September 6, 1995: The newly launched Windows 95 operating system dominates software sales, sending virtually every other company scurrying for cover — Apple included.
After launching Windows 95 at the end of August, Microsoft sells a massive 1.63 million copies of the $85 PC operating system by early September, according to excited analysts. It represents a massive triumph for Apple’s biggest rival of the 1990s.
Sizzling sales for Windows 95
“Early Windows 95 sales sizzle,” said the September 6 edition of Computer Reseller News, summing up the excitement.
While sales started to fall after the two-week mark, it’s hard to overstate just how big Windows 95 seemed at the time of its launch. For the operating system’s debut, Microsoft went into marketing overdrive — even paying to light up New York City’s Empire State Building in Microsoft colors.
It became apparent from the start that Windows 95 would be big. But by the time news stories began to roll out at the end of its second week, the updated Windows operating system was clearly a juggernaut.
Suddenly, Mac OS faces competition
The unexpectedly successful launch of Windows 95 proved a major blow to Apple’s psyche, as Microsoft delivered what many had feared: an OS close enough to Apple’s Mac OS to represent a threat.
“Microsoft was delivering a ‘look and feel’ which, while we threw rocks and said, ‘It’s not as good as ours,’ there was a fear that it was good enough that everybody who used Macs because they were easier to use, would then be able to say that Windows was just as easy,” said Mitch Stein, Apple’s former director of human interfaces, when I talked to him while researching my book The Apple Revolution.
Brad Silverberg, who started his career at Apple as a programmer on the Lisa computer, led the development of Windows 95. “I thought it was essentially game over for Apple,” Silverberg told me, recalling his thoughts about Microsoft’s hit operating system. “I didn’t see how they could compete.”
How Windows 95 inspired Apple
Inside Apple, the company attempted to deal with the massive success of the Windows 95 launch. Unfortunately, this didn’t turn out to be as straightforward as hoped. Development of Copland OS, Apple’s long-awaited update to the Mac‘s aging System 7, sputtered to a halt. (Copland never shipped to more than a handful of developers.)
In Copland’s place, Apple management began looking around for something to replace it. What they eventually settled on was an operating system developed at NeXT, the company founded by Steve Jobs after he left Apple.
A deal took a while to work out. However, by September 1997, Apple bought NeXT and Jobs came back to Apple.
Ultimately, the launch of Windows 95 — which looked like a guaranteed Apple-killer — spurred Cupertino to greater heights than ever.
Which computer system, if any, were you using in 1995? Leave your comments below.
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
2 responses to “Today in Apple history: Raging success of Windows 95 makes Cupertino worry”
I don’t know that I would make this a run-for-cover moment. For those who knew nothing about the Mac and MacOS 7, it was an utterly mind-blowing release. Windows 3.1, released just a few years earlier, was the first version of Windows that worked well enough to cause a stampede from DOS to Windows and to attract the attention of consumers. 3.1 was insanely clunky. It was an absolute horror show. When Apple released System 7 – that was an industry-changer and this had Microsoft’s complete attention. It was System 7 that fueled the development of 95. When Windows 95 came out it was such a leap forward from Windows 3.1 that it rocked the Windows world.
Windows users, who were almost universally unfamiliar with System 7, were convinced that 95 was the best OS on earth. Side-by-side comparisons totally shut down 95, but Apple didn’t bother to tell any one, and Apple-bashers had a field day – perpetuating all sorts of false claims and baseless attacks.
The fact is that while Windows 95 was a big step in the right direction, the execution was so awful that it was a huge pain in the neck. After three years MS released Windows 98, which fixed most of the bugs. That was the first time since DOS that MS had a truly usable system.
Naturally, Apple saw 95 as MS nipping at its ankles, but the main focus was on System 8 and then System 9. The huge misfire of the Copland leviathan did begin after the introduction of 95, but it was not until 98 that Apple reached its most frantic peak – fixing one thing resulting in breaking fifty other things – that resulted in the decision to buy a competing OS and adapt it for the Mac.
I’ve been an iOS developer for 9 years, but back then Windows 95 booting to Linux for web work and DOS for games was where it was at. I worked in a small startup with 3 Mac guys, and all I heard was duck quacks and swearing from their offices.
Then in 1996 quake came out, and the whole building would have a LAN party after work – except the Mac guys, who were always like ‘wow wtf!’.