Well said. I think we all have to remember that a lot of commenters here are probably quite young and may find it just as difficult to comprehend a world before mouse-driven GUIs. I just dusted off my old C64 a few days ago to show my kids what sort of computer I grew up with, and it was quite a mental adjustment to go back to no mouse or GUI!
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Former Apple CEO John Sculley Reflects on Steve Jobs
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Well said. I think we all have to remember that a lot of commenters here are probably quite young and may find it just as difficult to comprehend a world before mouse-driven GUIs. I just dusted off my old C64 a few days ago to show my kids what sort of computer I grew up with, and it was quite a mental adjustment to go back to no mouse or GUI!
Whatever they did before: developing ways to help businesses to manage their documents and communication including software which involves UI, y'know: http://www.xerox.com/digital-printing/workflow/enus.html
FYI you obviously don't have a slightest clue about the story of UI otherwise you would ask what PARC (then part of Xerox) is doing?
They are also doing fine, BTW: http://www.parc.com/
They just turned 40: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/20/parc_40th_anniversary/
And that's called vision. Right place, right time, right VISION!
People can get lucky in business, but how many people get lucky again, and again, and again? Jobs left Apple and turned Pixar into the envy of the animation industry. He came back to Apple when Apple was months away from death and turned it around to become the amazing success it is today. What more would he need to do to impress some of you people?
I wonder how many young fans today, would recognize these words from a famous Apple ad, or think about how they apply today:
I still believe that the best and most innovative offering around 1985 and the years after that was the Commodore Amiga. What an awesome computer that was.
What a pity that Commodore didn't have a slightly more clever marketing approach.
Amiga was originally a stand-alone company hired by Atari to create the graphic system for their next computer. Then when Atari was being dumped by Warner Commodore jumped in and bought the company. Another "what could have been" scenario.
BTW I worked with Von Ertwine, one of the hardware gurus at Commodore in the Amiga days. Worked with quite a few ex-Commodore guys, actually. Ironic considering I was vehemently anti-Commodore in my young days.
====================================
That's like saying, 'the only heaving lifting the Wright Brothers did was to lift ideas from Leonardo de Vinci'.
Apple's 'lifting' was a quantum leap over Xerox by creating and marketing a truly workable graphic interface computer for the masses.
John Lasseter is the driving force behind Pixar. Even Jobs would tell you that.
(And you're forgetting your history, Pixar was spun out of ILM it's not like it sprang from nowhere).
What is invention?
Disagree---taking existing pieces and putting them together into something better IS invention.
My craptastic cell phone had a "web browser" on it over 5 years ago. I never used it because it sucked in almost every way. It was to launch (usually came up when I didn't want it), it wasn't compatible with the uh, Web, and it was hard to use, had a teeny little useless screen, and for the money offered very little value.
When Apple introduced Safari on the iPhone, it suffered none of these problems. Enough real estate to actually use, extremely compatible with normal web technologies, easy to launch and easy to use. As a value, it was tremendous (esp over Wifi).
Others can lay claim to including a browser in a big useless feature list long before Apple did, but Apple included the first Web browser on a mobile device I wanted and enjoyed using. As far as I am concerned, that is completely novel.
To most users, the interface IS the product, and when you create a really great interface, sometimes you end up with a really great product. The other mobile web browsers I used before iPhone's were so bad they may as well have not existed as far as I am concerned.
Disagree---taking existing pieces and putting them together into something better IS invention.
My craptastic cell phone had a "web browser" on it over 5 years ago. I never used it because it sucked in almost every way. It was to launch (usually came up when I didn't want it), it wasn't compatible with the uh, Web, and it was hard to use, had a teeny little useless screen, and for the money offered very little value.
When Apple introduced Safari on the iPhone, it suffered none of these problems. Enough real estate to actually use, extremely compatible with normal web technologies, easy to launch and easy to use. As a value, it was tremendous (esp over Wifi).
Others can lay claim to including a browser in a big useless feature list long before Apple did, but Apple included the first Web browser on a mobile device I wanted and enjoyed using. As far as I am concerned, that is completely novel.
To most users, the interface IS the product, and when you create a really great interface, sometimes you end up with a really great product. The other mobile web browsers I used before iPhone's were so bad they may as well have not existed as far as I am concerned.
Lets not forget that Steve pulled Pixar out of ILM. They had a choice to stay but breaking out on their own was the better choice
Macintosh 128k, macintosh 512k, G4 Cube.
Basically Steve hated the concept of having a fan in the computer and he always tried to do without one. Give the heat generated from modern chipsets, its now impossible to build a computer without a fan, unless you want to embrace liquid cooling
Yeah, but Xerox didn't see the potential and willingly parted with the GUI. Jobs saw the potential immediately.
Inventing something is meaningless if it stays in the garage forever.
Focus groups v. usability research
Focus groups are hardly the only way to get feedback on a product. It is primarily a tool of Marketing. Usability research can be done without focus groups, though you still need real end users.
Usability testing would have told Apple that a round mouse is a mess of hurt. This is just scientific method applied to UI design. If you come up with a great idea, have a few people sit down and try to use it! If people do better with oval mice than round mouse, guess what, that means something.
Apple used to have a work class usability lab (Tog! Don Norman!) which has been dissolved. That is a waste of some world class talent. But usability != focus groups. That is ignorant.
Focus groups are hardly the only way to get feedback on a product. It is primarily a tool of Marketing. Usability research can be done without focus groups, though you still need real end users.
Usability testing would have told Apple that a round mouse is a mess of hurt. This is just scientific method applied to UI design. If you come up with a great idea, have a few people sit down and try to use it! If people do better with oval mice than round mouse, guess what, that means something.
Apple used to have a work class usability lab (Tog! Don Norman!) which has been dissolved. That is a waste of some world class talent. But usability != focus groups. That is ignorant.
Science project
Xerox did a wonderful, innovative science project---which their upper management failed to see the value in, as just as HP failed to see the value in the Apple I which Woz had created and which he offered up to them freely. This happens a lot. Palm was started by former Apple employees who wanted to take the PDA a different direction than the Newton, and SAP was founded by former IBMers who wanted to sell enterprise software, but they worked for a company who believed Big Iron was the only way to go.
Unlike Xerox, Jobs saw the value, acquired the talent and the rights to the science project, and made a real PRODUCT from it that people would actually consider buying--and did. They invented totally new things along the way to it become a product, like the menu bar across the top (with dropdowns) and the ability to have overlapping windows. Xerox started the fire but it wasn't finished and they had no intent of finishing it. So Jobs did it for them.
(Curiously, when Apple [Bill Atkinson of HyperCard and QuickDraw fame] invented overlapping window regions, they had assumed Xerox hadn't already done it. It seemed so obvious to them that windows should overlap, not just smack up border to border. But Xerox hadn't solved that issue at all. So sometimes when Apple was copying, they were actually inventing. Invention can be weird that way. Alas, Microsoft cannot make that claim.)
Xerox did a wonderful, innovative science project---which their upper management failed to see the value in, as just as HP failed to see the value in the Apple I which Woz had created and which he offered up to them freely. This happens a lot. Palm was started by former Apple employees who wanted to take the PDA a different direction than the Newton, and SAP was founded by former IBMers who wanted to sell enterprise software, but they worked for a company who believed Big Iron was the only way to go.
Unlike Xerox, Jobs saw the value, acquired the talent and the rights to the science project, and made a real PRODUCT from it that people would actually consider buying--and did. They invented totally new things along the way to it become a product, like the menu bar across the top (with dropdowns) and the ability to have overlapping windows. Xerox started the fire but it wasn't finished and they had no intent of finishing it. So Jobs did it for them.
(Curiously, when Apple [Bill Atkinson of HyperCard and QuickDraw fame] invented overlapping window regions, they had assumed Xerox hadn't already done it. It seemed so obvious to them that windows should overlap, not just smack up border to border. But Xerox hadn't solved that issue at all. So sometimes when Apple was copying, they were actually inventing. Invention can be weird that way. Alas, Microsoft cannot make that claim.)
Fans
Arguably, it wasn't really possible then either. The early Mac often suffered from overheating and was a big source of repair issues. Companies like Kensington made a bundle selling fans that attached to the exhaust port on compact macs.
Steve has great vision and great taste. But this doesn't make him infallible or an engineer or a usability PhD. So when he is wrong, bad things can happen -- and I am sure he ignored his engineers who told him why you need a fan inside a box with a 68000 chip, motherboard and a CRT (!).
So it was a bad technical idea to exclude a fan but still a great vision -- the iPhone/iPod Touch and iPad do not have fans and finally, the hardware makes that a reasonable decision. They are smaller, lighter and quieter than if they had fans, which makes all of the difference if you have a mobile device. So Jobs was in some ways right (his vision) but ignoring technical advice cost a lot of early Mac users a bundle of money and made Kensington a wad of cash too from same users.
Arguably, it wasn't really possible then either. The early Mac often suffered from overheating and was a big source of repair issues. Companies like Kensington made a bundle selling fans that attached to the exhaust port on compact macs.
Steve has great vision and great taste. But this doesn't make him infallible or an engineer or a usability PhD. So when he is wrong, bad things can happen -- and I am sure he ignored his engineers who told him why you need a fan inside a box with a 68000 chip, motherboard and a CRT (!).
So it was a bad technical idea to exclude a fan but still a great vision -- the iPhone/iPod Touch and iPad do not have fans and finally, the hardware makes that a reasonable decision. They are smaller, lighter and quieter than if they had fans, which makes all of the difference if you have a mobile device. So Jobs was in some ways right (his vision) but ignoring technical advice cost a lot of early Mac users a bundle of money and made Kensington a wad of cash too from same users.
Marketing
Marketing does not create insanely great products. They make people AWARE of them. But awareness alone does not make them great. Features, aesthetics and ease of use make great products--and the ability to differentiate that set from what everyone else has. Great products have failed because of lack of awareness; Apple takes no chances with that.
Marketing does not create insanely great products. They make people AWARE of them. But awareness alone does not make them great. Features, aesthetics and ease of use make great products--and the ability to differentiate that set from what everyone else has. Great products have failed because of lack of awareness; Apple takes no chances with that.
I never knew that about the overlapping windows issue. Interesting, thank you!