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In the computer industry, vaporware is a product, typically computer hardware or software, that is announced to the general public but is never actually manufactured nor officially cancelled. Use of the word has broadened to include products such as automobiles. Vaporware is often announced months or years before its purported release, with development details lacking. Developers have been accused of intentionally promoting vaporware to keep customers from switching to competing products that offer more features.〔(Vapour-ware definition of Vapour-ware in the Free Online Encyclopedia ). Encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com.〕 ''Network World'' magazine called vaporware an "epidemic" in 1989, and blamed the press for not investigating whether developers' claims were true. Seven major companies issued a report in 1990 saying they felt vaporware had hurt the industry's credibility. The United States accused several companies of announcing vaporware early in violation of antitrust laws, but few have been found guilty. ''InfoWorld'' magazine wrote that the word is overused, and places an unfair stigma on developers. "Vaporware" was coined by a Microsoft engineer in 1982 to describe the company's Xenix operating system, and first appeared in print in a newsletter by entrepreneur Esther Dyson in 1983. It became popular among writers in the industry as a way to describe products they felt took too long to be released. ''InfoWorld'' magazine editor Stewart Alsop helped popularize it by lampooning Bill Gates with a ''Golden Vaporware'' award for the late release of his company's first version of Windows in 1985. Vaporware first implied intentional fraud when it was applied to the Ovation office suite in 1983; the suite's demonstration was well received by the press, but the product was later revealed to have never existed. ==Etymology== "Vaporware", sometimes synonymous with "vaportalk" in the 1980s,〔 has no single definition. It is generally used to describe a hardware or software product that has been announced, but that the developer has no intention of releasing any time soon, if ever.〔Bayus; Jain; Rao (2001) p. 3.〕〔Prentice; Langmore (1994) p. 11.〕 The first reported use of the word was in 1982 by an engineer at the computer software company Microsoft.〔Flynn (1995), p. 1.〕 Ann Winblad, president of Open Systems Accounting Software, wanted to know if Microsoft planned to stop developing its Xenix operating system as some of Open System's products depended on it. She asked two Microsoft software engineers, John Ulett and Mark Ursino, who confirmed that development of Xenix had stopped. "One of them told me, 'Basically, it's vaporware'," she later said. Winblad compared the word to the idea of "selling smoke", implying Microsoft was selling a product it would soon not support.〔Shea (1984).〕 Winblad described the word to influential computer expert Esther Dyson,〔 who published it for the first time in her monthly newsletter ''RELease 1.0''. In an article titled "Vaporware" in the November 1983 issue of ''RELease 1.0'', Dyson defined the word as "good ideas incompletely implemented". She described three software products shown at COMDEX in Las Vegas that year with bombastic advertisements. She stated that demonstrations of the "purported revolutions, breakthroughs and new generations" at the exhibition did not meet those claims.〔〔Dyson (1983), pp. –6.〕 The practice existed before Winblad's account. In a January 1982 review of the new IBM Personal Computer, ''''Byte'' magazine'' magazine favorably noted that IBM "refused to acknowledge the existence of any product that is not ready to be put on dealers' shelves tomorrow. Although this is frustrating at times, it is a refreshing change from some companies' practice of announcing a product even before its design is finished." ''Creative Computing'' in March 1984 wrote of Coleco's delay in releasing the Adam that the company "did not invent the common practice of debuting products before they actually exist. In microcomputers, to do so otherwise would be to break with a veritable tradition." After Dyson's article, however, the word became popular among writers in the personal computer software industry as a way to describe products they believed took too long to be released after their first announcement.〔 ''InfoWorld'' magazine editor Stewart Alsop helped popularize its use by lampooning Bill Gates, then CEO of Microsoft, with a ''Golden Vaporware'' award for the 18-month late release of Microsoft's first version of Windows in 1985. Alsop presented it to Gates at a celebration for the release while the song "The Impossible Dream" played in the background.〔Garud (1997); Ichbiah cited in Bayus; Jain; Rao (2001) p. 3.〕〔Bayus; Jain; Rao (2001), p. 5.〕 "Vaporware" took another meaning when it was used to describe a product that did not exist. A new company named Ovation Technologies announced its office suite Ovation in 1983.〔 The company invested in an advertising campaign that promoted Ovation as a "great innovation", and showed a demonstration of the program at computer trade shows.〔〔 The demonstration was well received by writers in the press, was featured in a cover story for an industry magazine, and reportedly created anticipation among potential customers.〔Jenkins (1998).〕 Executives later revealed that Ovation never existed. The company created the fake demonstration in an unsuccessful attempt to raise money to finish their product,〔Flynn (1995), p. 2.〕 and is "widely considered the mother of all vaporware," according to Laurie Flynn of ''The New York Times''.〔 Use of the term spread beyond the computer industry. ''Newsweek'' magazine's Allan Sloan described the manipulation of stocks by Yahoo! and Amazon.com as "financial vaporware" in 1997.〔Sloan (1997)〕 ''Popular Science'' magazine uses a scale ranging from "vaporware" to "bet on it" to describe release dates of new consumer electronics. Car manufacturer General Motors' plans to develop and sell an electric car were called vaporware by an advocacy group in 2008. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「vaporware」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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