August 2, 1993: Apple debuts the MessagePad, the primary product in its Newton line of handheld private digital assistants. Whereas it’ll change into essentially the most unfairly maligned product in Apple historical past, the Newton is a revolutionary machine.
It predates Apple’s push towards app-based cell units 14 years later. And, whereas typically dismissed as a failure, the Newton ranks close to the highest of the listing of Apple’s most influential creations.
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The Apple Newton: John Sculley’s Mac
The Newton was typically regarded, each internally and externally, as Apple CEO John Sculley‘s answer to Steve Jobs’ Mac. The machine marked his first try and launch a game-changing new product line throughout his tenure as Apple’s chief government.
“It was Sculley’s Macintosh,” Frank O’Mahoney, one of many Apple advertising and marketing managers who labored on the Newton, instructed me after I interviewed him for my e book The Apple Revolution. “It was Sculley’s opportunity to do what Steve had done, but in his own category of product.”
The Newton was the brainchild of Apple engineer Steve Sakoman. Passionately devoted to handheld computing, Sakoman beforehand constructed the HP 110, the world’s first battery-powered moveable MS-DOS PC, whereas at Hewlett-Packard within the Eighties.
He began the Apple skunkworks venture that grew to become the Newton in 1987. Nonetheless, it grew unwieldy after Sakoman added to his wishlist all of the cutting-edge cell expertise exhibiting up in analysis labs. These included a touch-sensitive display, handwriting recognition, a tough disk and a large battery. An infrared port would even enable the units to speak with each other. (Keep in mind that each one of this was within the late Eighties!)
Sakoman left Apple in 1990. In early 1991, Sculley noticed the idea. At that time, the Newton moved from skunkworks venture to full-speed-ahead growth. One in all advertising and marketing whiz Sculley‘s chief contributions? Developing with the phrase “personal digital assistant” to explain what the Newton would truly do for patrons.
The launch of the Newton MessagePad
The Newton MessagePad launch on at the present time on the 1993 Macworld Expo proved comparatively low-key in comparison with the 1984 debut of the Macintosh. Nonetheless, Apple’s new handheld machine garnered a good quantity of press.
Sadly, a few of this took the type of parodies of the Newton’s expertise. The Apple PDA’s handwriting-recognition software program took an particularly massive hit. (It bought spoofed in a Doonesbury cartoon and on The Simpsons.)
Photograph: Doonesbury
Actually, the Apple Newton’s handwriting recognition truly labored impressively effectively. Take into account two of its most beautiful options (and once more, let me remind you this was three a long time in the past!).
First, the Newton may acknowledge cursive handwriting in addition to printed letters. Second, whereas it shipped with a library of 10,000 phrases it may acknowledge out of the field, the machine may study new phrases simply as iPhones do right this moment.
That wasn’t the one little bit of synthetic intelligence constructed into the MessagePad, both. It additionally confirmed contextual consciousness of what an individual was writing. As an illustration, scribbling in “Meet Killian Bell for lunch on Wednesday” would create an entry within the MessagePad’s calendar app on the applicable time.
Talking of apps, the first-gen MessagePad included a notepad, an appointment e book and an tackle e book. Impressively, it additionally integrated Sakoman’s infrared transmitter, letting customers “beam” information to and from different Newtons or — in a considerably un-Apple transfer — to rival Sharp Wizard digital organizers. Add-on {hardware} included reminiscence playing cards, battery packs, energy adapters and an exterior fax modem that linked the machine to Macs or Home windows PCs.
The Newton MessagePad: Forward of its time
In all, the Newton MessagePad was a formidable $699 machine that proved far forward of its time. The smooth black look of the machine was extra paying homage to Apple’s later iPhones than the “Snow White” design language of the Macintosh line within the early ’90s.
Finally, three issues doomed the Newton: early unfavorable press, an absence of web connectivity that will make smartphones “must have” gadgets, and Apple’s early Nineties identification disaster. (The corporate’s merchandise proved too dear for informal consumers however too dangerous and underpowered for enterprise customers.)
The Newton grew to become a industrial failure — but it surely spawned lots of the greatest successes Apple loved in later years.
Apple Newton will get higher over time
Though the Newton by no means wound up turning into a giant hit for Apple, subsequent iterations of the machine ironed out loads of its early issues. By the point Jobs returned to Apple within the late Nineties, the ultimate Newton — the MessagePad 2100 — had been launched, providing the perfect iteration of the product but.
By this level, Apple engineers had solved the early handwriting-recognition issues. The consequence was as helpful a pocket machine as you possibly can anticipate within the days earlier than ubiquitous cell web. However, Jobs canceled the product line. He selected to focus Apple’s consideration on blockbuster merchandise just like the iMac, the iBook and the iPod.
Did you personal an authentic Apple Newton MessagePad? Go away your feedback and recollections beneath.