"Obsolete" is overstating it. You could do a lot with HyperCard. People did. Apple management started talking about cutting it pretty much immediately. It didn

"Obsolete" is overstating it. You could do a lot with HyperCard. People did. Apple management started talking about cutting it pretty much immediately. It didn't directly generate any revenue--Apple gave it away for free. It didn't fit into any familiar product category. It wasn't on anybody's list of must-have features. Basically, Apple management didn't understand what it was or why it existed. Apple's programmers and other makers were an entirely different matter. They used it for all sorts of things. So did third-party developers. So did people who discovered how to make software through working with HyperCard. Projects sprouted in Apple that either extended HyperCard or implemented new software in the same spirit with expanded capabilities--but all those projects had the same problem as HyperCard: management didn't see what they were supposed to be for. Furthermore, the other projects didn't benefit from Apple management's promise to Bill Atkinson that HyperCard would be given away to Apple customers. HyperCard's days were numbered from the beginning; that much is true. But to call it "obsolete" from the beginning misunderstands a lot.