“You’re probably using a mouse today, but you may never buy one again. All the planets are aligning against this humble pointing device,” Mike Elgan writes for Datamation.
“The computer mouse has long been associated with the PC, but in fact it was invented during the Kennedy administration (in 1963) by Silicon Valley engineers Douglas Engelbart and Bill English,” Elgan writes.
“The mouse was nothing but a lab rat until the Xerox Star shipped in 1981. Though it was the first time anyone could buy a mouse, few did. The Star was overpriced ($16,000) and poorly marketed. The IBM PC came out that year, too — without a mouse. But when the Apple Macintosh hit in January of 1984, the mouse went mainstream and has been with us ever since,” Elgan writes.
Elgan continues, “Now, Gartner analyst Steve Prentice says the mouse’s dominance as the leading pointing devices may be over within 2 to 4 years. And I tend to agree. Several recent developments are slowly changing — or threaten to change — our mouse habit.”
1. Apple’s giant trackpad with multi-touch
2. Gaming pointing devices
3. “Brain-reading” devices
4. Apple iPhone and the “iPhone Killers”
Elgan writes, “I’m confident that Apple will take advantage of its many patents for ‘multi-touch’ systems and ship an iPhone-like version of Mac OS within the next year or two… So take the time to savor every point and every click. It won’t last. The mouse is as good as dead.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The Macintosh uses an experimental pointing device called a “mouse.” There is no evidence that people want to use these things. – John C. Dvorak, Feb 1984
[Thanks to Bill Cosby for inspiring the headline.]