I was just looking at the Guy Kawasaki website and saw an article that stirred up some memories – Macintosh 25th Anniversary Reunion: Where Did Time Go? To commemorate the event many of the people who were involved in that launch came together at the home of one of software evangelists – there are some nice pictures of some of the people who made a huge difference to the way that we live and work today. The picture of the Macintosh 128k really did remind me of the first time I actually used one of these wonderful machines, having previously used an ‘IBM-compatible’ machine running on MS-Dos! With its exciting new graphical user interface and operating system, using the computer for mundane tasks became a joy.
The applications that you used with it were also a revelation – MacPaint and MacWrite were surely the precursors of applications like Word and Photoshop. There was also a programme on there called HyperCard which allowed you to stack cards and link them to one another – sound familiar? And anyone who wrote an assignment at college using Macintosh and not an IBM-compatible’ machine always gained a few extra marks – purely because of the beautiful presentation!
This machine really did kick start a revolution and many of the machines and much of the technology we use today can directly relate back to this event. Microsoft even identified that it had to change its offering to become more ‘Mac-like’ to get ahead. This nostalgia may even make me think of boxing up my Acer and buying a new Apple!
** UPDATE **
Here’s a very neat interview, entitled How the Mac was made, from the Guardian with some of those involved in creating the Macintosh 25 years’ ago, including Steve Wozniak.
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