how MY point is that 3d printing has been around for over 15 years and the reason it hasn't set the world afire is that nobody really wants it.