The Apple Newton was an innovative and cutting-edge product both during its lifetime (1993-1998) as well as today, almost ten years after its demise. With features like handwriting recognition, virtual keyboards, and an effective portable OS, the Newton was a breakthrough for the 90's and still at par or above some of the smartphones on the market today.Despite a glowing reception by consumers and Apple loyalists, the product failed and the idea of a tablet/PDA/phone was not resurrected by Apple until a few months ago with their announcement of the upcoming iPhone.
There're several reasons why the Newton failed. Some say the market was not ready for this kind of product while others argue that Apple was just not ready to integrate a non-computer product into their portfolio. When the product was first released, many saw the Newton as a competitor rather than a complement to the burgeoning laptop market. Basically, the product was too good. From Wikipedia,
"The Newton project's broad vision fell victim to project slippage, feature creep, and a growing fear that it would interfere with Macintosh sales. It was reinvented as a PDA which would be a complementary Macintosh peripheral instead of a stand-alone computer which might compete with the Macintosh."
Today, Apple and the market have evolved dramatically. Whether or not each is ready for the Newton's successor is something we'll see decided in the next few months.
Hey, there's a guy here on campus (Peter Miller) who works at the Center for Better Health. He was at Apple at the time of the Newton. Maybe we should invite him in to tell us all about it. He said that there are still "nuts" out there who use Newtons.
ReplyDeleteI hope the folks in Cupertino are working on a cross between the Newton and the sexy MacBook Pros of today. The only thing I wish my Mac had was a stylus to use it like a tablet... if they introduced the new NewtonMacBook I would be all over it.
ReplyDeletethat would be awesome. we were actually at the center for better health on friday for an MIP simulation. Do you have Peter Miller's email address? If not, I might be able to get it from Nancy.
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