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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Nothing says failure like this Swedish museum

Dan Webster

Life is full of success stories. And we tend to applaud all those innovators, from the inventor of the wheel to Steve Jobs, who changed the arc of history.

But what about those among us who fail? Well, it turns out that Sweden has a museum that is dedicated to that very proposition. From fat-free Pringles to Google Glass, the Museum of Failure documents all the would-be steps forward that ended up being miserable failures.

“We know that 80 to 90 percent of innovation projects, they fail and you never read about them, you don’t see them, people don’t talk about them,” says museum founder Samuel West. “And if there’s anything we can do from these failures, is learn from them.”

One of my favorite failures: The 2004 board game called “I’m Back And You’re Fired” in which players use game pieces branded with a "T" and money adorned with the image of Donald Trump.

“It’s a boring version of Monopoly," West said. "It’s simplified so stupid people can play it, but it’s also horribly boring,”