I screamed a little when I saw these things on the new season of my favorite Apple TV+ show.
Category: Apple History
Quinn Nelson, on the TAM⇢
I love my 20th Anniversary Mac, but wow is it weird. My buddy Quinn got his hands on one and made a great video about the machine:
Clarus is Back in macOS Ventura
Clarus the Dogcow is my favorite bit of Apple lore. It’s really cool to see that our friend is back in the new version of macOS.
Did you know that with macOS Ventura, Clarus the Dogcow has at long last returned home? Recently, while doing something else, I accidentally hit Cmd+Shift+P which opened the Page Setup dialog. I was greeted, surprisingly, with a new high-resolution version of the classic Clarus icon that I’d never seen before. I looked at it briefly, and then closed the dialog and went back to whatever I was doing before. I had assumed that because I’d been in a 3rd-party app at the time, that the Clarus icon was just some easter egg the developer had left. But a little while later, I got to thinking. What were the chances that someone went to the trouble of customizing the Page Setup dialog, of all things, just for an easter egg? Zero, it turns out. That dialog shows Clarus on the page preview in every app.
Signed-by-Woz Apple 1 Sells at Auction⇢
The fully-functioning example went for big money:
Sold for $340,100! A great outcome for us and for the new owner, an experienced vintage computer collector and Apple aficionado in the United States!
— The AAPL Collection (@AAPLcollection) June 12, 2022
New HIG, Who Dis⇢
Apple has totally overhauled its Human Interface Guidelines:
Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) is a comprehensive resource for designers and developers looking to create great experiences across Apple platforms. Now, it’s been fully redesigned and refreshed to meet your needs — from your first sketch to the final pixel.
The whole thing looks great, but I’m a little sad it can’t be easily downloaded, like say the 1987 edition of the HIG.
Einstein⇢
Speaking of the Newton, if you want to emulate one on a Mac, this application is the way to do it. The newest version has added support for printing.
Newton Turns 30⇢
Twenty Years Ago, Steve Jobs Held a Funeral for Mac OS 9
At WWDC in May 2002, Apple said goodbye to the classic Mac OS in a weird and wonderful way:
Philip Michaels wrote about it Macworld:
Steve Jobs wore black Monday, and not just because that’s the Apple CEO’s usual sartorial color of choice. Instead, Jobs donned his trademark black mock turtleneck to preside over a funeral for Mac OS 9.
Inside the iPod⇢
Harry McCracken has a cool article out about Lumafield, a company that is working to reinvent CT scans, and Tony Fadell, the father of the iPod.
The HP iPods
In addition to the Harry Potter iPod and the U2 iPod, there is another special edition iPod that was a little … less special.
Let’s talk about the HP iPod.
Mmmm, Brushed Metal and Windows XP…
I always like referring to Apple’s press releases when looking at historic products or announcements. This time, the dateline includes something a bit unusual:
LAS VEGAS, Consumer Electronics Show, January 8, 2004
The U2 iPod
Over the span of two decades, Apple made a bunch of iPods. The original may have been just a single 5 GB player delivering 1,000 songs in your pocket, but the line spread from there to meet the needs of many more users. The iPod mini, iPod shuffle, iPod nano, iPod photo, iPod classic and iPod touch all enjoyed time on store shelves.
A couple of special-edition iPods were created, such as the Harry Potter Collector’s iPod released in 2005.
Apple Discontinues the iPod touch⇢
Apple PR has announced that the iPod touch will be for sale as long as supplies last:
Since its introduction over 20 years ago, iPod has captivated users all over the world who love the ability to take their music with them on the go. Today, the experience of taking one’s music library out into the world has been integrated across Apple’s product line — from iPhone and Apple Watch to iPad and Mac — along with access to more than 90 million songs and over 30,000 playlists available via Apple Music.