Encarta is a great example of Microsoft winning a market, and after it was defeated, letting it fade out.
Encarta lasted from 1991-2009.
The iPod was introduced in 2001, saw sells start to fall off a cliff around 2009 and were all discontinued in 2017 - except for the iPod in name only iPod Touch. No one would say that the iPod was a failure. Encarta helped start the multimedia PC boom that helped make home computers more ubiquitous just like the iPod was Apple’s introduction to a wider audience.
Calling the iPad touch an iPad in name only is disingenuous. It’s 1/2 the price of the original and has more space etc. As to falling off a cliff, they sold significantly more iPods in 09, 10, and 11 than 06. They even sold more than 3x as many iPods in 2014 than 2004.
Apples watch is still a watch even if it does a lot of other things. Microsoft never ported Encarta functionality to anything after 09, it just died.
As a brand sure, but the iPhone has been a fair replacement for many people. I mean digital camera sales have dropped 84% since 2010, but if anything people are taking far more photos now.
For most people cellphones have mostly replaced watches, digital cameras, keychain flashlights, and MP3 players not because they are awesome at it but because having slightly better but largely redundant devices is not worth it. https://www.statista.com/chart/5782/digital-camera-shipments...
Encarta lasted from 1991-2009.
The iPod was introduced in 2001, saw sells start to fall off a cliff around 2009 and were all discontinued in 2017 - except for the iPod in name only iPod Touch. No one would say that the iPod was a failure. Encarta helped start the multimedia PC boom that helped make home computers more ubiquitous just like the iPod was Apple’s introduction to a wider audience.