What technological marvels failed to turn heads in 2011? Witness the horrible truth.
Photo: Peter Taylor/Flickr

It’s the end of year, which means it’s the time for all good columnists to whip out their “best of the year” lists. Or, if they’re feeling impish, their “worst of the year” lists. Often both because, hey, two columns.

However, I march to the beat of a different drummer. In fact, he may not actually be a drummer at all — I think he’s actually the guy I hired to fix my water heater.

Nonetheless, rather than probing the heights or descending the depths of the past year, I’m going to talk a...

Pat Lincoln, director of SRI’s Computer Science Laboratory, stands next to a huge display running BotHunter, SRI's botnet detection software. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired

Who invented Siri?

Like it says on the box… I was designed by Apple in California.

Didn’t SRI invent Siri?

I don’t know what you mean by ‘Didn’t SRI invent Siri’

Indeed. Even virtual celebrities forget their humble origins all too quickly.

The fact is, a non-profit R&D powerhouse called SRI International conducted decades of research in artificial intelligence to build the foundations of Apple’s virtual digital assistant. The p...