Thing is, for a while in the '50s, people came to expect SF to be predictive -- mostly as a result of "rocket science". Seems to me, some of the disappointment stems from the fact that it can't be, not realistically.

Most SF writers are trying to tell stories, not invent things -- not even "virtually", in a predictive sort of way. And not all of them have the inclination, let alone the time, to entertain all the societal ramifications of the developments they do anticipate. For instance, as someone brought up: advanced medicine and life extension... but not the monetary cost.

Another thing to keep in mind: Moonbases, and manned spaceflight beyond the Moon, and the rest of The vonBraun Dream, were possible by extrapolation of tech available at the time the stories were written. That it doesn't exist now is a result of politics, not science or technology. Could anyone in, say, 1955 or 1960 have predicted the death of the Apollo program, let alone the reasons?

Even so, writers later than 1960 did score a few anticipatory points. My favorite example: Brunner's The Shockwave Rider (1975), which incorporated something like the Internet, including malicious software (he called them "worms").

And if you think nanotech has been unanticipated in the pages of SF, you haven't read much Greg Bear. It's been one of his major themes for quite a while. Blood Music dates from 1985; the novelette of the same title, from which the novel was expanded, is two years older. The latter won both the Nebula and the Hugo.

Yes, I know, you were talking pre-1960... that was before electron microscopy was advanced enough that anyone could even think about building things that small. Kinda hard to fault the genre for that.

Oh, and you forgot one in the "flying car" category: slidewalks. Sure, there are limited installations in airports, but they've never appeared elsewhere... and considering the potential for mechanical failure, probably never will.