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Steve Jobs Says PC Folks' World Is Slipping Away

Posted by kdawson on from the freedom-from-porn dept.

theodp writes "Provoked by an iPad ad promising a 'revolution,' Valleywag's Ryan Tate fired off a late-night missive to Steve Jobs. Jobs responded, and the two engaged in an after-midnight e-mail debate over lockdown, Cocoa vs. Flash, battery life, and whether 'freedom from porn' is a bug or a feature. 'The times they are a changin',' quipped Jobs, 'and some traditional PC folks feel like their world is slipping away. It is.' Tate was unswayed by the Apple CEO's reality distortion field, but did come away impressed by Jobs' willingness to spar one-on-one over his beliefs — at two in the morning on a weekend."

2 of 1,067 comments (clear)

  1. Re:haha by macs4all · · Score: 5, Informative

    Enough metaphors. If you don't know how to use a computer, Apple is for you. If you know how, you don't need the crap that they're trying to sell you

    As an embedded developer for the past 30 years, and an Apple user since 1976, I can assure you that your statement is utter rubbish.

    I use Macs because I don't WANT to fuck around inside my computer. I got all that out of my system about 20 years ago with my Apple ][s, which lived perpetually with their lids off, so that I could tinker.

    Now, I'd prefer my computers to be as APPLIANCE-LIKE as possible. Not because I "don't know how"; but rather, because I have better things to do. Apple (mostly) achieves that goal. I guess I can understand why others don't feel like I do, which is more than I can say for most of the people commenting here.

    But don't ever mistake "don't want to" with "don't know how".

  2. Re:Sounds to me... by MCSEBear · · Score: 5, Informative
    Xerox PARC was certainly responsible for many innovations, nobody can deny that. However, claims that Xerox single handedly invented the WIMP interface (Windows, Icons, Pointer, Menus) and that Apple copied that interface exactly as created by Xerox are simply incorrect.

    Englebart's NLS created the first implementation of Windows, and of using a Pointer to access Menus. The only addition made by Xerox PARC was the addition of Icons. NLS had bitmapped WYSIWYG graphics, but did not come up with the idea of using Icons to represent commands, using text based menus instead.

    Here is a bit of Alto History for you:

    The Alto was first conceptualized in 1972 in a memo written by Butler Lampson, inspired by the On-Line System (NLS) developed by Douglas Engelbart at SRI, and was designed primarily by Chuck Thacker.

    Going back farther, NLS was inspired by work done by Ivan Sutherland who created a program called Sketchpad as his Ph.D thesis.

    Sketchpad:

    is considered to be the ancestor of modern computer-aided drafting (CAD) programs as well as a major breakthrough in the development of computer graphics in general. For example, the Graphic User Interface was derived from the Sketchpad as well as modern object oriented programming. Ivan Sutherland demonstrated with it that computer graphics could be used for both artistic and technical purposes in addition to showing a novel method of human-computer interaction.

    Some video of Sketchpad in action is available online. (Jump to the four minute mark.)

    Going back still farther, Everyone I've mentioned points back to an article by Vannevar Bush published in 1945 describing an imaginary personal computer called the Memex as a huge inspiration.

    The Memex (a portmanteau of "memory" and "index", like Rolodex an earlier index portmanteau common at the time) is the name given by Vannevar Bush to the theoretical proto-hypertext computer system he proposed in his 1945 The Atlantic Monthly article As We May Think. The memex is a device in which an individual compresses and stores all of their books, records, and communications which is then mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility. A document can be given a simple numerical code that allows the user to access it after dialing the number combination. Documents are also able to be edited in real-time. This process makes annotation fast and simple. The memex is an enlarged intimate supplement to one's memory.

    To sum things up...

    Ivan Sutherland's Sketchpad was inspired by Vannevar Bush's idea of the Memex.

    Douglas Engelbart at SRI was inspired by Sutherland's Sketchpad when he created NLS.

    Xerox was inspired by NLS when they created Alto.

    Apple was inspired by Alto when they created Lisa and Macintosh.

    None of these was a direct copy of the other. Learn some history, and STAY OFF MY LAWN!

    (BTW - Neither Alto nor Macintosh were written in an object oriented programming language.)