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The dead brand index
203 companies, stores, gadgets and websites from the 1990s and 2000s, with what became of each one and who holds the name in 2026. Every row links to the full story, sourced and dated. Sort by clicking a column, or filter by typing.
| Name | Started | Status in 2026 | Who owns it now |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3dfx | 1994, San Jose, California, by three Silicon Graphics engineers | Defunct. Operations ended December 2000, bankruptcy filing in 2002 | Nvidia, which bought the patents, trademarks and brand names in December 2000 |
| 3DO | October 4, 1993, as the Panasonic FZ-1 | Discontinued since 1996; a 2026 relaunch collapsed in a week | Throwback Entertainment, Toronto (trademark, designs, 3do.com) |
| Adobe Flash | August 19, 1996 as FutureSplash Animator, renamed Flash 1.0 in 1997 | Discontinued. Flash Player ended on December 31, 2020 and was blocked from January 12, 2021 | Adobe, which bought Macromedia for about $3.4 billion in 2005 |
| AltaVista | December 15, 1995, by Digital Equipment Corporation | Closed on July 8, 2013; altavista.com redirects to Yahoo Search | Yahoo Inc., majority-owned by Apollo Global Management funds since 2021 |
| Amazon | Still public as AMZN; market value passed $3 trillion in August 2026 | ||
| Anbernic | Still trading in 2026, but direct China-to-US shipping was suspended on April 21, 2025, so US orders depend on warehouse stock | ||
| Angelfire | 1996, as a combined website builder and medical transcription service | Shut down April 24, 2026; hosted pages purged, nothing running | Lycos, Inc.; control contested since 2013 between Brightcom Group, formerly Ybrant Digital, and Daum |
| AOL | Active: free AOL Mail, news portal and paid plans | Bending Spoons (Milan), since January 2, 2026 | |
| AOL Instant Messenger | May 1997, by America Online | Shut down. No official service since December 15, 2017 | AOL brand held by Bending Spoons, since January 2, 2026 |
| AOL Time Warner | Dissolved. AOL was spun off in 2009 and the name is gone | AOL: Bending Spoons. Time Warner assets: Warner Bros. Discovery | |
| Apple | Apple Inc. is public on Nasdaq as AAPL; market value crossed $4 trillion on October 28, 2025 | Shareholders. Microsoft sold its entire Apple stake by 2003 | |
| Apple Newton | August 2, 1993, Apple Computer, $699 | Discontinued February 27, 1998; no Newton device or Newton OS release since | Apple Inc., which still owns the Newton name |
| Arcades | Still operating: 7,113 US arcade, food and entertainment businesses in 2026 | ||
| Ask Jeeves | Beta in April 1997, full launch June 1, 1997 | Closed. Ask.com went dark on May 1, 2026 | IAC, which shut the search business down |
| Atari Jaguar | November 23, 1993, Atari Corporation, $249.99 | Discontinued in 1996; Atari Corporation no longer exists | Atari SA, Euronext Paris, run by CEO Wade Rosen since 2021 |
| Atari Lynx | September 1989, Atari Corporation, $179.99 | Discontinued in 1995, never reissued as hardware | Atari SA, chaired by Wade Rosen |
| Barnes and Noble | Open and expanding, with more than 720 US bookstores in 2026 | Elliott Investment Management, which paid about $683 million in 2019 | |
| Beanie Babies | 8 February 1993, nine designs shown by Ty Inc. at the New York Toy Fair | Ty Inc. is still in business and still sells Beanie Babies | Ty Warner, sole owner of Ty Inc. |
| Betamax vs VHS | May 10, 1975 in Tokyo, November 1975 in the United States | Dead format. Recorders ended in 2002, the last blank cassettes shipped in March 2016 | Sony |
| BlackBerry | 1984 in Waterloo, Ontario, as Research In Motion | Active software company; no BlackBerry phones since 2016 | Publicly traded, no parent company (NYSE: BB, TSX: BB) |
| Bliss wallpaper | Vineyard land; briefly bare and green again on 18 February 2026 | ||
| Blockbuster | Open, one franchise store in Bend, Oregon | Dish Network, part of EchoStar; Dish DBS filed Chapter 11 on June 30, 2026 | |
| BonziBuddy | 1999, Bonzi Software Inc. (California) | Discontinued in 2004; no supported download | Joe Bonzi and Jay Bonzi, who now run 2KDirect |
| Boo.com | 3 November 1999, London, in 18 countries at once | Dead since 18 May 2000; no store at boo.com | Hostelworld Group plc, formerly Web Reservations International |
| Borders | 1971, Ann Arbor, Michigan, as a used bookstore run by Tom and Louis Borders | No Borders stores in the US since 2011. Borders-branded shops still trade in the Gulf under Al Maya Group | Barnes & Noble, which paid $13.9 million in 2011 and is itself owned by Elliott Investment Management |
| Boston Market | 1985 as Boston Chicken in Newton, Massachusetts | Still open in a few locations, and sold as frozen dinners in supermarkets | Engage Brands, controlled by Jay Pandya since April 2020 |
| Broadcast.com | September 1995 in Dallas as AudioNet; renamed Broadcast.com in 1998 | Discontinued in 2002; no service at the address in 2026 | Yahoo, run by Apollo Global Management funds since 2021 |
| Chuck E. Cheese | 1977, founded by Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell | Animatronics in 5 US stores; removed chain-wide by the end of 2024 | CEC Entertainment, about 90 percent held by six private equity groups (2026) |
| Circuit City | 1949 in Richmond, Virginia, as Wards, by Samuel Wurtzel | Online-only brand. No stores since March 8, 2009 | Circuit City Corporation, led by Ronny Shmoel (bought the brand from Systemax in 2016) |
| Claire's | 1961 as Fashion Tress Industries, a wig company, renamed after buying Claire's Boutiques in 1973 | Open and still piercing ears, with more than 131 million piercings claimed since 1978 | Ames Watson, since September 19, 2025 |
| Clippy | November 19, 1996, in Microsoft Office 97 | Not a feature. A Microsoft 365 emoji and a hidden Copilot avatar | |
| Club Penguin | October 24, 2005, New Horizon Interactive, Kelowna, BC | Closed since March 29, 2017; no official version since 2018 | The Walt Disney Company, which bought it on August 1, 2007 |
| Columbia House | 1955, as the Columbia Record Club | Closed. No new orders accepted after September 15, 2026 | Edge Line Ventures, John Lippman's company; Sony Music Entertainment holds the trademark |
| Commodore | 1954 by Jack Tramiel; the Commodore 64 launched August 1982 at $595 | Trading again as Commodore Corporation B.V. since July 2025 | Investor group led by Christian Simpson (Peri Fractic) |
| Compaq | February 1982, Houston, by three ex-Texas Instruments managers | Not a company since May 3, 2002; HP retired the brand in 2013 | HP Inc., which licenses the name to other manufacturers |
| CompUSA | 1984 as Soft Warehouse, Inc. in Dallas; renamed CompUSA in March 1991 | Dormant brand. No CompUSA store since 2008, no CompUSA retailer since 2012 | |
| CompuServe | 1969, Columbus, Ohio, as a Golden United Life Insurance subsidiary | No online service; compuserve.com runs as a news portal | Yahoo, owned by Apollo Global Management funds since September 2021 |
| Counter-Strike | Live as Counter-Strike 2, released September 27, 2023 | Valve Corporation, since 2000 | |
| Craigslist | 1995 as Craig Newmark's San Francisco email list; incorporated 1999 | Still operating, in more than 570 cities in over 70 countries | Private; founder Craig Newmark and CEO Jim Buckmaster |
| Dial-Up Internet | Still sold in the US in 2026 by NetZero, Juno and MSN Dial-Up Internet Access | NetZero and Juno are United Online brands, owned by BRC Group Holdings, the company renamed from B. Riley Financial on January 1, 2026 | |
| Dial-Up Sound | AOL ended dial-up on September 30, 2025; NetZero and Juno still sell it, and about 100,277 US households used dial-up in the 2024 ACS | ||
| Dial-Up Speed | Still sold by NetZero and Juno; AOL ended dial-up on September 30, 2025 | ||
| Digg | December 5, 2004, by Kevin Rose and three co-founders | Live at digg.com as an AI news aggregator, in alpha since May 2026 | Kevin Rose and Alexis Ohanian, who bought Digg in March 2025 |
| Digitize VHS Tapes | Still doable at home; Legacybox, Southtree and Kodak Digitizing are one Chattanooga company, AMB Media LLC | ||
| Discovery Zone | 1989; first center in Kansas City, Missouri, October 1989 | Original chain liquidated; last locations closed by the end of 2001 | CEC Entertainment bought the trademarks in 1999; an unaffiliated operator runs one Discovery Zone at Florence Mall, Kentucky |
| Disney Store | March 28, 1987, at the Glendale Galleria in Glendale, California | Open, with selling shifted to shopDisney and Target shop-in-shops, plus two Disney Store Limited Time pop-ups | The Walt Disney Company |
| DIVX | June 8, 1998 in test markets; national rollout September 25, 1998 | Dead. Discontinued June 16, 1999; no disc has played since June 30, 2001 | |
| Doom | December 10, 1993, by id Software, as shareware | Active series; Doom: The Dark Ages shipped May 15, 2025 | Microsoft, through ZeniMax Media and id Software |
| EarthLink | 1994, EarthLink Network, Los Angeles | Still selling fiber, fixed wireless and satellite internet from Atlanta | Trive Capital, which paid $330 million in 2018 |
| eBay | September 1995, as AuctionWeb, by Pierre Omidyar | Still operating, public on Nasdaq as EBAY | Public shareholders; no single owner |
| Eee PC | October 2007, Asus Eee PC, $299.99 to $399.99 in the US | Dead category. No major brand has sold a netbook since 2013 | |
| Encarta | March 22, 1993, Microsoft | Discontinued. Disc sales ended June 2009, MSN Encarta closed October 31, 2009 | |
| eToys | 1997, founded by Toby Lenk in Santa Monica, California | Bankrupt since March 7, 2001; no eToys store operating in 2026 | Toys R Us, which bought the eToys.com name in February 2009 and has been controlled by WHP Global since March 2021 |
| Eudora | Discontinued; last release October 11, 2006 | Computer History Museum, since May 2018 | |
| EverQuest | March 16, 1999, by Verant Interactive for Sony Online Entertainment | Live in 2026. Newest server, Lethar, opened August 26, 2026 | Darkpaw Games, published by Daybreak Game Company, owned by Enad Global 7 |
| Excite | October 1995, from Architext Software, incorporated June 1993 by six Stanford students | Gone. excite.com was shut down in August 2026 | IAC, which ran excite.com through Ask Media Group until the shutdown |
| Excite@Home | @Home Network, 1995, by Milo Medin, William Randolph Hearst III and three cable operators | Gone. Chapter 11 on September 28, 2001; network switched off December 1, 2001 | excite.com is an IAC property, operated by Ask Media Group; search by System1 |
| FAO Schwarz | 1862, as a toy bazaar in Baltimore; a New York store since 1870 | Open and expanding, with FAO Schwarz toys on Nordstrom.com since June 2026 | ThreeSixty Group of Irvine, California, which bought the brand in October 2016 |
| Flickr | February 10, 2004, by Ludicorp in Vancouver | Still online and taking uploads in 2026 | SmugMug, since April 2018 |
| Flooz | Fall 1999, Flooz.Com, Inc. | Defunct; the bankruptcy case was terminated on July 27, 2012 | |
| Floppy disk | No factory anywhere makes floppy disks; every disk sold is pre-2011 stock | ||
| Flying Toasters | Still built into Windows 11 and macOS; the boxed screensaver business is gone | After Dark went to the Sierra On-Line division of CUC International in 1997, with no version sold since | |
| Friendster | Founded 2002 by Jonathan Abrams, public beta March 2003 | Relaunched April 29, 2026 as an iOS-only app | Friendster Labs Inc., run by programmer Mike Carson |
| Fry's Electronics | May 17, 1985, Sunnyvale, California | Closed since February 24, 2021 | |
| Furbies | October 2, 1998, Tiger Electronics, $35 | In production; Furby Vibes shipped July 15, 2026 | Hasbro |
| G4 TV | April 24, 2002, as a Comcast cable venture | Off the air since October 16, 2022; no channel or streaming feed | Comcast Spectacor holds the G4 brand |
| Game Boy | July 31, 1989 in the United States, $89.95, Nintendo | Used market only, no factory warranty since 2003 | |
| Game Genie | 1990, designed by Codemasters, sold in the US by Galoob | Discontinued; Galoob owned by Hasbro since 1998; loose units about $22 | |
| Game Informer | 1991, as a FuncoLand store handout | Publishing 10 print issues a year; issue 381 is the 35th anniversary | Gunzilla Games, since March 25, 2025 |
| GameStop | 1984 in Dallas, Texas, as Babbage's; renamed GameStop in 1999 | Open and profitable; reopening selected closed stores since September 11, 2026 | No parent company. Public on the New York Stock Exchange as GME, run by Ryan Cohen |
| Gateway Computers | September 5, 1985, on a cattle ranch near Sioux City, Iowa | A brand only: Walmart-exclusive laptops and tablets since September 2020 | Acer Inc., which bought Gateway in 2007 for $710 million |
| Geocaching | Active, with more than 3.4 million caches in 191 countries | Groundspeak, Inc. (Geocaching HQ), Seattle, privately held | |
| GeoCities | 1994 as Beverly Hills Internet, founded by David Bohnett and John Rezner | Closed. No GeoCities page has been served from geocities.com since 2009 | Yahoo Inc., owned by funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management since September 2021 |
| GoldenEye 007 | 1997, developed by Rare, published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 64 | Playable on Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack and Xbox Game Pass since January 27, 2023 | Microsoft owns Rare and the game code; Nintendo published the original; MGM and Eon Productions own James Bond |
| Google Glass | Explorer Edition, February 2013, $1,500 | Discontinued. Sales ended March 15, 2023 | |
| Google Reader | October 7, 2005, through Google Labs | Gone. No revival announced as of September 2026 | |
| Google+ | June 28, 2011, invitation only | Shut down. The consumer version closed on April 2, 2019 | Google, which retired the last version, Google Currents, on July 5, 2023 |
| Habbo Hotel | August 2000 in Finland as Hotelli Kultakala; the US hotel at habbo.com opened in September 2004 | Online and free to play in 2026, with hundreds of thousands of monthly active users and Habbo Hotel: Origins on Steam since October 2025 | Azerion, sole owner since January 2021, which has classified Habbo Hotel as held for sale through August 2026 |
| HD DVD | April 18, 2006, Toshiba HD-A1 at $499 | Discontinued since February 19, 2008; existing discs and players still work | Toshiba is private, bought out by a Japan Industrial Partners consortium in 2023 |
| Heelys | 2000, by Roger Adams through Heeling Sports Limited of Carrollton, Texas | Still made and sold new in 2026, about $60 to $75 a pair | BBC International, which paid $11 million for the brand in April 2021 |
| Hollywood Video | 1988, Hollywood Entertainment Corporation | Closed. The last stores shut on August 8, 2010 | MGIP, LLC of Hillside, New Jersey, holds the trademark |
| Homestar Runner | January 1, 2000, by Mike Chapman and Matt Chapman | Still updating in 2026, on no fixed schedule | Mike Chapman and Matt Chapman, independent and ad-free |
| Hotmail | July 4, 1996, by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith | Brand retired May 2013; @hotmail.com addresses still work on Outlook.com | Microsoft, since December 31, 1997 |
| HotWired | October 27, 1994, on HotWired | US display advertising worth $81.6 billion in 2025 (IAB and PwC) | |
| HyperCard | August 11, 1987, Apple Computer, written by Bill Atkinson | Discontinued March 2004, stacks emulated free at the Internet Archive | |
| ICQ | November 1996, by Mirabilis in Tel Aviv | Shut down on June 26, 2024, after 28 years | VK Company Limited, formerly Mail.ru Group |
| iMac G3 | Announced May 6, 1998; on sale August 15, 1998 | Discontinued March 2003; the iMac line continues | |
| Iomega | March 1995, $199 drive and $19.95 100MB disks | Brand retired; the LenovoEMC line ended in 2018 | Dell Technologies, through EMC's 2008 purchase |
| iPod | Discontinued. Apple ended the iPod line on May 10, 2022 | ||
| IRC | August 1988, by Jarkko Oikarinen at the University of Oulu, Finland | Active. The top 100 IRC networks carried more than 162,000 users at a time in April 2026 | Nobody. IRC is an open protocol, and each network is run separately |
| Iridium | Commercial service 1 November 1998, Iridium LLC, backed by Motorola | Still flying, 2,627,000 billable subscribers on 30 June 2026 | Iridium Communications (Nasdaq: IRDM); Rocket Lab purchase approved by stockholders 24 September 2026, closing expected mid-2027 |
| Kazaa | March 2001, by the Dutch company Consumer Empowerment | Shut down; the licensed service stopped in August 2012 | None active. Atrinsic held the license and filed for Chapter 11 in June 2012 |
| KB Toys | April 1, 1922 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, as Kaufman Brothers | Brand only. Collectibles online and convention booths, no stores | Strategic Marks, LLC; licensing run by Firefly Brand Management since July 2024 |
| Kinko's | 1970 in Isla Vista, California, by Paul Orfalea | No US store carries the Kinko's name. FedEx Office ran about 2,000 US stores as of May 31, 2026 | FedEx owns FedEx Office; Konica Minolta owns Kinko's Japan |
| Kmart | Open, plus Kmart.com shipping to the 50 states and APO/FPO addresses | Transform SR Brands LLC (Transformco), tied to Edward Lampert | |
| Kodak | In business and profitable; Q2 2026 net income of 17 million dollars | Independent, publicly traded as NYSE: KODK; no parent company | |
| Kozmo | March 1998 in New York by Joseph Park and Yong Kang | Defunct since April 11, 2001; the domain is dark | Yummy Foods, LLC (Yummy.com), Los Angeles, since January 2013 |
| LAN parties | Still running: QuakeCon held its BYOC hall August 6 to 9, 2026 | ||
| LaserDisc | December 15, 1978 in Atlanta, as MCA DiscoVision, with Jaws as the first title | Dead format. No new discs since 2001, no new players since 2009 | |
| LimeWire | August 2000, Lime Group LLC, on the Gnutella network | Brand active as an AI and storage platform; file sharing dead since 2010 | BabyDoge, since September 14, 2026 |
| LiveJournal | April 15, 1999, by Brad Fitzpatrick | Online, mostly Russian-language | Rambler Group, fully owned by Sber since October 2020 |
| Lotus 1-2-3 | January 26, 1983, Lotus Development Corporation | Discontinued. Withdrawn from marketing June 11, 2013, support ended September 30, 2014 | IBM, which bought Lotus Development Corporation in 1995 for about $3.5 billion |
| Lycos | July 1994, Carnegie Mellon University, by Michael Mauldin | Portal still online; Angelfire and Tripod closed April 24, 2026 | Lycos Inc., a Brightcom Group subsidiary; a 56 percent stake in receivership since 2018 |
| MapQuest | February 5, 1996, at mapquest.com | Still live at mapquest.com, with apps for iPhone and Android | System1, which bought it from Verizon in October 2019 |
| MCI | WorldCom gone; MCI still a wholly owned Verizon subsidiary in 2026 | Verizon Communications, which closed the MCI merger on January 6, 2006 | |
| Microsoft Bob | March 10, 1995, by Microsoft, at $99 | Discontinued and unsupported; free disk images on the Internet Archive | Microsoft still owns Bob; the bob.com domain went to collector Bob Kerstein in 1999 |
| Microsoft Zune | November 14, 2006, $249.99 for 30 GB | Discontinued; hardware ended in 2011, services ended November 15, 2015 | Microsoft, which folded the brand into Xbox Music in 2012 |
| MiniDisc | Discontinued. Last players sold March 2013, blank discs ended February 2025 | Sony still owns the format and the trademark but sells nothing for it | |
| Montgomery Ward | August 1872, Chicago, by Aaron Montgomery Ward with $1,600 in capital and a one-sheet catalog | No stores anywhere. Montgomery Ward sells online at wards.com on installment credit | Colony Brands Inc. of Monroe, Wisconsin, since 2008, bought for $15.5 million |
| Motorola Razr V3 | November 16, 2004, Motorola, exclusive to Cingular Wireless | Cannot make a call in the US; last 2G network shut off August 3, 2026 | Lenovo, which sells folding Razrs from $799 to $1,899 |
| MSN Messenger | July 22, 1999, as MSN Messenger Service | Dead at Microsoft, playable for free on the fan server Escargot | Microsoft still owns the MSN name; Escargot is independent of it |
| MTV | August 1, 1981, with the Buggles' Video Killed the Radio Star | On air in the US and UK; five music-only channels closed December 31, 2025 | Paramount Skydance Corporation, since August 7, 2025 |
| MySpace | Online at myspace.com, described as read-only in 2026 | Viant Technology Inc. (Nasdaq: DSP), Irvine, California | |
| Napster | Music streaming shut down January 1, 2026; the company now sells AI agents at about one cent a minute | Napster Corporation, called Infinite Reality until May 2025 | |
| NCSA Mosaic | January 23, 1993, by NCSA at the University of Illinois | Discontinued. Final release Mosaic 3.0, January 7, 1997 | University of Illinois holds the name and copyright |
| Neo Geo AES | April 26, 1990 in Japan, by SNK | Discontinued 1997; about $1,020 loose, AES+ reissue due September 16, 2027 | |
| Neopets | November 15, 1999, by Adam Powell and Donna Williams | Online and free to play at neopets.com | World of Neopia, Inc., independent since July 2023 |
| NES | Famicom in Japan July 15, 1983; NES tested in New York October 18, 1985 | Hardware retired; 87 NES games on Nintendo Switch Online in September 2026 | |
| Netflix | April 14, 1998, as the first online DVD rental store | Closed since September 29, 2023. DVDInbox mails discs instead, from $9.99 a month in 2026 | |
| Netscape | Browser discontinued March 1, 2008. Netscape Internet Service closed November 30, 2025 | Bending Spoons S.p.A., which completed its purchase of AOL on January 2, 2026 | |
| Netscape Navigator | Netscape Navigator, December 1994, Netscape Communications | Discontinued; AOL ended Netscape browser support March 1, 2008 | The NETSCAPE trademark (US Reg. 2027552) is held by Yahoo Inc. |
| Newgrounds Is | July 6, 1995, by Tom Fulp, from a 1991 paper fanzine | Online and independent in 2026, 31 years after launch | Newgrounds, Inc., never sold, no outside investors |
| Nextel | Fleet Call, April 1987; renamed Nextel in 1993 | Gone; iDEN decommissioning began June 30, 2013 | T-Mobile holds the Nextel trademarks, after buying Sprint |
| Nintendo GameCube | September 14, 2001 in Japan, November 18, 2001 in North America at $199.99 | Out of production since 2007; the library runs on Nintendo Switch 2 | Nintendo, which launched GameCube Nintendo Classics on June 5, 2025 |
| Nintendo Wii | November 19, 2006 in North America at $249.99 | Discontinued October 21, 2013; consoles still play discs offline | |
| Nokia | No Nokia-branded smartphones since the start of 2025; feature phones only, under a September 2025 license extension | Nokia Corporation, Espoo, Finland, a network equipment maker with EUR 4.81 billion in Q2 2026 net sales | |
| Nokia 3310 | Announced September 1, 2000, on sale in the fourth quarter | Second-hand only, and it cannot place calls on a US network | Nokia Corporation owns the brand; HMD Global's device licence ended in March 2026 |
| Nokia N-Gage | October 7, 2003, $299.99 in the United States | Discontinued; hardware ended November 2005, service closed September 2010 | Nokia Corporation, which still holds the N-Gage trademark |
| Nortel | 1895, as the Northern Electric and Manufacturing Company | Defunct; businesses absorbed by Ericsson, Avaya and Ciena | |
| Oregon Trail | Still sold new in 2026, on Steam, Switch, Xbox and Apple Arcade | HarperCollins, through HarperCollins Productions; Gameloft holds the game license | |
| Original Xbox | November 15, 2001 in the US, at $299 | Discontinued; its Xbox Live service was switched off on April 15, 2010 | Microsoft, which still runs the Xbox brand |
| OSRS | Both games live, with Old School RuneScape the larger of the two | CVC Capital Partners and Haveli Investments, since February 2024 | |
| Packard Bell | 1986, Packard Bell Electronics, Inc., built on a radio trademark bought in 1985 | Relaunched September 2026 across Europe, the Middle East and Africa; the DotBook laptop starts at 499 euros | Acer Inc., which reached Packard Bell through its 2007 purchase of Gateway |
| Pager | Still sold and serviced, mainly to hospitals and emergency services | ||
| Palm | Not a company. The Palm name is a dormant trademark, with no new Palm phone since November 2018 | TCL, which confirmed in January 2015 that it had bought the Palm trademark from HP | |
| Palm Pilot | March 1996, Pilot 1000, $299, Palm Computing under U.S. Robotics | Discontinued. Trademark owned by TCL, webOS owned by LG | |
| Payphones | Still operating, but uncounted since the FCC dropped payphone audits in 2018 | Pacific Telemanagement Services, the largest operator, which said it ran 20,000 phones in 2018 | |
| Pets.com | Store opened November 1998; first financial year began February 1999 | Gone as a company; pets.com redirects to petsmart.com | PetSmart, which bought the domain and trademarks in December 2000 |
| Philips CD-i | December 3, 1991 in the United States, by Philips | Discontinued in 1998, never revived | |
| Photobucket | 2003, by Alex Welch and Darren Crystal | Alive, subscription based. Free accounts ended June 2023; a limited free plan returned for new sign-ups in early 2026 | Photobucket Inc., privately held, based in Colorado |
| PizzaNet | PizzaNet is gone; Pizza Hut takes orders through its own site and app | LongRange Capital, which completed its purchase from Yum! Brands on September 1, 2026 | |
| PointCast | February 13, 1996, in beta, by PointCast Inc. | Dead. The network sent its last push at the end of March 2000 | AOL, which bought successor company Infogate in March 2003 |
| Polaroid | 1937 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, by Edwin Land | Still trading; cameras and film sold worldwide | The Smolokowski family, through Polaroid B.V. in the Netherlands |
| Power Glove | October 1989, Mattel in the US and PAX in Japan | Collector item and maker platform, about $100 loose and $216 boxed on PriceCharting in 2026 | |
| Prodigy | September 6, 1990 nationwide, as an IBM and Sears joint venture | Closed. Prodigy Classic shut down October 1, 1999; the company was taken private in 2001 | AT&T holds prodigy.net; Telmex holds prodigy.net.mx |
| PS2 | March 4, 2000 in Japan; October 26, 2000 in North America at $299 | Discontinued in January 2013; still the best-selling console ever | |
| PSP | December 12, 2004 in Japan; March 24, 2005 in the US | Discontinued, no Sony support; PSP downloads run through the PS3 and PS Vita stores, closing in stages from August 2026 to July 2027 | |
| Quake | Shareware episode, June 22, 1996, id Software | Still sold and still played. A free 19-map episode, Dawn of the Machine, shipped August 6, 2026 for the 30th anniversary | id Software, part of ZeniMax Media, a Microsoft subsidiary since March 9, 2021 |
| RadioShack | Product brand and website; no US chain | Unicomer Group, El Salvador, since May 2023 | |
| Rainforest Cafe | October 1994, Mall of America, Bloomington, Minnesota | Open and trading, not expanding; Disney Village closes by the end of 2026 | Landry's, owned by Tilman Fertitta |
| RealPlayer | April 1995, as RealAudio 1.0 from Progressive Networks | Still published; RealPlayer 25 for Windows shipped in 2026 | RealNetworks LLC, private and controlled by Rob Glaser since December 2022 |
| Redbox | 2002 inside McDonald's Ventures; DVD kiosks from 2004 | Shut down. Parent liquidated in Chapter 7 on July 10, 2024 | No operator. Trademarks auctioned by the bankruptcy trustee on April 23, 2025 |
| RollerCoaster Tycoon | March 22, 1999 in North America, Hasbro Interactive under the MicroProse label | Active. RollerCoaster Tycoon Wonderworks in Steam early access, winter 2026 | Chris Sawyer holds the trademark; Atari publishes under licence |
| Sam Goody | 1951, New York City, by Sam "Goody" Gutowitz | Gone as a chain. Most stores closed or became FYE between 2006 and 2008 | Sunrise Records and Entertainment, which bought the FYE chain in 2020 |
| Screen Savers | May 11, 1998, as ZDTV, owned by Ziff-Davis | Off the air since February 15, 2005, with no revival announced | Comcast, which has held the TechTV name since 2004 |
| Sears | Open and trading. Not in bankruptcy since the February 2019 sale | Transform Holdco LLC, trading as Transformco, controlled by Eddie Lampert's ESL Investments | |
| Second Life | June 23, 2003, by Linden Lab | Still running in 2026; daily concurrency in the mid-30,000s | Linden Research, Inc., bought by an investor group led by Randy Waterfield and Brad Oberwager |
| Sega | Still publishing games, no home console since the Dreamcast | Sega Sammy Holdings, formed October 1, 2004 | |
| Sega 32X | November 21, 1994 in North America, $159.99 | Discontinued in 1996, no official support and no Sega re-release | |
| Sega CD | October 15, 1992 in North America, $299 | Discontinued in 1996, never revived | Sega, the entertainment division of Sega Sammy Holdings |
| Sega Channel | December 12, 1994, by Sega of America with TCI and Time Warner | Dead since 1998, but 144 recovered ROMs were published free by Gaming Alexandria on December 15, 2025 | |
| Sega Game Gear | October 6, 1990 in Japan; April 1991 in the US at $149.99 | Discontinued April 30, 1997; no Sega handheld since | Sega, inside Sega Sammy Holdings since the 2004 merger |
| Sega Genesis | August 14, 1989 in North America, by Sega, at $189.99 with Altered Beast packed in | No new Sega Genesis hardware from Sega since the Sega Genesis Mini 2 in October 2022 | |
| Sega Nomad | October 1995, Sega of America, North America only | Discontinued since 1999, second-hand only, no reissue | |
| Sega Saturn | November 22, 1994 in Japan; May 11, 1995 in North America | Discontinued; dropped in the US in 1998, sold in Japan until 2000 | |
| Segway | Brand active; Personal Transporter production ended July 15, 2020 | Segway-Ninebot of Beijing, listed in Shanghai as 689009 | |
| Sharper Image | A licensed brand selling through sharperimage.com, a catalog and other retailers, with the Axis 4D massage chair listed at $6,999 in 2026 | ThreeSixty Group of Irvine, California, which paid $100 million in December 2016 | |
| SimCity | 1989, by Maxis, founded by Will Wright and Jeff Braun in 1987 | Franchise dormant on PC, alive on mobile through SimCity BuildIt | Electronic Arts, taken private in August 2026 by a consortium led by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund |
| Sims 1 | February 4, 2000, by Maxis and Electronic Arts | Sold as The Sims: Legacy Collection since January 31, 2025 | Electronic Arts, private since August 4, 2026 under a PIF-led consortium |
| SkyMall | 1990, on Eastern Airlines, from Phoenix, Arizona | Online store at skymall.com plus a Walmart marketplace storefront; no seat-pocket catalog | C+A Global, which bought SkyMall as C&A Marketing in 2015 |
| Skype | 2003, by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis | Retired on May 5, 2025; the apps and the skype.com sign-in point to Microsoft Teams Free | Microsoft, which paid $8.5 billion in cash in May 2011 |
| Sony Aibo | June 1, 1999 (ERS-110), Sony | Still made; Japan sales ended June 2026 | Sony, which never sold or licensed the brand |
| Sony Discman | November 1984, Sony D-50, 49,800 yen (about $350) | Discontinued; Sony ended portable CD players around 2010 | Sony Group Corporation still holds the Discman trademark |
| Sound Blaster | 1981 in Singapore, by Sim Wong Hoo and Ng Kai Wa | Still trading; listed on the Singapore Exchange as C76 | Independent public company; CEO Sim Li Ern since January 2026 |
| Standalone GPS Devices | TomTom Go, March 2004, the first all-in-one car navigator | Still sold. Garmin Drive 53 at $149.99; TomTom exited US device sales | Magellan brand held by MiTAC International since 2008 |
| StarCraft | March 31, 1998, by Blizzard Entertainment | Still played; ASL Season 21 ran March to May 2026 | Microsoft, since the Activision Blizzard deal closed October 13, 2023 |
| Sun Microsystems | February 24, 1982, in Santa Clara, California | Brand retired, no products sold under the name | Oracle Corporation, as Oracle America, Inc. |
| T-Mobile Sidekick | October 1, 2002, as the Danger Hiptop, sold by T-Mobile | Discontinued. Sales ended July 2, 2010, data service May 31, 2011, 2G August 3, 2026 | Microsoft absorbed Danger, Inc. in 2008; T-Mobile US keeps the Sidekick name |
| Tamagotchi | November 23, 1996, by Bandai in Japan | Still in production, with a 30th anniversary line in 2026 | Bandai, part of Bandai Namco Holdings since 2005 |
| theGlobe.com | May 1, 1995, by Cornell students Stephan Paternot and Todd Krizelman | Shell company, ticker TGLO, no employees, $15,115 in cash (June 2026) | |
| TiVo | March 31, 1999, built by Philips Electronics: $499 for 14 hours, $999 for 30 hours | DVR hardware discontinued October 1, 2025; TiVo OS ships on smart TVs | Xperi Inc., through TiVo Platform Technologies LLC |
| Toonami | March 17, 1997, on Cartoon Network | On the air, Saturdays 12:00 a.m. to 4:00 a.m. ET on Adult Swim | Skydance, which closed its purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery on October 6, 2026 |
| Tower Records | 1960 in Sacramento, California, by Russ Solomon | Online only in the US since November 13, 2020 | Tower.com and the trademark sold for about $4.2 million in March 2007. Tower Records Japan is majority owned by NTT Docomo |
| Toys R Us | Brand active; the original US retailer is gone | WHP Global, controlling stake since March 15, 2021 | |
| Tumblr | 2007, by David Karp | Online and free, about half a billion blogs, still unprofitable | Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com |
| TurboGrafx-16 Won Japan | October 30, 1987 in Japan as the PC Engine; August 1989 in the United States | Discontinued in North America in May 1994. Konami's 99.99 dollar TurboGrafx-16 Mini from 2020 is the only official hardware; original consoles sell for about 207 dollars loose | Konami, which merged Hudson Soft into its games arm in March 2012 |
| Virgin Megastore | 1992, first US store on Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles | No US store since 2009; 40-plus stores in the Middle East and North Africa | Virgin Group licenses the name; Azadea Group operates the stores |
| Virtual Boy | July 21, 1995 in Japan; August 14, 1995 in North America at $179.95 | Discontinued in 1996; back on Nintendo Switch since February 17, 2026 | |
| Wade Rosen | Active; revenue of 56.0 million euros for the year to March 2026, a decade high | Atari SA, listed on Euronext Growth Paris as ALATA | |
| WebTV | September 18, 1996, by WebTV Networks | Service shut down September 30, 2013; boxes run only on fan-built servers | Microsoft, which bought WebTV Networks for about $425 million in 1997 |
| Webvan | June 1999, San Francisco Bay Area | Closed. Shut down July 9, 2001 and liquidated in Chapter 11 | Amazon holds the Webvan name and the webvan.com address |
| Winamp | 1997, by Justin Frankel and Dmitry Boldyrev at Nullsoft | Active. Winamp 5.9.2 (April 2023) is still a free download | Winamp Group, Belgium, bought from AOL in January 2014 |
| Windows 95 Launch | August 24, 1995, by Microsoft | Unsupported since December 31, 2001; runs only in emulators | Microsoft, which still owns the code |
| Windows Movie Maker | September 14, 2000, with Windows Me | Discontinued January 10, 2017; no official download since | Microsoft |
| Wine.com | Operating; privately held, San Francisco | The private company founded as eVineyard, buyer of the brand in April 2001 | |
| Woolworth | 1879, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, by Frank Winfield Woolworth | No US Woolworth store since 1997; more than 1,000 Woolworth stores trading in Europe under a separate German company | Dick's Sporting Goods, which completed its Foot Locker purchase on September 8, 2025 |
| WordPerfect | 1979, by Alan Ashton and Bruce Bastian in Orem, Utah | Still sold; WordPerfect Office 2021 remains the latest version | Corel Corporation, backed by Vector Capital since May 2026 |
| Xanga | 1999, by Marc Ginsburg, John Hiler and Dan Huddle in New York | Online as Xanga 2.0, closed to new members since 2013 | |
| Y2K | Fixed. Two-digit years are gone from mainstream systems, but date-overflow bugs still hit production software | ||
| Yahoo | Private and operating in 2026: Yahoo Finance, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo Sports, Yahoo News, Yahoo Search and the Scout answer engine | Funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management, about 90 percent; Verizon holds the other 10 percent | |
| Yahoo Answers | December 8, 2005, as a public beta from Yahoo | Closed. answers.yahoo.com no longer serves questions and Yahoo has no replacement | Apollo Global Management, which holds about 90 percent of Yahoo; Verizon keeps about 10 percent |
| Yahoo Messenger | March 9, 1998, as Yahoo Pager; renamed Yahoo Messenger in 1999 | Discontinued; Yahoo has run no chat service since April 2019 | Apollo Global Management, which bought Yahoo in September 2021 |
| You've Got Mail | Still AOL Mail's alert; no replacement voice announced | Bending Spoons, which closed its $1.45 billion purchase of AOL on January 2, 2026 |
Showing all 203 entries. The archive holds 217 posts in total, including the ones that do not answer a status question.
Using this table
Last checked 25 October 2026. Every status is taken from the linked post, where the sources are listed. The data is free to reuse, including in articles and research, as long as you credit 404 Memory Found and link back to this page.
Cite it as: 404 Memory Found, “The dead brand index”, 25 October 2026, https://404memoryfound.com/dead-brand-index.html