Anyway it may just be a statistical bump...Last year was a huge year, maybe this year is seeing a fall off.
Delphi or Javascript? Delphi I could see. Javascript, not so much. They should not be recording a reduction of interest in Javascript when more frameworks appeared in the last year than ever before. I have seen no signs of the Javascript engine waning. In fact, it's continuing to pick up speed as customers demand web applications with greater interactivity and responsiveness.
What seems to be true to me is that their methodology is flawed. What they are doing is effectively a Google Fight on a professional scale. Which can lead to all sorts of problems due to the way the english language works. For example, take these two Google Fights:
Yet if we follow their methodology and search Google with +"Delphi programming" and +"Javascript programming" we get 260,000 vs. 341,000 results, respectively. Does that mean that Javascript is only slightly more popular for programming than Delphi? No, it means that people don't use the term "Javascript programming" a whole lot. (Or the search engine doesn't find that combination of words very appetizing. Either way.)
A more interesting search is to check Sourceforge. 1842 results for Javascript, 1359 results for AJAX, and 889 results for Delphi. That tells me that Javascript is WAY more popular than Delphi.
I think Javascript is also hampered by the fact that there aren't all that many different apps, and that a lot of people do view it as a semi-essential skill, so it gets less play.
I find "not all that many apps" to be a hard pill to swallow. There are very few sites on the internet that don't make use of Javascript in some form or another. On top of that, the number of AJAX/DHTML frameworks has exploded in the last year, with Google GWT leading the charge.
You don't see HTML up there anywhere.
HTML is not a programming language. It is a document format. Thus the concept of an HTML "programmer" was always a bit of a misnomer.:-)
I know Javascript quite well and don't see why it is required for Java development (beyond the UI and presentation layer, which has nothing to do with the Java backend).
I didn't say they needed Javascript to write Java, I said they needed it to do their job correctly. The implication being that the majority of Java programmers do web programming. (Which is a fairly safe bet.):-)
Though now that you mention it, Sun is trying to make Javascript a more prominent part of the Java language in 1.6. Which should be another factor putting pressure on its popularity.
Stop repeating this. If you want to say that Java is slower than C/C++, that's at least a defensible position. (Though not by much. All the benchmarks are showing Java exceeding C++ performance and giving C a run for its money.) But anyone who states that Java is "slow as hell" is painting a big, fat target on his forehead.
But did anyone else find Visual Basic rising two spots to #3 past PHP & C++ to be a sure sign of the apocalypse?
I dunno, there seems to be something seriously wrong with their methodology. According to the current chart, Javascript (which is finally coming into its own) is less popular than Delphi, a language that's all but walking dead. (No offense to our Pascal friends around here.)
I find this to be a highly suspicious turn of events. Especially when you consider that 70-80% of those Java programmers at #1 in the list, have to work with Javascript in order to perform their job correctly. In comparison, Delphi is completely divorced from any other platform or language. Yet Delphi is more popular? I don't think so...
many laptops can't put out an HDTV signal natively to take advantage of those resolutions on a TV screen.
Untrue. I just picked up an HDTV to use as my computer monitor. I hooked it up with a VGA cable, and with a bit of fiddling in the NVidia control panel I had it outputting 1360x768. My work laptop is doing even better, driving a 1440x900 HD LCD Monitor while in its docking station. (Though the dock isn't actually a requirement. Just a convenience.)
Video cards have had programmable output specs for years. Even the oldest NVidia, ATI, or Intel video card can output HD graphics. The absolute worst case is that you'll need to update your drivers to a newer revision.
Am I the only one who thinks of the movie Antitrust when I hear this? I wonder if Microsoft bumped off a few OSS developers to get the code for Synap-- err... I mean... Live Mesh? And now that I think about it, is my wife really my wife or actually a Microsoft spy? Hmm..../insert paranoia and tinfoil hats
"However, modern scholarly discussion and support is very limited." "The idea of Jesus as a myth is rejected by the majority of biblical scholars and historians." "Richard Burridge and Graham Gould stated that they did not know of any "respectable" scholars that held the view today." "Robert E. Van Voorst has stated that biblical scholars and historians regard the thesis as "effectively refuted"." Grant writes "To sum up, modern critical methods fail to support the Christ myth theory. It has 'again and again been answered and annihilated by first rank scholars.' In recent years, 'no serious scholar has ventured to postulate the non historicity of Jesus' or at any rate very few, and they have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary." Charlesworth writes "No reputable scholar today questions that a Jew named Jesus son of Joseph lived; most readily admit that we now know a considerable amount about his actions and basic teachings...",
And for the record, Maxo-Texas, it's nothing against you. It's just a pet peeve of mine when the mods abuse their powers. It's perfectly acceptable for you to think what you want to think.
But when the mods decide to silence someone who points out that historians agree on the existence of a historical figure? Well, that's the exact OPPOSITE of good science. The exact sort of behavior that I imagine those mods are angry at religious fanatics for.
Wow. -1 Overrated & -1 Troll. The mods must really hate the truth.
Geez, it's not like we said anything horrendous. A guy existed 2,000 years ago and happened to start a new religion. That religion believes he was the Son of the Jewish God and died on the cross to save humans from their sins. That's what we in the business like to call "facts". So get over yourselves already.
(And yes, I will keep posting if you mods keep mis-modding. You are abusing your mod points and you know it.)
Actually there's awful little evidence to support his existence. Go investigate!;)
Apparently you need to investigate harder. There is very little argument at this point over whether Jesus existed or not. Wikipedia has an article which details historical sources used to reconstruct the existence of Jesus independent from the religious views about him:
Whether you believe him to be the Son of God or simply a man who started Yet Another Religion(TM), not too many historians will take the position that he simply didn't exist.
At the company I work at, there is extreme contempt for hooking widescreen laptops up to projectors and smartboards as the user on the laptop cannot view what they are doing on the laptop's screen (if they do it is super distorted to fit on the other viewing device).
That's odd. All the laptops I use happily show an 800x600 image square in the middle of the screen when hooked up to a projector. (Either that or I can use it as a second screen. Depends on how your laptop is configured.) You may want to play around in the Display Properties and see if you can reconfigure your laptop to handle that situation correctly. In my experience, there are very few widescreen devices that lack support for 4:3 mode with black bars.
Is it still insanely counter-intuitive and hard to learn?
For the 3D part? Probably. But the video editing was (surprisingly) a snap. Just follow Eugenia's instructions and you'll be up and running in no time flat!
If you don't believe me, check this out. After seeing this story, I downloaded the latest Blender and got cracking. A short time later I had this video uploaded to YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUzVi_f5kyE
All the source videos were fairly large clips that Blender handled without issue. With only a smidge of practice, I was able to clip them to size and add transitions. So I'm pretty happy with the result. Especially since I have absolutely NO video editing experience. If I had a bit more time with this tool, I imagine I could whip up a pretty good promotional video.
I didn't bother with the audio tracks on my first run-through, but it doesn't appear to be too difficult to include them. The one issue I'm concerned about is if there is support for a decent mixer. (e.g. Could I play background music, then at some point fade it to a less audible level, play the original speech/effects, then adjust the BG music back to full volume?) Worst case, that's probably something I could work out in an audio editing program, but it would be a major pain.
I can't complain, though, given what I paid for Blender. (i.e. Nothing!) It's possibly the best FREE video editing tool I have ever seen. Which probably says more about the lack of such tools than about the brilliance of Blender, but I'm still happy.:-)
Feel free to give it a go yourself. If you need some footage to mess around with, the stuff I used can be found here: http://blog.wiicade.com/?p=177
Indeed. The "solo" buttons and effects switch are the big features of the guitar. But in actual construction quality and usability, the Les Paul wins on every count. For one, the first batch or two of Rock Band guitars broke with alarming regularity. (It wasn't just one of those "reported" things. Two of the three people I know with Rock Band had to get replacements.) This has (hopefully!) been corrected, but there are still two major design issues:
- The strum bar is EXTREMELY stiff. As the difficulty ramps up, it's difficult to keep strumming to the beat. If you prefer to double-strum (e.g. both up-stroke and down-stroke) it's not too bad. But for those of us who like to single-strum, the guitar is nothing but pain. - The buttons are flush on the guitar. This makes it nicer to look at, but it can be difficult to find your finger positions without looking.
Try a side-by-side comparison of the two controllers some time and I think you'll find that the Les Paul is far more comfortable and reliable every time.
It is not an intent to troll. It is a well-known fact that the GH3 controller is of superior quality and construction to the Rock Band controller. Which is why it's such a big deal when they don't support the GH3 controller. (As with the PS3.)
There are times I wonder about Slashdot. They ignore the HUGE story that Rock Band for the Wii will be horribly nerfed, but post stories about some weirdo who decides to dress up in a white costume that says "Wii" on it.
What ever happened to "Stuff that Matters"? It seems to be less and less true these days.:-(
It is almost like they lost the will to make games.
That is more or less what happened. In 1984, InfoCom tried to "serious up" with the Cornerstone database. Unfortunately, it was not well received and kind of dragged the company down:
Also by 1986, gamers were fascinated with cool graphics and sounds that pushed the envelope of their C64s, as well as this interesting new console called the "Nintendo Entertainment System" with its distinctly unique brand of games. There wasn't a whole lot of room in the market for text adventures anymore. With their resources spread out and depleted, "loosing their will" was probably an apt description.
What is this "free will" you speak of? Does my brain break some law of physics when I make a decision? How could I have made the decision any other way?
Did someone fail Quantum Physics 101? We live in a universe of probability, not determinism.
Second: We greatly underestimated the challenges we face. Here was an underestimation made by the public but not by the engineers. We saw that we went from heavier than air flight to being on the moon in inside 70 years and assumed that continued progress would follow the same track. As a matter of fact it couldn't (not least because of diminishing marginal returns but also because of the huge change in challenges between getting to LEO and getting to the moon). Once we got to the moon we realized that the next step wasn't right around the corner. This happened to coincide with a number of social changes that demystified the space race and caused people to be less inclined to pay for large government projects.
Actually, the engineers were far more on the ball than this. They really did envision a grand space program with colonies across the solar system. To make it happen, they designed quite a few incredible machines. The Saturn V was only the herald of many amazing advancements in spaceflight that were to come. Artificial gravity, Single-Stage to Orbit, Nuclear Pulse Propulsion, Nuclear Thermal Engines, and other amazing designs were drawn up, prototyped, and in some cases even built.
Rockets were going to diversify into craft that were smaller and cheaper for manned space flight as well as craft that were larger and similarly cheaper for launching massive payloads like space stations, moon base supplies, interplanetary craft, raw materials, foundries, whatever you could imagine.
So what really happened? Well, there's no question in that respect. The space race was 98% politically motivated. The US and the USSR couldn't lob nukes at each other due to that pesky MAD thing, so they lobbed space technology breakthroughs at each other in the biggest pissing contest in history. Both sides developed incredibly expensive crash programs to bring advanced space technology to fruition. The result was the development of new materials, new engines, new electronics, new physics, new logistics, just about every area of science and technology was pushed to the limit of what these post-WWII economies could muster. (Which was quite a bit given the breakneck pace of WWII technological development and modernization.)
Each side tried to out-muster the other, with the USSR handily keeping one step ahead of the US in every development. So the US set its sights on an incredible goal: Landing a man on the moon. The USSR tried to beat the US to the punch on this task, but when they failed, they didn't take the loss lightly. Rather than admit defeat, the USSR buried any information on the fact that they had even tried. The official line to the public was, the USSR was not in a race to the moon.
Where did that leave the US? Ultimately, with a very expensive space program that had outlived its political usefulness. Lunar missions were scaled back and eventually canceled. The SkyLab station was put in a parking orbit and eventually allowed to reenter and burn up. The grand plans for a small space shuttle, a large Saturn V, a "jumping off" space station, a moon base, and interplanetary mini-Orion missions were scaled back to a single spacecraft. President Nixon demanded that both NASA and the military fly one craft, and one craft only. So they hatched a grand plan for the future, put all their eggs in one basket, and asked the impossible of their engineers: They wanted the Space Shuttle.
Now there's an interesting economic issue with trying to create a machine that is everything to everyone. Unless you have a strong history of both successes and failures from which to understand every nuance required to design and build the all-in-one wonder, you are almost guaranteed to produce a machine that is jack-of-all-trades and master-of-none. Which is exactly what happened with the Space Shuttle.
* Cargo capability was too small for military sats * Launch cost was too high for commercial sats * Satellite return capability was unnecessary * Extreme cro
Thus my comment about short-term. They make a lot of money for a while. But someone else will often take the market away in the long term. Note the AC above who also made that mistake.
As for Ageia, I don't think they actually broke open a new market. All they did was sell a semiconductor that nobody wanted. So they would actually go in the failure category rather than the success category.
Your comment doesn't make a lick of sense. I mentioned that the early entrants into a new market make the most money in the short-term. You then try to refute my argument with a long-term argument. Logic error. Danger Will Robinson. Danger!
Was MySpace the first social networking site?
No. That dubious distinction belongs to Classmates.com, a site launching in 1995 that did quite well for itself and is still going strong. (Oddly.)
Was World of Warcraft the first MMORPG?
Neverwinter Nights, Ultima Online, and Everquest (nay, Evercrack!) were all highly successful and made their creators a lot of money in the short term.
Consider Ford versus Toyota/Honda/etc.
Consider what? Ford went gangbuster when it released the Model T to the market. In the short term, Ford's assembly-line approach effectively handed them the market. Toyota and Honda weren't competitors for nearly 80 years!
Slashdot Mirror
Delphi or Javascript? Delphi I could see. Javascript, not so much. They should not be recording a reduction of interest in Javascript when more frameworks appeared in the last year than ever before. I have seen no signs of the Javascript engine waning. In fact, it's continuing to pick up speed as customers demand web applications with greater interactivity and responsiveness.
What seems to be true to me is that their methodology is flawed. What they are doing is effectively a Google Fight on a professional scale. Which can lead to all sorts of problems due to the way the english language works. For example, take these two Google Fights:
Delphi vs. Javascript - 6.62:1 in favor of Javascript
Delphi programming vs. Javascript programming - 2:1 in favor of Javascript
Yet if we follow their methodology and search Google with +"Delphi programming" and +"Javascript programming" we get 260,000 vs. 341,000 results, respectively. Does that mean that Javascript is only slightly more popular for programming than Delphi? No, it means that people don't use the term "Javascript programming" a whole lot. (Or the search engine doesn't find that combination of words very appetizing. Either way.)
A more interesting search is to check Sourceforge. 1842 results for Javascript, 1359 results for AJAX, and 889 results for Delphi. That tells me that Javascript is WAY more popular than Delphi.
I didn't say they needed Javascript to write Java, I said they needed it to do their job correctly. The implication being that the majority of Java programmers do web programming. (Which is a fairly safe bet.)
Though now that you mention it, Sun is trying to make Javascript a more prominent part of the Java language in 1.6. Which should be another factor putting pressure on its popularity.
Just a friendly bit of advice.
I dunno, there seems to be something seriously wrong with their methodology. According to the current chart, Javascript (which is finally coming into its own) is less popular than Delphi, a language that's all but walking dead. (No offense to our Pascal friends around here.)
I find this to be a highly suspicious turn of events. Especially when you consider that 70-80% of those Java programmers at #1 in the list, have to work with Javascript in order to perform their job correctly. In comparison, Delphi is completely divorced from any other platform or language. Yet Delphi is more popular? I don't think so...
Untrue. I just picked up an HDTV to use as my computer monitor. I hooked it up with a VGA cable, and with a bit of fiddling in the NVidia control panel I had it outputting 1360x768. My work laptop is doing even better, driving a 1440x900 HD LCD Monitor while in its docking station. (Though the dock isn't actually a requirement. Just a convenience.)
Video cards have had programmable output specs for years. Even the oldest NVidia, ATI, or Intel video card can output HD graphics. The absolute worst case is that you'll need to update your drivers to a newer revision.
Am I the only one who thinks of the movie Antitrust when I hear this? I wonder if Microsoft bumped off a few OSS developers to get the code for Synap-- err... I mean... Live Mesh? And now that I think about it, is my wife really my wife or actually a Microsoft spy? Hmm.... /insert paranoia and tinfoil hats
From your link:
...",
"However, modern scholarly discussion and support is very limited."
"The idea of Jesus as a myth is rejected by the majority of biblical scholars and historians."
"Richard Burridge and Graham Gould stated that they did not know of any "respectable" scholars that held the view today."
"Robert E. Van Voorst has stated that biblical scholars and historians regard the thesis as "effectively refuted"."
Grant writes "To sum up, modern critical methods fail to support the Christ myth theory. It has 'again and again been answered and annihilated by first rank scholars.' In recent years, 'no serious scholar has ventured to postulate the non historicity of Jesus' or at any rate very few, and they have not succeeded in disposing of the much stronger, indeed very abundant, evidence to the contrary."
Charlesworth writes "No reputable scholar today questions that a Jew named Jesus son of Joseph lived; most readily admit that we now know a considerable amount about his actions and basic teachings
Oh yeah, that's brilliant. (eye roll)
And for the record, Maxo-Texas, it's nothing against you. It's just a pet peeve of mine when the mods abuse their powers. It's perfectly acceptable for you to think what you want to think.
But when the mods decide to silence someone who points out that historians agree on the existence of a historical figure? Well, that's the exact OPPOSITE of good science. The exact sort of behavior that I imagine those mods are angry at religious fanatics for.
Amazing. A +5 for going completely off the topic. What was the topic? Did Jesus exist. A: Resounding yes from all parties.
Now that we have that settled, the mods are still abusing their mod points. Shame on them.
Wow. -1 Overrated & -1 Troll. The mods must really hate the truth.
Geez, it's not like we said anything horrendous. A guy existed 2,000 years ago and happened to start a new religion. That religion believes he was the Son of the Jewish God and died on the cross to save humans from their sins. That's what we in the business like to call "facts". So get over yourselves already.
(And yes, I will keep posting if you mods keep mis-modding. You are abusing your mod points and you know it.)
Apparently you need to investigate harder. There is very little argument at this point over whether Jesus existed or not. Wikipedia has an article which details historical sources used to reconstruct the existence of Jesus independent from the religious views about him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus
Whether you believe him to be the Son of God or simply a man who started Yet Another Religion(TM), not too many historians will take the position that he simply didn't exist.
That's odd. All the laptops I use happily show an 800x600 image square in the middle of the screen when hooked up to a projector. (Either that or I can use it as a second screen. Depends on how your laptop is configured.) You may want to play around in the Display Properties and see if you can reconfigure your laptop to handle that situation correctly. In my experience, there are very few widescreen devices that lack support for 4:3 mode with black bars.
For the 3D part? Probably. But the video editing was (surprisingly) a snap. Just follow Eugenia's instructions and you'll be up and running in no time flat!
If you don't believe me, check this out. After seeing this story, I downloaded the latest Blender and got cracking. A short time later I had this video uploaded to YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUzVi_f5kyE
All the source videos were fairly large clips that Blender handled without issue. With only a smidge of practice, I was able to clip them to size and add transitions. So I'm pretty happy with the result. Especially since I have absolutely NO video editing experience. If I had a bit more time with this tool, I imagine I could whip up a pretty good promotional video.
I didn't bother with the audio tracks on my first run-through, but it doesn't appear to be too difficult to include them. The one issue I'm concerned about is if there is support for a decent mixer. (e.g. Could I play background music, then at some point fade it to a less audible level, play the original speech/effects, then adjust the BG music back to full volume?) Worst case, that's probably something I could work out in an audio editing program, but it would be a major pain.
I can't complain, though, given what I paid for Blender. (i.e. Nothing!) It's possibly the best FREE video editing tool I have ever seen. Which probably says more about the lack of such tools than about the brilliance of Blender, but I'm still happy.
Feel free to give it a go yourself. If you need some footage to mess around with, the stuff I used can be found here: http://blog.wiicade.com/?p=177
Indeed. The "solo" buttons and effects switch are the big features of the guitar. But in actual construction quality and usability, the Les Paul wins on every count. For one, the first batch or two of Rock Band guitars broke with alarming regularity. (It wasn't just one of those "reported" things. Two of the three people I know with Rock Band had to get replacements.) This has (hopefully!) been corrected, but there are still two major design issues:
- The strum bar is EXTREMELY stiff. As the difficulty ramps up, it's difficult to keep strumming to the beat. If you prefer to double-strum (e.g. both up-stroke and down-stroke) it's not too bad. But for those of us who like to single-strum, the guitar is nothing but pain.
- The buttons are flush on the guitar. This makes it nicer to look at, but it can be difficult to find your finger positions without looking.
Try a side-by-side comparison of the two controllers some time and I think you'll find that the Les Paul is far more comfortable and reliable every time.
It is not an intent to troll. It is a well-known fact that the GH3 controller is of superior quality and construction to the Rock Band controller. Which is why it's such a big deal when they don't support the GH3 controller. (As with the PS3.)
There are times I wonder about Slashdot. They ignore the HUGE story that Rock Band for the Wii will be horribly nerfed, but post stories about some weirdo who decides to dress up in a white costume that says "Wii" on it.
:-(
What ever happened to "Stuff that Matters"? It seems to be less and less true these days.
Auto-cannibalism is not the answer!
I believe the correct response to disliking recycled jokes is: EAT ME
That is more or less what happened. In 1984, InfoCom tried to "serious up" with the Cornerstone database. Unfortunately, it was not well received and kind of dragged the company down:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infocom#Cornerstone
Also by 1986, gamers were fascinated with cool graphics and sounds that pushed the envelope of their C64s, as well as this interesting new console called the "Nintendo Entertainment System" with its distinctly unique brand of games. There wasn't a whole lot of room in the market for text adventures anymore. With their resources spread out and depleted, "loosing their will" was probably an apt description.
Hmm... that reminds me of this DailyWTF. Who knew that Mr. Test User was such a big customer? :-P
Did someone fail Quantum Physics 101? We live in a universe of probability, not determinism.
Actually, the engineers were far more on the ball than this. They really did envision a grand space program with colonies across the solar system. To make it happen, they designed quite a few incredible machines. The Saturn V was only the herald of many amazing advancements in spaceflight that were to come. Artificial gravity, Single-Stage to Orbit, Nuclear Pulse Propulsion, Nuclear Thermal Engines, and other amazing designs were drawn up, prototyped, and in some cases even built.
Rockets were going to diversify into craft that were smaller and cheaper for manned space flight as well as craft that were larger and similarly cheaper for launching massive payloads like space stations, moon base supplies, interplanetary craft, raw materials, foundries, whatever you could imagine.
So what really happened? Well, there's no question in that respect. The space race was 98% politically motivated. The US and the USSR couldn't lob nukes at each other due to that pesky MAD thing, so they lobbed space technology breakthroughs at each other in the biggest pissing contest in history. Both sides developed incredibly expensive crash programs to bring advanced space technology to fruition. The result was the development of new materials, new engines, new electronics, new physics, new logistics, just about every area of science and technology was pushed to the limit of what these post-WWII economies could muster. (Which was quite a bit given the breakneck pace of WWII technological development and modernization.)
Each side tried to out-muster the other, with the USSR handily keeping one step ahead of the US in every development. So the US set its sights on an incredible goal: Landing a man on the moon. The USSR tried to beat the US to the punch on this task, but when they failed, they didn't take the loss lightly. Rather than admit defeat, the USSR buried any information on the fact that they had even tried. The official line to the public was, the USSR was not in a race to the moon.
Where did that leave the US? Ultimately, with a very expensive space program that had outlived its political usefulness. Lunar missions were scaled back and eventually canceled. The SkyLab station was put in a parking orbit and eventually allowed to reenter and burn up. The grand plans for a small space shuttle, a large Saturn V, a "jumping off" space station, a moon base, and interplanetary mini-Orion missions were scaled back to a single spacecraft. President Nixon demanded that both NASA and the military fly one craft, and one craft only. So they hatched a grand plan for the future, put all their eggs in one basket, and asked the impossible of their engineers: They wanted the Space Shuttle.
Now there's an interesting economic issue with trying to create a machine that is everything to everyone. Unless you have a strong history of both successes and failures from which to understand every nuance required to design and build the all-in-one wonder, you are almost guaranteed to produce a machine that is jack-of-all-trades and master-of-none. Which is exactly what happened with the Space Shuttle.
* Cargo capability was too small for military sats
* Launch cost was too high for commercial sats
* Satellite return capability was unnecessary
* Extreme cro
Thus my comment about short-term. They make a lot of money for a while. But someone else will often take the market away in the long term. Note the AC above who also made that mistake.
As for Ageia, I don't think they actually broke open a new market. All they did was sell a semiconductor that nobody wanted. So they would actually go in the failure category rather than the success category.
No. That dubious distinction belongs to Classmates.com, a site launching in 1995 that did quite well for itself and is still going strong. (Oddly.)
Neverwinter Nights, Ultima Online, and Everquest (nay, Evercrack!) were all highly successful and made their creators a lot of money in the short term.
Consider what? Ford went gangbuster when it released the Model T to the market. In the short term, Ford's assembly-line approach effectively handed them the market. Toyota and Honda weren't competitors for nearly 80 years!