Macintosh Folklore Radio

Steven Levy on why Macintosh developers aren’t scared of Claris, the software company backed by Apple Computer. Original text from Macworld Magazine, June 1992. ClarisWorks and other seemingly Macintosh-only products did indeed ship on Windows. Claris’ first product on Windows: Hollywood. Press coverage. A big thank you to Blake Patterson of The Byte Cellar for preserving the Claris promotional video heard in this episode. Watch the full VHS video on YouTube.

Andy Hertzfeld’s first task as an employee of Apple Computer. Original text from folklore.org.

The story of how “the best-loved application for the Mac” took on Microsoft Works as told by programmer [Bob Hearn in 2003][bob]. Read Macworld’s roundup of integrated packages to see how ClarisWorks 1.0 stacked up against its competition. Watch Symantec GreatWorks in action courtesy of hirudov2d on YouTube: Version 1.0.1, 2.0.1 Watch Bob Hearn talking about AlphaGo starting at 4m50s.

Steve Jobs temporarily forbid the Macintosh team from working with Sony. Original text from folklore.org. Bill Gates Twiggy drive clip from All Things D5, 2007, 3m54s. Alternate source.

The FBI’s attempted investigation of the nuPrometheus League. I wish there was a dramatic conclusion to this 1990 editorial, but we’ve heard nothing from the nuPrometheus League since their first and only dispatch. Original text from Macworld Magazine, September 1990.

The early days of Apple’s culture of secrecy. If you had people digging through the garbage bins outside your corporate headquarters, you would be paranoid too! Original text from Macworld Magazine, November 1989. Introductory news clip from The Computer Chronicles with bonus crazy background saxophone for some reason. Hugo Fiennes quote from the Computer History Museum’s iPhone development team panel discussion. Steve Jobs’ “Super Secret Apple Rumours” podcast from the MWSF 2006 GarageBand demo. Alleged insider comments on the damage Apple’s internal secrecy has done to Mac OS X at Michael Tsai’s blog, one of the few Macintosh news sources worth reading these days.

Steven Levy on a little-known Macintosh clone project from 1989. Original text from Macworld Magazine, April 1989. Our sponsor for April 1st: The Mac Zone!

Is it too late for Apple’s lightweight laptops? Steven Levy’s summary of the awkward PowerBook Duo situation. Original text from Macworld Magazine, December 1993. PowerBook Duo commercials courtesy of the RetroMacCast on YouTube (1, 2). Watch the Duo and Dock in action (insert, eject). PowerBook Duo commercial in Swedish Titanium PowerBook G4 introduction at Macworld San Francisco 2001 12-inch PowerBook G4 introduction at Macworld San Francisco 2003 MacBook Air introduction at Macworld San Francisco 2008

David Pogue reviews the PowerBook Duo 210/230 and the companion Duo Dock. NuBus and SCSI weren’t hot pluggable, meaning you had to shut down the machine every time you docked or undocked! Original text from Macworld Magazine, March 1993. PowerBook Duo Dock sounds courtesy of the RetroMacCast on YouTube (insert, eject).

Happy Birthday, Macintosh! Andy Hertzfeld and company rush to complete the first release of the Macintosh system software, then cobble together a demo before launch day. Original text at folklore.org: Real Artists Ship, It Sure Is Great To Get Out of That Bag, and The Times They Are A-Changin’ Make your own four-voice 256-byte wavetable music, sine wavey or otherwise, with ConcertWare or MusicWorks. Andy Hertzfeld “six person hours of testing” quote from his 2005 NerdTV interview. (video, transcript) The entire January 24th, 1984 Apple Shareholders Meeting on YouTube. Try Software Automatic Mouth in your browser or Macintalk in Mini vMac. A Macintalk mini-documentary.

Two interviews with StuffIt creator Raymond Lau, conducted during Apple’s darkest days (Maclopedia 1996, AppleWizards 1998). StuffIt Deluxe 2.0 review. Yes, people were already complaining about software bloat in 1991. Raymond’s personal website Raymond’s palmpilotfiles/palmcentral.com Raymond’s PhD Dissertation: “Subword Lexical Modelling for Speech Recognition” Today, Leonard Rosenthol is a PDF Architect at Adobe. StuffIt End-of-Life Announcement Michael Dell’s “appearance” at November 1997 Steve Jobs Keynote Barry Diller Wikipedia claims PackIt III development stopped after Harry Chesley went to work at Apple. Rumor Monger, part of Harry Chesley’s output in Apple’s Advanced Technology Group

The story behind Apple’s big RISC. Written by Steven Levy, The Iconoclast, Macworld, May/June 1994. Watch a special Christmas message from MFR. The Alberta Goat Breeders Association (and the reason for linking to them) Half-Moon Bay Review article on Jack McHenry Apple’s extremely terrible internal marketing video for the Power Mac The Digital Antiquarian’s take on the PowerPC transition Gary Davidian Oral History (video 1, 2; transcript 1, 2) Richard Lary’s highly entertaining (but not Mac- or PowerPC-related) career highlights (video, transcript) Metrowerks CodeWarrior for PowerPC was ready in late 1993. Eat that, Symantec! CPUShack: A look back at the Motorola 88000 family The Computer Chronicles visits the Somerset Design Center Andy Bechtolsheim on Motorola’s slow development cycle (CHM video, transcript) Rich Siegel: interview podcast with iMore and The Mac Observer; Apple’s “Meet the Developer” on Rich; Rich on Twitter, still developing for the Mac 36 years on Intro from Power Mac Reseller

A shakeup in Apple II engineering frees up Andy Hertzfeld to work on the Macintosh. Original text from folklore.org. Jef Raskin and Andy Hertzfeld audio excerpts from “The Macintosh at 20” panel hosted at Macworld Boston 2004. Highly recommended!

The Newton MessagePad soap opera from product launch to cancellation, and all that could have been. Check out “Love Notes to Newton” for even more history, interviews, and a great soundtrack. The director, Noah Leon, was interviewed on embedded.fm #262 and the RetroMacCast #440. Steve Jobs quotes: WWDC 1997, EDUCAUSE 1998, Borg-like compliance and audience hissing at Internet Explorer at MWNY 1998 Hermann Hauser on Intel inadvertently inspiring the ARM: video, transcript Avie Tevanian on the business decision we didn’t want to hear: direct quote, video (1, 2), transcript (1, 2) Bob Supnik on Dan Dobberpuhl’s brilliant StrongARM: video (1, 2), transcript (1, 2) On the memory leak that caused higher than normal recognition failure rates in early OS releases: “I can’t even get my unit to recognize the word ‘Newton’”

The very first image displayed on the very first prototype Macintosh, an Apple II expansion card with a Motorola 6809E. Original text at folklore.org. Audio excerpts from Andy Hertzfeld’s keynote speech at the O’Reilly Open Source Convention (OSCON) 2000. Listen to the full keynote, preserved in 2004 by yours truly from a long-gone RealAudio streaming server.

“Mask ROM” means something a little different in 2020. E-mail your article and topic suggestions to derek at macfolkloreradio.com.

Surf the Web, deal with e-mail, crunch spreadsheets, write real documents, and keep your life together with this 1.4-pound wonder. Written by Jeff Pittelkau, MacUser June 1997. Text available in HTML and ePub.

Of Newton and Magic Link, Marco and Envoy. The Newton and its competition continue to make progress… sort of. Written by Steven Levy, The Iconoclast, Macworld April 1995. Text available in HTML and ePub.

Newton will be great if it can live down its beginnings. Written by Steven Levy, The Iconoclast, Macworld January 1994. Text available in HTML and ePub. Audio from the Newton TV Commercial Collection.

From the days before flash ROM and easy firmware updates, the tale of Landon Dyer’s accidental inspiration for what to do when your ROMs are truly read-only. Non-techies may wish to skip the middle bit and go straight to Landon’s Newton post-mortem at 12m10s. Original text from dadhacker.com. Intro audio clip from Michael Tchao at the Apple User Group Breakfast, Boston MacWorld 1993. Patch talk from the Q&A section at 1h23m25s. Outro audio clip of Steve Capps (ex-Newton) and Donna Dubinsky, former CEO of Palm and ex-Claris VP, from the Computer History Museum’s Computing In Your Pocket panel discussion.