Tech blog Gizmodo has created an interactive museum in New York City to pay homage to the 80 coolest gadgets from today and years past. The Gizmodo Gallery, open September 23-27, features high-tech new inventions alongside some “off the beaten path” electronics and devices from decades ago. CNNMoney chose a six of their favorites, two of which mention Apple:
• First Apple Macintosh (1984): Long before the “I’m a Mac/I’m a PC” battle, Apple launched the first commercially successful personal computer with a graphics-based interface. The 1984 Macintosh, released on Jan. 24 for $2,500, was a revolutionary new device that shook the tech world. Instead of entering computer commands made up of rows of text and numbers to run the device, users could operate the Mac with a mouse — the first ever — to click on the screen’s images.
To launch the Mac, Ridley Scott directed a now-famous commercial aptly titled “1984” — a nod to George Orwell’s famous dystopian novel. The $1.5 million spot featured a blonde woman with a picture of the new Macintosh on her white tank top, smashing a screen meant to represent Big Brother. The ad was hailed as a marketing “watershed event” and helped set the tone for Apple’s long reign.
• Apple touchscreen and tablet prototypes (1980s): These two designs never made it to market, but they continue to inspire Apple’s products. First, industrial designer Hartmut Esslinger — who actually assembled the Gizmodo Gallery — developed a monochrome touch screen computer that could be operated with a stylus. These days it looks a lot like a precursor to the iPhone and iPod touch. Esslinger had been working for Sony when his work caught the eye of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, who offered the designer an eye-popping $1 million contract. In the process of creating the touch screen, Esslinger also developed the “Snow White design,” an aesthetic motif characterized by the machine’s off-white color and a shape framed by horizontal and vertical lines. The design was ultimately applied to all Apple products from 1984 to 1990.
Esslinger also used the Snow White design to create a tablet computer for Apple, which has yet to see the light of day. Rumors have swirled for months that Apple will roll out a touch screen tablet PC that can run on a 3G network. The blogosphere says we can expect to see an Apple tablet computer in stores by early 2010 — but Esslinger saw it in his mind’s eye decades ago.
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Lurker_PC” for the heads up.]