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What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

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Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#61

Post by pjmlp »

underwater wrote: post #31
GuiA wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know students who have written essays, put together presentations, etc solely on their phones. If you really believe that the only thing “younger generations” do is post on social media, I suggest you spend more time around high schoolers (for example), particularly those with limited financial means.

I can’t imagine writing something much more substantial than a couple of paragraphs. Typing is fine, but editing is so slow without a mouse.

Here, how a kid in Africa used a Nokia feature phone doing T9 typing, before he could eventually get a job doing Android development.

https://hanselminutes.com/615/developing-on-not-for-a-nokia-...

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#62

Post by pjmlp »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #41
jaysonelliot wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPad that could rule the world hasn't been made yet. Once iOS and OS X completely merge, then we'll see. It's sized for creating things, but running the OS of a device made for consuming things.

It has been, it's called Microsoft Surface. It's sized for creating things and is running on the OS made for productive work. But it's expensive and made by a company that's not very much liked by people.

Well, the thing about liking Microsoft is pretty much regional, just like Apple's or Google's love.

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#63

Post by greglindahl »

sincerely wrote: post #47
greglindahl wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. As a highly educated person, I had no idea I was choosing inferior tools! Thanks for letting me know. I gave all my nieces and nephews tablets, and they all used them, I hope I didn’t destroy their lives. Seriously, I have a hard time believing you can quote any evidence that a paper book is much better than a tablet for everyone. Which appears to be your assertion, although it’s hard to tell.

books can last decades. an ipad absolutely won’t.

Undergraduates mostly have textbooks which change every couple of years. Also, electronic books that don't have DRM don't die when the device does.

I was physics/math and was lucky that my textbooks didn't change that rapidly, but still, it's a bit odd to claim that paper is the obvious choice for everyone based on widely varying circumstances.

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#64

Post by [deleted] »

axaxs wrote: post #50
greglindahl wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh. I read on a tablet all of the time, I guess that makes me a prisoner of hype! Minority view, yes.

Are you a k12 student? If not, why are you replying at all? Anyone who asserts that iPads are a good choice for education are completely out of touch at best, or ignorant at worst. I'm sorry if this borders on a personal attack, but it feels like you're just looking for a reason to be offended.

[deleted]

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#65

Post by GeekyBear »

SllX wrote: post #43
maxerickson wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he's well enough aware that the Mac was cheaper. For instance: https://www.forbes.com/sites/chunkamui/2017/04/04/7-steps-fo... It's not made very gracefully, but the point is that the Mac wasn't a big leap forward in capability, it was the consumer version of the thing they had working a decade earlier. Of course it's an open question what sort of computers Apple would have made if Jobs hadn't visited PARC.

It isn't any less an open question, but I think there's a good shot that Jef Raskin's original concept for the Macintosh would have made it to market under Apple's banner. Possibly the best look we'll ever get at the type of Human-Computer Interface he wanted to build is written down in "The Humane Interface", although I believe he did, and correct me if I'm wrong, develop a system for Canon that implemented some of…

Jef went to work for Canon after leaving Apple and created the Canon Cat which implemented his original vision.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_Cat

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#66

Post by alankay »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #7

> (the Mac was done in 1984, 11 years after the more powerful and capable Parc Alto, which started working in 1973). I find this comment mildly irritating. The Alto apparently cost $40k [1] in (or around) 1973, which was equivalent to $95k in 1984 (or $232k today). Compare with the Mac which cost $2.5k in 1984. Sure, the Alto may have been more powerful, but if it was financially out of reach of almost everybody, it'…

We understood Moore's Law, so it made sense in the early 70s to make a personal computer in 1973 that would have the power of much less expensive personal computers 10 or more years later. Why? Because the new SW and UI takes a lot of work to invent -- this allowed us to show Steve "the 80s" in 1979.

(Worth pondering this way of going about things.)

What was disappointing is that the market couldn't value personal computing, especially the general market. For example, the Lisa with its hard disk was really the better machine to be the flagship for Apple. In the early 80s it was priced at less than an average car -- ~$10K -- a mass market price if you could see that this would be your "information and speculation vehicle".

Instead, PCs could only be sold at consumer price levels, more or less as novelties and in business as spreadsheet machines -- and this forced the Mac to be much smaller (both in RAM and disk) so that it was more like a toy than a vehicle.

So, no, we (not I - I was part of a research community) did not underestimate the importance of economics. Note that my original Dynabook paper in 1972 said these would eventually be sold for the same price as color TV sets. But we did underestimate the ability of the early market to value computing.

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#67

Post by alankay »

gok wrote: post #49
bogomipz wrote: post #17

>"“Have I got a deal for you: a Honda with a one-quart gas tank!”. Steve did not like this memo, but what could he do given the history, and that it was quite true?" Can someone explain the joke? Also does anyone know how long Alan was with Apple?

I believe he left in 1997 when Jobs returned and Advanced Technology Group was shut down.

1996 before the return of Steve

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#68

Post by greglindahl »

schoen wrote: post #60
sincerely wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

books can last decades. an ipad absolutely won’t.

I have a printed book that's the same age as the U.S. constitution (now 231 years) and another printed book that's a few decades older (293 years), both of which are still completely legible. "Decades" feels like a big understatement to me. :-) We mostly think of paper as a poor archival medium because of a few decades, mainly at the end of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, when high-acid wood…

I've digitized a bunch of 16th century books so I (and everyone else, they're out of copyright) can read them on a tablet or whatever. Added a search function, too.

I am suggesting that claiming that one thing is best for everything and everyone is not true.

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#69

Post by cma »

alankay wrote: post #66
AceJohnny2 wrote: post #7

> (the Mac was done in 1984, 11 years after the more powerful and capable Parc Alto, which started working in 1973). I find this comment mildly irritating. The Alto apparently cost $40k [1] in (or around) 1973, which was equivalent to $95k in 1984 (or $232k today). Compare with the Mac which cost $2.5k in 1984. Sure, the Alto may have been more powerful, but if it was financially out of reach of almost everybody, it'…

We understood Moore's Law, so it made sense in the early 70s to make a personal computer in 1973 that would have the power of much less expensive personal computers 10 or more years later. Why? Because the new SW and UI takes a lot of work to invent -- this allowed us to show Steve "the 80s" in 1979. (Worth pondering this way of going about things.) What was disappointing is that the market couldn't value personal co…

> In the early 80s it was priced at less than an average car -- ~$10K -- a mass market price if you could see that this would be your "information and speculation vehicle".

A car is a major purchase and people keep them for years or get significant resale value out of them. Moore's law would mean Lisa would be rapidly devalued. For businesses that could justify it generating $x amount of revenue in that time it could make sense. For individuals at the time I'm not sure.

That's not to say people don't spend extravagant amounts on cars beyond the base level of needed functionality. I just can't think of too many purchases at that level that get obsolete so quickly.

Re: What did Alan Kay and Steve Jobs talk about at the 2007 iPhone keynote?

#70

Post by schtitt »

make3 wrote: post #48
TeMPOraL wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Education is not about just reading, but regardless - you know what's better for reading than an iPad? A paper book . And if your concern is weight, you know what combines the best qualities of a paper book and a tablet? An e-book reader with e-Ink display. (This is sad, really. As I understand, e-Ink tech is patented to death, so there's little progress there.) Still, I'm not saying iPads are useless in general. The…

- e-ink has garbage level latency, which makes it useless for anything even slightly dynamic, including educational videos of course - e-ink doesn't have color, color is helpful in educational material to make it friendly and accessible - there are outlets everywhere, so unless you're going camping, the battery life is not that big of an advantage, more of a slight convenience thing all of these points are why tablet…

The ReMarkable has, by some black magic, managed to reduce the latency by quite a lot compared to, say, a Kindle.
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