Apple Newton, Apple’s struggles summed up in one device. The Newton was a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) that was released in the early 1990s. During this time, Steve Jobs quit and left his own company because of internal conflicts, and left the CEO at the time John Sculley in charge. The Jobsless Apple was starting to struggle and was “experimenting” with many ideas including digital cameras and video games, but nothing seem to stick. And one of these experiments was the Apple Newton. Now Apple’s PDA did not go mainstream and was swept under the rug for a reason. Before that, It is time to talk about the development of the Newton. It was released in 1993 and was the first to have handwriting recognition. The Newton developed cycle was a smooth throughout, except towards the middle, for the company and their first time creating such a device. Apple was able to get a custom AISC chip with 163 mhz that was quite powerful for a portable device at the time and energy efficient. It ra...
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Sundial, the only device not to work in the dark after solar panels. Sundials are quite the important leap for man because it was the first time in human history that we are able to tell and manage time. There simple yet effective design (only if there was sunlight of course) provided a way for early humans to keep up a schedule for the work throughout the day. Without this invention, life as we know it could be completely out of sync. The history of sundial and time it self start with, like everything, in Egypt. Their sundial was a stick or pillar that they would stick in the ground and told time of the length of the shadow. The Egyptians also created another form of the sundial which was a t-shape. This sundial had 5 hours were written on the stick and would be set up two way, one in the morning with the stick facing east, then west when afternoon came along. The Greeks created a sundial which was called “pelekinon”. This sundial was different because it is closer to the sundi...
Telegraph, the first device to allow people to finally “text “ one-another even an ocean away. I would be writing about more specifically about the electric telegraph.Basically a telegraph is a machine that is able to send information through Morse’s code. The telegraph was the first to send information to one place to another no matter the distance and in a matter of minutes! This means that important information like treaties, war status, etc could be sent without waiting weeks for a letter. The invention of the electric telegraph is mostly thank by two set of researchers: Sir William and Sir Charles Wheatstone also Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail. Morse and Vail helped to develop what now we know as Morse’s code which is made up of dots and dashes for each letter of the alphabet. While William and Charles are credited with building the machine itself in 1830s after the discovery of the first battery by Alessandro Volta and Hans Christian Oersted discovery of the connection betwe...
The IBM 5150, the pinnacle of Moore’s law. The IBM 5150 is one of the first computers that really brought the keyboard and processor to the home. It revolutionized the market and help set the standards that other computer of the past and even now follow. It is hard to believe that a decade before computers were the size of a bedroom room, needing to be cooled with an air conditioner and run by a group of 20 men to being able to sit on top of a desk with double the processing power. The IBM 5150 was released on August 12, 1981 with relatively positive views. It was the first for the major computer company because they mostly dominated the office space, but began to be interested in the home market as IBM saw the growth of consumer pc. There was 40,000 IBM 5150 pc order on the day of the announcement and the numbers grew. This was a major blow towards IBM new competitors Apple and Atari and other smaller companies as IBM would also take over the new personal market as well as the o...
Betamax, the official device of “is that a VHS?” question. The Betamax format is one of the earliest form of box office movies in the home. It was introduced in the United States by Sony in 1975, two years before JVC’s iconic VHS format. The “superior” Betamax always lagged behind VHS in terms of sales until Sony threw the towel in 1988. Yet there is not much of a difference between these two formats that would put one with a larger advantage than the other. The Betamax format is almost impossible to tell without mentioning the so called “Format Wars” that was between VHS and Betamax. It consisted, as you may have guessed, of the two format duking it out for dominance in the living room. What further helped encourage this was the backing of retail stores, manufacturers, etc picking sides to see who would win and become the default format people would use, I am sure you already know who won. What ultimately came down to that lead VHS to win was cost. JVC would allow other comp...
Eight-track, the official device of avoiding potholes and bumps while driving to prevent your jam from becoming interrupted by distortion and static. Eight-tracks once dominated in the car and home market, up to them even being used in radios stations for jiggles and such, now remain a distant memory which only a few would recollect. What did happen to the mighty eight-track and why did it vanish for popularity as fast as it came in? Before we can answer that here is some quick history. Although tape media existed as early as the 1940s, in the way of reel-to-reel, it failed to capture the casual market as the machines were expensive and a lot more complicated than vinyl records. It was not until 1964 Bill Lear of Lear Jet Corporation and other corporations like Ford Motor Company, GM, and Motorola helped to develop the 8-track. The reason for the backing of motor companies for 8-tracks is because the desire to get high quality audio removable media in cars, as FM radio...
Furby, the official toy of uneasy feelings since 1998. These toys were once the rage during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Every kid wanted one and every parent had to get it. Although they are unsettling to some, they are quite an interesting toy and very advance for their time, which most likely contributed to such high demand for them. The brilliant minds behind the Furby were Dave Hampton and Caleb Chung. They developed the Furby in 9 months and they spent an additional 9 months coming up with a design.They attempted twice to license the Furby concept until Richard C. Levy pitch the product to Tiger Electronics who would later show off at the American International Toy Fair. The initial sales price for Furby was $35 and became the must have toy of the 1998 holiday season. The resale price of Furbies was skyrocket to several hundred dollars as supply could not meet the demand. In a twelve month period, Furby would go off to sell over 27 million units. This would not be the last...