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Was the iPod Accessory Port Inspired By a 40-Year-Old Camera?
An anonymous reader writes "While Samsung has been accused of repeatedly borrowing everything from Apple's hardware, to packaging and accessories, it appears that all current iDevices share a port which is very similar to one found on a forty-year-old Polaroid camera. It gets more interesting when you realize that camera was the 'supreme achievement' of a man Steve Jobs idolized. Edwin Land was the creator of the Polaroid camera and, if Steve Jobs obsessed over Land's devices the way many do with iPhones, etc. today, there's a chance this similarity is not a coincidence."
That slot on a Polaroid camera was actually an edge connector. The flash bar was printed on a PCB and had gold trace "fingers" on a protruding section, like an ISA card. These are very cheap, as only one side of the connector even is a connector at all, the other is just a PCB. But they also aren't physically very strong and aren't good for a lot of insertion/removal cycles.
The iPod 30-pin has a metal shelled connector on both mating pieces. These are more precise, last longer and with the a latch system (present on some iPod cables, not others) physically strong. You can hang an iPod Mini easily from a latched 30-pin connector while the Polaroid flash bars fell out without even putting weight on them.
Also note Steve Jobs didn't design Apple's 30-pin connector, Donald J Novotney did.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
They should use that in court against Samsung.
"It's not parent infringement, it's an Easter egg!"
I accidentally posted this while trying to plug my iPod's charging cable into my old Poloroid camera's flash port. At a bar.
Here's something that is barely relevant about standards. At least some of it isn't made up! ;)
Why are (most) automobile axles as long as they are?
Because they were the same length as the then railcar axles (I think railroads were originally narrow Gage).
Why were railcars axles as long as they were?
Because that was the Gage (duh) of the railway.
Why was the Gage of the railway set to be that width?
Because it matched the width of the wagons and carriages used on roads at the time.
Why was the axles of the wagons and carriages standardized on that length? (they were made before mass production so many varying lengths would be more probable).
Because they were made to match the ruts formed in the often muddy roads.
Why were the ruts in the road formed at that particular width?
Because one width was used by one kind of common vehicle (the roman chariot).
Why was that width particularly useful?
Because it was the width of two horses.
(Sort of) Moral: nothing is new and our primary transportation technology is based on horses assess!
Edwin Land would certainly be a good role model for Jobs.
He was probably the greatest developer of optical and photographic technologies in American history. I'm particularly fond of him for designing the folding ultra-high resolution cameras that allowed the U2 spyplane to photograph objects at 2.5 foot resolutions from 60,000 feet up. Those cameras were refined into those used on the blackbird (80,000 feet and resolution high enough to see the stripes on a parking lot) and those used in satellites. These cameras were, of course, was just one of many achievements in his field.
Anyone with those kind of standards would have been a god to Steve Jobs, I'm sure.