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Logitech Makes 1 Billionth Mouse
Smivs writes "Logitech has hailed as a major landmark the production of their one billionth computer mouse.
The news comes at a time when analysts claim the days of the mouse are numbered.
'It's rare in human history that a billionth of anything has been shipped by one company,' said Logitech's general manager Rory Dooley.
'Look at any other industry and it has never happened. This is a significant milestone.'
The computer mouse will achieve a milestone of its own next week when it turns 40.
It was 9 December 1968 when Douglas C. Engelbart and his group of researchers at Stanford University put the first mouse through its paces."
McDonalds anyone?
Sheesh...
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
A colleague called me to his office the other day. His PowerMac was "locking up" not responsive to clicks. And when he'd reboot the optical drive would eject. Turns out his Logitech USB mouse was stuck in the left click position. (Macs eject their optical disk on restart if the mouse button is clicked.)
I think McDonald's would disagree with you.
Large manufacturers of small parts like screws can easily reach the billion mark in a decade.
The same goes for "categories" of parts like mice, computers, microprocessors, phones, etc.
I wonder how many CPUs Intel has shipped? I wonder how many phones the pre-1983-breakup version of AT&T shipped. I wonder how many screws and fasteners a large screw-making company ships in 10 years?
No, a billion may be a milestone but it's not huge, not when you put it in context.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Oh, I hope so! It'll go great with the CDs from my last 3 malfunctioning Logitech mice.
I've pretty much used Logitech mice exclusively since I've stared using a computer. They've consistently provided high-quality, low-priced products. My mouse I use at home is a simple $12 Logitech optical mouse, and it works perfectly. Unfortunately, I'm using a MS mouse at work. I think I will buy another Logitech mouse to replace this one.
The news comes at a time when analysts claim the days of the mouse are numbered.
[citation needed]
No seriously, where is there a mainstream commentator predicting the demise of the mouse, and backing it up with hard data and logic?
ball bearing balls? bottlecaps? shoes? Bolts? Lesbians!
"It's rare in human history that a billionth of anything has been shipped by one company," said Logitech's general manager Rory Dooley. "Look at any other industry and it has never happened. This is a significant milestone."
Gum? Pencils? Paper? Soft drink? Bag of chips? Stick of RAM? Screwdriver? Television set? Surely some of these items have been sold more than a billion times by a single company...
i believe that the razor blade manufacturers hit their billionth mark within a decade of beginning production. yes, few companies ship billions- but logitech hit billion from multiple models. razor companies from the same model blade.
Remember when the "bus mouse" was the cool upgrade over a crappy serial-port mouse, and you had that extra 8-bit ISA card with the funny port on it? IRQs ? I/O ports ? That was back before teenage girls took over the Internet.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
That's weird. Why on earth would a Mac user not simply use the supplied Apple brand mouse? Oh, right.
Speaking to your criticism directly, I have about half a dozen Logitech mice, spanning a decade, that all work flawlessly. The only reason I have bought more since the first one 11 years ago has been to keep pace with technology (optical, wireless, 2d scroll wheel, laser, etc.)
Then again, it's not like I use mine for grueling tasks like ejecting CDs.
Come on, you can make, and sell, 1 billion mice; how hard can it be to make a minor variant of the Cordless Optical TrackMan that uses Bluetooth instead of an RF dongle???
I can't imagine the market is smaller than for some of the weird niche mice I've seen out there...
Dan Aris
Fun. Free. Online. RPG. BattleMaster.
A /. reader admitted to using an MS product! He must have no fear!
Obligatory Douglas Engelbart mouse demo video link:
http://sloan.stanford.edu/mousesite/1968Demo.html
the no
I wonder if when they ship this one billionth mouse to a customer, they will include in the box a flashing ad telling him that he is the one billionth customer and should click here to claim his prize.
Logitech have been shipping mice since 1981, giving them almost a two decade head start on Microsoft. Their early mice used balls and so needed replacing after a few years. Over the last 26 years, they have made mice that have been rebranded and shipped by numerous OEMs, including Apple, HP and Dell. For most of the '80s and '90s, any serious computer user had a logitech mouse (and less serious ones often had a cheap Logitech mouse with their computer maker's brand on it). Calling them a minority player is like calling Microsoft a minority player in the desktop OS market.
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Yes, a billionth of most things are microscopic in size. So shipping it is quite difficult. Great job logitec.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
How do you figure that? If they have shipped a billion mice then that means that there are at most a billion Logitech mice out there. Considering that a lot of their early ball mice are almost certainly no longer in working order, the real number is likely a lot less.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I'm curious to know how many mice Microsoft has shipped; theirs seem to be more plentiful than Logitech's in the wild.
That's because they pull their own cords and escape to the woods. They're a lot less house-trained than their Logitech counterparts.
I too am a big fan of Logitech mice. My main computer rig actually sports a Razer Diamondback these days, but my laptop mouse is Logitech, as are the mice on my workstation and server rack's KVM at work. Over the years I've had countless ones. Like you, I mostly have upgraded to keep pace with technology: moving to one with a scroll wheel, moving to an optical, moving to USB, getting a mouse with more buttons, etc.
Like all heavy use devices I've had a few failures (I've had 2 Logitech mice wear out on me), but overall compared with other mice I've still noticed them to be of a pretty high quality. When I used to work as a tech at a college many years ago, I can't count how many Microsoft Intellimouses had a scroll wheel that was jammed where it couldn't be moved anymore.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Because Steve Jobs only recently relented and allowed a second button on them. Before the mighty mouse, Apple mice were pretty useless creatures.
Much as I'm loath to admit it, the best mouse I've ever owned was manufactured by Microsoft.
Logitech however does place a close second. Followed even more closely by virtually every other mouse I've ever owned by any company, I mean, it's a mouse, there's not all that much you can do to set it apart from the rest of the pack. If it moves the pointer around smoothly, has at least 3 buttons and a scroll wheel, and doesn't stick it's as good as at least 90% of the mice (is that even the right term?) out there.
Curiosity was framed, Ignorance killed the cat.
Whoever makes cockroaches passed the billion mark a long time ago. And using a model with very few variations, too.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Yeah... right... it won't be mainstream in 3-5 years... sorry, but I call BS.
Touchscreens and facial recognition software will not replace the mouse in an office environment. It won't replace it for gaming. Hell, it won't replace it period.
Take gaming as a simple example. When I'm playing WoW, I'm often looking elsewhere, eating a snack, drinking a beer, or talking to my wife who is sitting on the other side of the room... the last thing I'm going to want to do is stare at the screen and make funny faces at it to move the mouse. Sorry, ain't gonna happen.
Don't get me wrong here; touch screens are a huge boon and will have a place in specialized industries; auto interfaces, shared spaces, Cell Phones, etc.
But making the claim that it will no longer be mainstream and large companies, lets say HR Block, will drop the mouse and replace everything with a touch screen and facial recognition software is the biggest load of crap I've heard in quote a long time.
I hope there will be a headline where computer equipment manufacturers are recycling this shit.
Got a new logitech mouse recently. New to me anyway, it's a G5
Has 2 buttons on it to increase or decrease the mouse sensitivity in real time. I don't play many games these days, but I could see that being very useful for first person shooters.. zoom in with a sniper rifle.. decrease mouse sensitivity at the press of a button ..etc
Also the mouse has a weight cartridge with adjustable weight, so each user can adjust the physical feel of the mouse to their liking.
Plus it's laser and my old optical one sucked.
You are incorrect. The click detection is indeed done by detecting the capacitance of your fingers. I accept that there may be more than one physical microswitch inside the device, but that has nothing to do with left/right-click determination. The only thing that matters is whether your finger is resting on the left half of the device or not.
ZFS: because love is never having to say fsck
Microsoft is an excellent mouse-making company. It's a shame people keep complaining about their failed OS sideline.
As others have mentioned, if you turn over most of the OEM branded mice the come with a computer, you'll see a Logitech logo on it.
Thanks, I just turned over my lenovo mouse to check, and blinded myself with the laser
back in my day when we advertised a product like logitech(c) brand mice we used banners.
Good people go to bed earlier.
No, he meant no other industry has shipped a billion mice.
McDonald's has probably shipped a billion mice, too.
I wouldn't call this an event worthy of celebration. These billion mice (along with the billions of other plastic mass-produced products out there) will one day end up in a landfill somewhere, and will take hundreds of years to break down. The major consequence of mass-production is mass-consumption, and the drawback of mass-consumption is mass-disposal.
I find it a bit sad that a device which, essentially, hasn't changed in 20 years isn't re-used more often. I have 10 year old keyboards and mice I still use.
I guess it's just part of our "throw away, buy a new one" culture that seems to ignore what happens to things once they're in the bin. Out of sight, out of mind.
Ok, McDonalds, screws, whatever, you got those... But you forgot:
"Annual production of Lego bricks averages approximately 20 billion per year"
Funny. So did my uncle.
Much as I'm loath to admit it, the best mouse I've ever owned was manufactured by Microsoft. Logitech however does place a close second. Followed even more closely by virtually every other mouse I've ever owned by any company, I mean, it's a mouse, there's not all that much you can do to set it apart from the rest of the pack. If it moves the pointer around smoothly, has at least 3 buttons and a scroll wheel, and doesn't stick it's as good as at least 90% of the mice (is that even the right term?) out there.
I bought my Microsoft Trackball optical when logitech stopped making the trackball i liked, and I have never looked back. The software was great (programmable "program dependant" buttons with macros) (If you stuck to the version 4.1) I even bought 5 of them from Microcenter when I learned they were being discontinued.
I still have 4 new in the box, and I see they are going for about $150 on ebay now.
The one I am using right now is... 4 years old I think.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
their first mouse was a rebranded logitech.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I'd imagine that the manufacturing in all cases is done by Wun Hung Lo Light Industry and Pre-Used Organs Conglomerate in China. Branding is largely superficial.
As an aside though, the Microsoft Explorer Trackball was a Microsoft custom job that Logitech have never produced a direct competitor for. I mention this because, being Microsoft, they killed it off despite its popularity in its niche. Used examples are now selling for $250 and rising on eBay, and there's even a market for cleaning kits and maintenance marketed specifically at this device; I doubt we'll ever see any particular Logitech branded pointing device being missed as much.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Same thing we do very night, Pinky: try to take over the world! You see, I have commissioned a company by the name of Logitech to deliver ONE BILLION mice, an army large enough to overwhelm any defence system known to man.
[ding dong]
Ah, that will be my delivery. Soon, Pinky, the world will be ours for the taking.
Crikey, Brain, these mice are kind of odd. Why are their tails so long, and what is this hard shell [toc] all around them?
Holy crap you're right! My parents have a Mighty Mouse on their iMac. I've been trying to right click with it for 2 weeks, with no luck, and its been driving me nuts. I just went upstairs and tried by lifting my index finger when I clicked, and voila: context menu! My reaction: "stupidest mouse ever."
This has to be the worst human interface design ever. This goes way beyond non-intuitive and is in face counter-intuitive. Why should I have to lift one finger to press with another? Point-and-click is now point-lift-and-click? Its going to take forever to explain this to my mom!
Seriously, who comes up with this crap? And how does it ever get past the testing stages? Does Apple deliberately retard their accessories in order to support a strong third party market?
I wish Apple would stop sacrificing function for obscure coolness. "Check it out, my Apple mouse can tell where my fingers are! Sure its a pain in the ass to use it, but IT CAN TELL WHERE MY FINGERS ARE!!!"
"Yeah? Well my Logitech mouse works right." Suck it, Steve.
blog
Can just about make out "Suzhou Logitech Electronics Co. Ltd. Made in China" in very tiny fontsize.
So with my exhaustive sampling, I can say definitively that Logitech products are more ubiquitous than I thought.
I don't think consumables can be fairly included in this topic. You could talk about bottles of milk, cans of oil, etc. All of those get consumed. I think the difference is that this is a nonconsumable, like a car or an air conditioner.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
Why the Milliard (sic) Fillmore tag? What does the 13th president have to do with this. Sorry for my noob question...
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Seriously. I've switched from Logitech to MS trackballs and keyboards, though Linux is my OS of choice.
In fairness, they've improved it a lot for the mighty mouse 2. All you need to do for a right click, is to point your mouse at the screen, and slap your forehead with your left hand until the context menu appears.
The G7 is also rather expensive IMO.
:).
So to answer the OP's: "there's not all that much you can do to set it apart from the rest of the pack"
Something like the G7 but a lot cheaper would set it apart.
Being a wired mouse is fine. The wires don't bother me much, expensive does bother me
It's fun to become agitated AND I learned an OSX function I never new about ;-)
That's the Mac experince in a nutshell.