In the 1980's the computer industry suffered from product announcements long before product reality.  This month, Facebook and Microsoft's Hotmail brought us back to those days of hype over reality.

Vaporware is a word used to describe computer products that are announced to th public long before their actual release. The term was widely used in the mid 1980s in relation to the 18-month late release of Microsoft's first version of Windows.  There was lots of hype from Microsoft, lots of demonstrations, lists of product features - everything you needed except the actual product.

In recent years, the software industry has swung in the opposite direction.  Lead by Apple and Google, it is quite common there to be no official pre-announcements.  While rumors may swirl, the official announcement occurs only days before the actual product release. For example, Google's recent announcement of encrypted search featured these words "today we’re gradually rolling out a new choice."

However, recent announcements by Facebook regarding Facebook privacy and Microsoft about a summer release of Hotmail seem to be returning us to the days of old.  Days when vaporware implied a negative opinion of a product with uncertainty that it will eventually be released.  The news of an upgraded Hotmail garnered little attention, and thus little confusion.  However, Facebook's news was most often reported as a current fact - not future features.

Facebook, after suffering from endless criticism about their privacy policy announced a new privacy center with the words "We'll be rolling out these changes to all of you over the next few weeks."  Their announcement included this screen capture:

While millions of Facebook users heard about the hoopla around this announcement, when they logged in they were greeted with the same old confusing privacy section.

But these were not the mistakes of confused users, but of a press that has forgotten about vaporware.  Go back an look at some articles on the Facebook announcement and look for the words "coming soon" or "pending release" or "soon to be available" and you won't find them.  Check out the PC World New Zealand article or this article at nzherald.co.nz which says "For those who found it complicated to prevent outside websites and applications from gaining access to Facebook data, there's now a way to do so in a couple of clicks."

Those words "there's now a way to do so" or similar words occurred around the world in hundreds of publications - authors and editors who are living in our world of immediate software releases having either never known of or forgotten about the days of vaporware. 

Hopefully Facebook and Microsoft will not be starting a trend - hopefully new features will occur when announcements are made.  But for now, Facebook users will keep reading and then keep looking for the vapors of new privacy features.