Andy Hertzfeld

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Today in Apple history: Radius kicks off clone Mac era in style

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Radius was the first company to launch an official Macintosh clone, the Radius System 100.
Radius was the first company to launch an official Macintosh clone.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

March 27: Today in Apple history: Radius kicks off clone Mac era in style with System 100 computer March 27, 1995: The Radius System 100, the first official Macintosh clone, launches.

A high-end computer made by a company founded by several notable Macintosh alumni, this marvelous machine kicks off the era of clone Macs in grand fashion. However, it won’t be long until things take a turn for the worse.

Today in Apple history: Macintosh 512K, aka the ‘Fat Mac,’ quadruples the memory

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Apple Mac
The "Fat Mac" solved one of the original Mac's biggest problems.
Photo: Apple

September 10: Today in Apple history: Macintosh 512K, aka the 'Fat Mac,' quadruples the memory September 10, 1984: Apple ships the Macintosh 512K, the first upgrade to the first-gen Macintosh 128K.

Coming less than eight months after the original Macintosh, the 512K Mac makes no sweeping changes to the computer’s form factor. Instead, the big upgrade is quadrupling the RAM. This leads Apple fans to refer to the computer as the “Fat Mac.”

Today in Apple history: MultiFinder brings multitasking to Mac

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MultiFinder running on the Macintosh
MultiFinder let you switch between running applications from the Apple menu — you could even see two apps side by side on your desktop!
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac

August 11: Today in Apple history: MultiFinder brings multitasking to Mac August 11, 1987: MultiFinder brings the biggest software update to the Mac since its launch: multitasking with two apps on screen at once.

While MultiFinder brings an undeniable boost to the Macintosh’s technical capabilities, it is built on a shaky foundation that soon will begin to show its age.

General Magic trailer gives peek into one of Silicon Valley’s most influential startups

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0CC94C75-E155-4BEC-BA3B-4D2051B913FD
The smartphone that never was.
Photo: Spellbound Productions

The documentary about the most important tech company you’ve never heard of is nearly ready to hit the big screen.

General Magic, a ‘90s startup created by some of the best minds at Apple, is getting the documentary treatment it deserves and the trailer is finally here.

Check it out:

General Magic tells story of Apple spinoff that almost changed the world

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General Magic documentary tells story of the iPhone that never was!
The iPhone that never was!
Photo: Spellbound Productions

How do you follow a project like the Macintosh? A high-flying Apple spinoff called General Magic tried to answer that question in the early 1990s.

After revolutionizing the personal computer, a team of ambitious ex-Apple engineers set out to build a connected touchscreen mobile device that prefigured the iPhone by 25 years. Their startup, General Magic, became one of the hottest ventures in Silicon Valley — before it all came crashing down.

“That period is one of the most important in computing history,” Sarah Kerruish, co-director of new documentary General Magic, told Cult of Mac. “It’s when handhelds were first realized, and when we saw the first early stages of the internet. General Magic combines these profoundly important threads in technology.”

7 reasons Steve Jobs failed to meet its early Oscars buzz

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Aaron Sorkin’s Steve Jobs movie is coming to Netflix
Steve Jobs wasn't the movie many fans hoped for.
Photo: François Duhamel/©2015 Universal Studios

It’s the Oscars this weekend, and if you’re an Apple fan, one question that lingers in the mind is what exactly happened to all the early awards buzz for Aaron Sorkin and Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs biopic.

Initially hailed as one of 2015’s crowning cinematic achievements, the movie bombed at the box office and even registered on some “worst movies of the year” lists. Although it has picked up Oscar nominations for Best Actor and Supporting Actress (Michael Fassbender and Kate Winslet), the movie failed to get put forward for Best Picture, while Sorkin was also a notable absence in the Best Adapted Screenplay category.

Having now seen Steve Jobs three times (twice at the theater and once on Blu-ray), here are my thoughts on why the flick was ultimately a disappointment.

Andy Hertzfeld: Steve Jobs movie is ‘almost nothing’ like reality

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The Woz (left) and Andy Hertzfeld (center) at an original Apple Computer Users Group meeting in the 80s. Photo: Tony Wills
Andy Hertzfeld (center) at an original Apple Computer Users Group meeting in the 80s.
Photo: Tony Wills

Next to Steve Jobs, Andy Hertzfeld is the name I most associate with the original Macintosh project. For that reason, Hertzfeld is one of the characters portrayed in the new Aaron Sorkin Steve Jobs movie, as well as someone who got to see an early unfinished cut of the film.

His take on it? That it’s almost nothing like reality in terms of the events portrayed — but a great movie all the same.

The problem with Becoming Steve Jobs? Too much Steve Jobs

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Becoming Steve Jobs
The world needs fresh insight into how Apple works, but you won't find much of that in Becoming Steve Jobs. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

One of Steve Jobs’ favorite recordings was The Beatles working on version after version of “Strawberry Fields Forever.”

The new Jobs biography, Becoming Steve Jobs, is like that recording: It serves up fresh takes on oft-told stories from Apple’s history, this time with more sugarcoating.

Sorkin’s Steve Jobs movie starts filling out cast with supporting roles

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The Woz (left) and Andy Hertzfeld (center) at an original Apple Computer Users Group meeting in the 80s. Photo: Tony Wills
The Woz (left) and Andy Hertzfeld (center) at an original Apple Computer Users Group meeting in the 80s. Photo: Tony Wills

Aaron Sorkin’s ill-fated Steve Jobs script is starting to actually become a reality, even after pretty much everything about the project was unearthed by the hacking of Sony Pictures.

After nailing down Michael Fassbender as Jobs and Seth Rogan to play Steve Wozniak, the film’s cast of supporting characters is starting to fill out.

Why Steve Jobs replaced the Mac’s  key with ⌘

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Screen Shot 2014-06-23 at 7.42.40 AM

Graphic designer Susan Kare is iconic — literally. The mastermind behind the friendly 32 x 32 and 16 x 16 icons used in the original Mac operating system, Kare’s work has reached more people than almost any other graphic designer on Earth.

Yet the way she stumbled into designing the icons for the Mac operating system was pretty much a lark, and in a recent presentation at the EG conference in California, Kare spoke a little bit about how she stumbled into the job.

It’s a fascinating talk, not just for the details she shares about early Mac operating system development, but also because Kare finally reveals why Apple switched from the Apple symbol to the Command key.

Fact vs. Fiction: Steve Wozniak, Dan Kottke & Andy Hertzfeld Discuss the Film Jobs

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John Wants Answers
John Vink interviews Steve Wozniak, Daniel Kottke and Andy Hertzfeld (photo: Jeff Lee)

The big screen biopic Jobs opened this summer to mixed reviews, primarily over the film’s lack of accuracy in depicting events from Steve Jobs life and Apple’s history. It’s not the first movie out about Jobs and it definitely won’t be the last as filmmakers strive to tell a celluloid version of the life of the mercurial Apple co-founder.

A lot of Apple old-timers have commented on the accuracy of the movie, but it took a Mountain View, CA local-access TV show called John Wants Answers to get Steve Wozniak, Daniel Kottke and Andy Hertzfeld together to dish fact from fiction. Host John Vink has a long history with the Cupertino company; he was an engineer at Apple from 1996 to 2012 and currently heads Macintosh desktop engineering for Nest Labs.

The two-hour discussion went through the film scene by scene, peppered with entertaining banter and some surprising recollections from the panel. Dan Kottke, who also worked as a script consultant on the movie, noted that “in making that film, it was a huge choice of where to start it and where to end it…I thought the movie did a pretty good job of getting the emotional notes right.”

Read on to know more about why no one ever got fired over kerning, had to ask what a Macintosh was and why you should watch TV movie Pirates of Silicon Valley.

Fact Versus Fiction

The general consensus was that events, dates, facts and fiction were occasionally conflated to tell a better story. Many scenes were partially correct, but key details were altered. Some events portrayed were complete fiction, and the chronology wasn’t always right.

One example is the story of the Apple I and the Homebrew Computer Club. In Jobs the film, a young Steve Jobs stumbles across Wozniak’s new creation – a computer with a keyboard and screen – and becomes mesmerized staring into the TV monitor. He then sells the idea of a computing revolution to a reluctant Woz and convinces his shy companion to bring his system to the Homebrew Computer Club.

Woz spoke at length about what really happened:

“Steve and I both had gone over to a friend’s house, Captain Crunch, John Draper of the old blue box phone phreaking fame,” recalled Wozniak. “He sat down at a terminal, a teletype, and he started typing. Then he began playing chess with a computer in Boston.” Woz and Jobs were dumbfounded.

“Whoa!” said Woz. I thought: “this is just like Pong. I have to have this ability.”

Woz got some chips, an expensive keyboard ($60 – uppercase only) and wired the thing into his TV set. “This was not a computer, this was a terminal,” said Woz, “But it was a very short step before that terminal just got a little addition that made it a computer.”

Soon Woz made those additions and while Jobs was off at college, he started going to the HomeBrew computer club. Every two weeks, Wozniak hauled his TV set in the car, set up everything on a table in the lobby and started programming in earnest. Soon crowds began gathering and he started showing off his creation.

The buzz was growing, so Woz recalled that during one time Jobs was back home, “I pulled him to the club and showed him all the people around me. And he got the idea that we could sell them. I would have given them away for free.” The HomeBrew computer club already was full of people who wanted to change the world and Woz wanted to help.

“This is the complete opposite of the movie,” interjected show host John Vink. “In the movie we had Steve Jobs trying to convince you [Woz] to come to HomeBrew and you said ‘Nah, I don’t wanna go.'”

“Oh no,” replied Wozniak, “I’d been there since day one.”

What’s a Macintosh?

The development of Lisa and Macintosh were seminal events for the future of Apple. The group concurred that the scene where the Lisa team was chewed out for not having multiple fonts in the word processor was complete fiction. Nobody was fired for a lack of typefaces or kerning, but they did note that a different engineer at Apple was fired around that same time for not wanting to undertake the effort to build a mouse for the system.

511px-Macintosh_128k_transparencyMany of the celluloid scenes did portray parts of events accurately, with dramatic effect added for flair. One clip included in the trailer portrays Jobs drafting a young Andy Hertzfeld for the Macintosh team. When Hertzfeld asks for more time to continue working on his Apple II project, Jobs yanks the computer off his desk and says “you’re working on the Macintosh team now.” Then a quick cut to Apple employee Bill Fernandez, who asks “What’s a Macintosh?”

Via email I asked the panel if that was how things really happened, or just good theater?

All three agreed that the Mac project was not a secret around Apple engineers and management at that time.

Nobody would ever have asked “What’s a Macintosh?” That line was just tossed in for dramatic effect, and Fernandez was actually working in Japan at that time. But Hertzfeld did confirm that he lost his computer in the transition.

“[Jobs] came by my desk and said “you’re working on the Mac now’,” said Hertzfeld. “I had just started this new OS for the Apple II, DOS 4.0… and I wanted to get it in good enough shape that someone else could take it over. Steve said ‘Are you kidding? The Apple II’s obsolete, the Apple II’s gonna be dead, you gotta work on the Mac!”

Hertzfeld pleaded for more time, but ultimately to no avail. “Then he unplugged my computer and carried it away. So I had no choice but to go after him!”

The Mac Failed Terribly

Some of the most animated discussion centered around Jobs departure from Apple in 1985 and the initial failure of the Macintosh project. They felt the movie didn’t accurately portray why Jobs was removed from the Mac team.

Woz: “The real situation was that the Mac failed terribly. Totally. We built a factory to build 50,000 of them and we were selling 500 a month. Steve had cancelled projects because they could only sell 2,000 a month.”

“I think he was taking it real hard that he’d failed for a third computer he’d tried to create and his vision really didn’t understand you have to build a market, it takes time, you aren’t going to sell 50,000 on day one. And meanwhile, we had to save the company.”

Jobs wanted to cancel or hamstring the Apple II in favor of the Macintosh, but it was important to continue selling and marketing the older system for a few more years. It generated most of the revenue. That was the primary business decision.

Hertzfeld chimed in: “I tell that story a little bit differently. The Mac did sell a lot of units initially, because of its novelty, because of its positive qualities. In June of 1984 it sold over 60,000 units. So they upped the forecast because Christmas was the big time and they thought they’d sell 80,000 units.”

But sales fell off steeply after the back-to-school rush in early fall, and by the end of the year sales were down to about 1,000 a month.

“When the Macs weren’t selling, a major mistake they made was trying to focus it on the office market,” recalled Hertzfeld. This was the time of the Lemmings commercial, a disastrous followup to the wildly successful 1984 spot. “The whole Macintosh Office thing never really got developed. The Mac needed a hard disk, that was really the biggest single design mistake that we made.”

Kottke: “And meanwhile Lisa had a hard drive.”

Woz: “Patience, patience, patience. Don’t put out a machine when it’s not a good enough machine for the price you’re selling this year. Work on it, work on it, work on it, and put it out when it is a good enough machine to sell at the price you’re offering.”

Steve Jobs and Apple clearly learned that lesson in the post-NeXT period.

Woz: “The Lisa was the right machine, with the right amount of RAM, but it was the wrong year for pricing. We finally got the Lisa back when we got OS X, actually, that’s what I like to say.”

Summing Things Up

The panel generally thought the that TV movie Pirates of Silicon Valley was a better portrayal of events of this period. Regarding Jobs, “there was no sense of suspense about this movie” said Wozniak. It didn’t show Steve’s thought process, how he reasoned and argued with people.

Hertzfeld noted that both movies had good acting, but Pirates had the better script. He felt that Jobs often felt like a laundry list of incidents instead of something which would show a deeper meaning.

Kottke said the producers of the film faced many decisions about what to put in and what to leave out, such as details about Pixar and NeXT. He said the filmmakers had tried very hard to get things right.

But one of Kottke’s most surprising memories might have been a quick quip to Woz: “Did you not love the Apple III? Because we all thought it was great!”

John Wants Answers 2
John Vink, Steve Wozniak, Daniel Kottke and Andy Hertzfeld wave goodbye (photo: Jeff Lee)

For more fascinating details, you can watch the entire two hour episode of John Wants Answers on YouTube. Source: John Wants Answers

Image: Photos: Jeff Lee

First Macintosh Praised By Its Creators In Rare Promo Video From 1983

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I bet you haven't seen this clip before.
I bet you haven't seen this clip before.

A rare Apple promotional video for the original Macintosh has surfaced online today, courtesy of one of the machine’s creators, Andy Hertzfeld. The one-minute clip, which was produced in 1983 by Chiat-Day, features members of the Macintosh team — including Hertzfeld, Bill Atkinson, Burrell Smith, and Mike Murray — who praise their product for its affordability, reliability, and more.