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Overdue Tech

After years of waiting for these promising technologies, we think they're still far from mainstream.

WiMax: Back in 2003, WiMax was heralded as the ultimate solution to the world's connectivity problems, capable of covering an entire city with ubiquitous broadband. WiMax today, however, is little more than an IT backbone for long-distance line-of-sight wide-area networks, largely because it's not very effective for the kinds of mobile devices that most people use for wireless Internet service. The basic technology of WiMax may yet evolve as part of future 4G cellular networks, but that's still a long way off.

IPTV: Oh, how we've hungered for the video nirvana that IPTV has been promising. But while Verizon's FiOS TV and AT&T's U-Verse are finally rolling out, they've yet to produce the amazing lineup of HD channels, on-demand shows, integrated gaming, and digital voice calling the companies claimed would come, and they're still anything but ubiquitous. Meanwhile, digital cable has evolved enough to take some of the wind out of IPTV's sails.

RFID: If early predictions were to be believed, today you would be walking through the grocery store filling up your cart as tiny radio frequency identification (RFID) tags announced the contents of the cart and an RFID-enabled credit card automatically paid the bill. Ummm, nope. The biggest holdup has come from the very companies attempting to roll out the technology, with industry infighting over standardization keeping RFID on the shelf.

Virtual reality: Second Life boasts a 3D space in which users can buy and sell property, create objects, and socialize, but its relatively crude graphics still feel more virtual than real. Virtual reality as folks imagined it in the 1990s isn't likely to emerge until someone invents a wearable display that people will actually wear. At least we have World of Warcraft.