Support NeoGAF

[tedtropy]

This (admitttedly Mac Centric) column talks about desk acessories from the original 1984 Macintosh:

http://daringfireball.net/2004/06/dashboard_vs_konfabulator

You could argue Apple still came up with it first, before Konfabulator.

Hmm, the first widget?

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

It's not the widgets idea that was stolen so much as the dashboard.

 

[Phoenix]

Dude, that shite that was posted utterly wrong. It's like reading about the Chinese and Korean occupation by the Japanese in Japanese text books!

Xerox was HUGE! Much bigger than Apple. And the existance of PARC plenty shows that they had the R and D resources to do the work. It wasn't that Xerox coudln't bring those ideas to fruition, it's that Xerox execs lacked the foresight to nurture the seeds that they possesed! They had absolutely no idea what they were giving away.

Are you a corporate exec, because you sound like one with that Just because you can R&D a product does not in any way mean that you can commercialize it even if its the best thing since sliced bread. Xerox at that time was simply not interested in commercializing a computer GUI much like many of their other more recent advances (like Aspect Oriented Programming), MBone, PARCTabs (Palm sized tablet PCs), etc.

Xerox has a very tight line of business and very frequently licenses, donates, etc. IP that they own. The fact that Xerox sued Apple after the fact is no different from many companies who sue their business partners after the fact because they feel they were on the losing end of a business deal.

 

[Hitokage]

it's not like a phone company had much use marketing UNIX.

 

[SteveMeister]

Just because you can R&D a product does not in any way mean that you can commercialize it even if its the best thing since sliced bread.

Hey, that sounds familiar

 

[Shogmaster]

Are you a corporate exec, because you sound like one with that Just because you can R&D a product does not in any way mean that you can commercialize it even if its the best thing since sliced bread. Xerox at that time was simply not interested in commercializing a computer GUI much like many of their other more recent advances (like Aspect Oriented Programming), MBone, PARCTabs (Palm sized tablet PCs), etc.

Then simply explain why PARC existed as was in the first place, genius. And don't tell me just to give it all away.

Xerox has a very tight line of business and very frequently licenses, donates, etc. IP that they own. The fact that Xerox sued Apple after the fact is no different from many companies who sue their business partners after the fact because they feel they were on the losing end of a business deal.

Like I said, if Xerox had forsight, they would never have gave these away.

And BTW, in 1981, MS was known as nothing more than a medium sized software house that just sold machine language (i.e. Basic for Intel 8080). No one expected that MS would venture into operating system business, nor applications. But Gates saw the opportunity and bought a CP/M clone called QDOS for $50,000 from another local software house in order to do OS business with IBM and off it went to make gazillions riding the IBM PC wave.

The same could have been for Xerox have they seised the oppotunities that they themselves had created. They could easily have been "MS" instead of MS.

 

[Hitokage]

And BTW, in 1982, MS was known as nothing more than a medium sized software house that just sold machine language (i.e. Basic for Intel 8080). No one expected that MS would venture into operating system business, nor applications. But Gates saw the opportunity and bought QDOS for $50,000 from another local software house in order to do OS business with IBM and off it went to make gazillions riding the IBM PC wave.

The same could have been for Xerox have they seised the oppotunities that they themselves had created. They could easily have been "MS" instead of MS.

You mean the opportunity to repackage QDOS with stolen CP/M code?

 

[Shogmaster]

You mean the opportunity to repackage QDOS with stolen CP/M code?

Actually, that was done by the place MS bought QDOS from just a few days before finalizing the IBM PC OS deal. MS just sold it as theirs to IBM.

 

[scorcho]

Hmm, the first widget?

well then i guess all single-minded utilities are 'widgets'.

 

[Hitokage]

Actually, that was done by the place MS bought QDOS from just a few days before finalizing the IBM PC OS deal. MS just sold it as theirs to IBM.

So you've got a chain of people selling other people's stuff as their own? Hah.

 

[Phoenix]

Then simply explain why PARC existed as was in the first place, genius. And don't tell me just to give it all away.

The same reason why Cisco, Time Warner, IBM, Microsoft, hell even Walt Disney (they came up with a nice web publishing language) have R&D teams - to pursue projects that might be worth pursuing for licensing to other parties in the future. Many companies (particularly big companies like those mentioned above) license most of the technology that their R&D teams create - not use it themselves.

The same could have been for Xerox have they seised the oppotunities that they themselves had created. They could easily have been "MS" instead of MS.

So they were going to sink considerable money into something outside of their core business, compete with IBM (which was unthinkable at the time), roll out a line of expensive PCs and have them compete with their core line of business machines? You need to go get a job here:

http://www.sun.com

because you share the same broken strategy as their CEO.

 

[Phoenix]

Someone never watched Triumph of the Nerds. Jobs on camera admits to ganking GUI/mouse, OOP, and Networking from PARC.

Pfft... PARC stole the mouse from Stanford Research Institute who probably stole it from some homeless guy with a box who was moving his belongings around on the sidewalk.

Douglas Engelbart's Augmentation Research Center at the Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International) in Menlo Park, California

- source of mouse

 

[Shogmaster]

The same reason why Cisco, Time Warner, IBM, Microsoft, hell even Walt Disney (they came up with a nice web publishing language) have R&D teams - to pursue projects that might be worth pursuing for licensing to other parties in the future. Many companies (particularly big companies like those mentioned above) license most of the technology that their R&D teams create - not use it themselves.

You are comparing PARC's acomplishments with those tripe?!? Come the fuck on. Xerox didn't hire the best computing research minds out of accident or lark.

So they were going to sink considerable money into something outside of their core business, compete with IBM (which was unthinkable at the time), roll out a line of expensive PCs and have them compete with their core line of business machines? You need to go get a job here:

http://www.sun.com

because you share the same broken strategy as their CEO.

Who the hell said competing with IBM on making/selling hardware? Did MS sell hardware to become so big and stinkin rich? Most of the innovation PARC started was software/infrastructure etc.. Look at all the companies that came from PARC alumni and tech: 3COM, Adobe etc.. They are not hardware ventures. They are IP tech/software ventures.

 

[Hitokage]

You are comparing PARC's acomplishments with those tripe?!? Come the fuck on. Xerox didn't hire the best computing research minds out of accident or lark.

Bell Labs?

 

[fse]

First widget? Maybe... widgets are mini applications after all I think.

 

[Phoenix]

You are comparing PARC's acomplishments with those tripe?!? Come the fuck on. Xerox didn't hire the best computing research minds out of accident or lark.

Uhm... I know PARC makes you all orgasmic and everything, but there ARE other research centers in the world - hell I'd happily work at one of IBM's Research Centers before working for PARC or if I wanted to stay in the multimedia space most assuredly Time Warners.

Who the hell said competing with IBM on making/selling hardware? Did MS sell hardware to become so big and stinkin rich? Most of the innovation PARC started was software/infrastructure etc.. Look at all the companies that came from PARC alumni and tech: 3COM, Adobe etc.. They are not hardware ventures. They are IP tech/software ventures.

Right, the are alumni FROM PARC that went SOMEWHERE ELSE and founded businesses. These folks weren't brain dead at PARC - Xerox wasn't in the business of building businesses out of those ideas! I guess if someone had come up with DirectX-like technology at PARC (and someone did) you'd argue that they could be competing with Sony for a piece of the console pie.

 

[Shogmaster]

Pfft... PARC stole the mouse from Stanford Research Institute who probably stole it from some homeless guy with a box who was moving his belongings around on the sidewalk.




- source of mouse

IIRC, Engelbart's staff from standford ended up at PARC, which explains things.

But if you notice, I said "GUI/mouse," not "GUI, mouse," since the demo to Jobs made them inseperable.

 

[Shogmaster]

Uhm... I know PARC makes you all orgasmic and everything, but there ARE other research centers in the world - hell I'd happily work at one of IBM's Research Centers before working for PARC or if I wanted to stay in the multimedia space most assuredly Time Warners.

PARC of 1980s makes me "orgasmic", just for all the stuff they came up with that directly relates to what we use on computers. I don't know how they stack up today, nor do I care since none of it (AFAIK) is about videogames.

Right, the are alumni FROM PARC that went SOMEWHERE ELSE and founded businesses. These folks weren't brain dead at PARC - Xerox wasn't in the business of building businesses out of those ideas! I guess if someone had come up with DirectX-like technology at PARC (and someone did) you'd argue that they could be competing with Sony for a piece of the console pie.

Xerox was asleep at the wheel, pure and simple. That's why many left PARC to pursue the very ideas they came up with at PARC.

 

[CaptainABAB]

On TabletPCs....

Yeah, because that's such a huuuuge market...

Oh, so the only innovations that count are ones that have mass market appeal??

 

[borghe]

there are two things here. the technology and the implementation.

the original WinCE devices lead to today's PocketPCs. However the original WinCE devices were fucking awful.

So you can still ridicule the implementation (the tabletpc) while respecting the technology (touch screen based fullscreen pc)

 

[Shogmaster]

So you can still ridicule the implementation (the tabletpc) while respecting the technology (touch screen based fullscreen pc)

That sentence shows so perfectly that you know nothing about TPCs, and thus have no basis to judge how good or bad the current implimentation of TPCs are (They are quite cool and well done already).

First of all, it's not touch screens, it's EMR active digitizers (such as Wacom pen tablets). Second, touch screen based full screen PCs have been done YEARS before TPCs came out by the like of Fujitsu running Windows 98 and the like.

Tablet PC, is really all about INK for the sake of INK. It's not really about handwriting recognition (although it's part of it), nor drawing. INK is the star, and the core. It's about bringing more natural human input into digital realm.

Seriously, it's the future of laptops. And INK will eventually find itself into desktops as well (but by then "desktops" as they are now might not even exist anymore).

 

[SteveMeister]

On TabletPCs....


Oh, so the only innovations that count are ones that have mass market appeal??

Huh? I was replying to Shogmaster's post in which he complained that Apple had ignored the Tablet PC market. It's not a lucrative market -- they're just not selling. And that's why Apple hasn't entered it, plain & simple. And it has nothing to do with the technology, just that people aren't buying the damned things. What does that have to do with innovation?

 

[Shogmaster]

Huh? I was replying to Shogmaster's post in which he complained that Apple had ignored the Tablet PC market. It's not a lucrative market -- they're just not selling. And that's why Apple hasn't entered it, plain & simple. What does that have to do with innovation?

And the widget market is a huge cash boon? Come on now.

And for laptops that just aren't selling, they sure are making a lot of them. New models pop out of the woodworks every damn day. I guess OEMs are just crazy and keep designing and producing stuff that don't sell.

 

[Slurpy]

The play control widget is perhaps the ugliest Ive ever seen.

In any case, I think its irrelevant what features microsoft copies, etc. As long as it improves windows, Im for it. There are only a certain number of general implementations to get something done. Microsoft is usually late to the party, but Id rather they use them than not.

 

[tedtropy]

First widget? Maybe... widgets are mini applications after all I think.

Even in the days of grayscale, there was a certain elegance to the Mac UI.

 

[SteveMeister]

And the widget market is a huge cash boon? Come on now.

Where the FUCK did that come from?! You're the one who brought up Tablet PCs. My reply initial reply to your post about Tablet PCs had nothing to do with Widgets or Gadgets, and neither did my reply to CaptainABAB have anything to do with Widgets or Gadgets.

Jesus Christ, talk about a complete non-sequitur.

 

[Shogmaster]

Where the FUCK did that come from?! You're the one who brought up Tablet PCs. My reply initial reply to your post about Tablet PCs had nothing to do with Widgets or Gadgets, and neither did my reply to CaptainABAB have anything to do with Widgets or Gadgets.

Jesus Christ, talk about a complete non-sequitur.

Aren't you the one that's trying to say that Apple only innovates when there is a market?

IIRC, Firewire took forever to get adopted by the market. That is an Apple innovation, no?

 

[SteveMeister]

Aren't you the one that's trying to say that Apple only innovates when there is a market?

IIRC, Firewire took forever to get adopted by the market. That is an Apple innovation, no?

No, I was merely saying that Apple most likely hadn't got into the Tablet PC market because they weren't selling. There've been rumors about Apple tablets for YEARS, with nothing released. It also doesn't help that their laptop line is basically dead-ended until the Intel switch.

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

Keep moving that bar, Shog-- you'll catch them yet!

 

[Hitokage]

IIRC, Firewire took forever to get adopted by the market. That is an Apple innovation, no?

So did USB, but ironically it was the iMac that ditched Serial-Parallel-PS/2 and got it going.

 

[McFly]

You guys should take a day free and read some articles by old Mac devs over at folklore.org:

Most users and developers only experienced the user interface as a completed whole, so they tend to think of it as static and never changing, when in fact these pictures show that it was always evolving as we gained more experience and tackled more application areas. A user interface is never good enough, and, while consistency between applications is an important virtue, the best developers will continue to innovate when faced with new problems or perhaps just when they see a much better way to accomplish something. As usual, Bob Dylan said it best when he wrote in 1965, "He not busy being born, is busy dying."

http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?pr...rn.txt&sortOrder=Sort by Rating&detail=medium

Apple, Microsoft, Xerox, IBM (ok, not so much IBM) ... they were all working together on some smaller projects here and there all the time. For example a way to switch between applications (the early form of multitasking) was first developed for DOS and Microsoft even asked an Apple dev to make something similar for their OS, payd of course, so that the workflow of their Mac version of the Office app could be better.

Fredi

 

[Hitokage]

Apple, Microsoft, Xerox, IBM (ok, not so much IBM) ... they were all working together on some smaller projects here and there all the time. For example a way to switch between applications (the early form of multitasking) was first developed for DOS and Microsoft even asked an Apple dev to make something similar for their OS, payd of course, so that the workflow of their Mac version of the Office app could be better.

Ok....

 

[McFly]

Read it here: http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?pr...er.txt&sortOrder=Sort by Rating&detail=medium

"Excuse me," he told us, as he pressed a key combination on his keyboard, his monitor screen instantly changing to a different program. He talked on the phone for a minute or two, occasionally typing, before he finished the conversation and pressed a key combination to switch back to his Thunderscan notes.

"What did you just do?," I asked John, curious about the software that he was running. "How did you switch to another application so quickly?"

"Oh, I'm running Memory Shift. Haven't you seen it?" John responded. "It's a DOS utility program that keeps multiple applications resident in memory, and allows you switch between them quickly. I've been using it a lot lately." John typed the switch command a few times in rapid succession, to show me how fast it could do its thing.

"You know, I think I could do that for the Macintosh", I suddenly blurted out, before I even thought about it consciously.

...

Jeff asked me what I was working on, and I told him about Thunderscan, which he seemed to be interested in. But when I mentioned that I was about to start some experiments with an application switching utility, his jaw dropped, and he looked like he couldn't believe what I said.

"That's just what we wanted to talk with you about!", he exclaimed, "It's great that you're already working on it".

Jeff explained that Microsoft had put a lot of effort into getting their applications to run well in the tiny space available in the 128K Macintosh, which they considered to be a key competitive advantage. But as things stood, the 512K Mac would undermine their efforts, since it allowed applications to be much larger. Plus, Lotus had recently announced an integrated application suite for the 512K Macintosh called Jazz that made it easy to quickly switch between different functional areas. But if the Macintosh could run multiple applications simultaneously, the small memory footprint of the Microsoft apps would continue to be advantageous, since their lower memory requirements meant that more of them could run concurrently, and users could put together customized application suites on their own. The purpose of the visit was to convince me to write an applications switcher under contract to Microsoft.

Fredi

 

[CaptainABAB]

Huh? I was replying to Shogmaster's post in which he complained that Apple had ignored the Tablet PC market. It's not a lucrative market -- they're just not selling. And that's why Apple hasn't entered it, plain & simple. And it has nothing to do with the technology, just that people aren't buying the damned things. What does that have to do with innovation?

Sorry, I misunderstood.

 

[Phoenix]

Aren't you the one that's trying to say that Apple only innovates when there is a market?

Apple only releases products when there is a market, but it innovates all the time as do many companies - you just never see their stuff because its locked away in some R&D facility. Most of the 'leaks' that people hear about are probably actual products in Apple R&D that they have just decided isn't ready for commercialization.

 

[element]

screw all this talk about stealing stuff. Start.com is freaking awesome. I can't wait for it to take off.

 

[Phoenix]

screw all this talk about stealing stuff. Start.com is freaking awesome. I can't wait for it to take off.

Maybe its just me, but it looks like a portal back to MSN Search ....

 

[videogamer]

Maybe its just me, but it looks like a portal back to MSN Search ....

Yeah, it's pretty much a portal like My Yahoo or Google's personalized home. It's interface is a lot like Google's.. close enough for me. But since Google's website integrates Gmail, I think it's a nice way to check if there is any new email without having to actually load up Gmail.