4 ms·

How Steve Jobs acquired the mouse and GUI (video)

41 points by ukdm 15y ago

melling 15y ago
Wonder why the story for decades was that Apple stole it from Xerox then Microsoft stole it from Apple while developing for the Mac? For most of my life, that's the story people would say to me.
- mrsebastian 15y ago
  'Stole' is just standard fanboy/zealot terminology. As we all know, technology is all about sharing, borrowing, and building on top of other innovations.
- nirvana 15y ago
  Because, for decades, Apple haters have been curiously following the strategy of claiming that Apple is not innovative at all, and thus, by "stealing" from Xerox, it justifies Microsoft's theft of the UI. The fact that Apple compensated Xerox with pre-IPO stock, and more importantly, had a license agreement from Xerox, and even more importantly, Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. In fact, it was only a couple months ago, on this very site, where a bunch of fandroids were attacking Apple on this same issue, and despite responding, with a citation to the real story, showing that Apple had licensed the technology, I was down voted to oblivion and repeatedly people asserted I was wrong (yep, just asserted.) I remember one, memorable response: "Just stop, its been widely accepted by us that Apple stole the GUI from Xerox". Its rare that someone uses the popularity of a myth as justification for its truth, but there it was.) Already, the same people are claiming that multi-touch has existed for years before the iPhone, and pointing to single-touch panels of the crossed wired style, or stylus driven interfaces as "proof". From this I conclude that most people who oppose patents and innovation do not understand technology well enough, or do not have any engineering background, and thus cannot tell the difference between two sheets of plastic with a grid of intersecting wires where pressure causes the wires to connect, and a capacitive touch panel, that maps out the shape of each picture, uses an accelerometer to determine the orientation of the device and then figures out which finger of the hand is touching it and thus from that, which pixel in the amorphous blob of contact the user is intending to touch. To them, they're both the same, and thus Apple's not innovative because its all been done before, and we should shut down the patent system. I just wouldn't expect that kind of ignorance on a site dedicated to High Tech Startups where, you pretty much have to have at least one founder who knows how to write software.
  - recoiledsnake 15y ago
    >The fact that Apple compensated Xerox with pre-IPO stock, and more importantly, had a license agreement from Xerox, and even more importantly, Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. kenjackson's comment is pretty insightful in this regard. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3206454 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3206454
    - afterburner 15y ago
      So, it was because Xerox PARC was using a mouse + GUI interface that Apple went in that direction. In other words, what everyone thought before.
  - cooldeal 15y ago
    Fandroids? Wow, had to check if I was on Reddit. >From this I conclude that most people who oppose patents and innovation do not understand technology well enough, or do not have any engineering background, and thus cannot tell the difference between two sheets of plastic with a grid of intersecting wires where pressure causes the wires to connect, and a capacitive touch panel, that maps out the shape of each picture, uses an accelerometer to determine the orientation of the device and then figures out which finger of the hand is touching it and thus from that, which pixel in the amorphous blob of contact the user is intending to touch. Are you claiming that Apple invented capacitative touch? > Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. Are you for real?
  - wmf 15y ago
    The history of multitouch isn't easily summarized, but I see capacitive multitouch in 1985 and then again in 1998: http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html
  - agumonkey 15y ago
    Funny note aside, Apple GUI Regions were added by Atkinson based on what Jobs thought he saw on the PARC system. Turns out this was kinda imaginary (IIRC) .. it's all a wonderful mistake build on faith, passion and Atkinson insights.
- smackfu 15y ago
  I heard Apple copied Xerox, and Microsoft copied Apple, rather than stole. The funny thing is that Apple always felt justified in their copying, when they really just they pulled a fast one on the Xerox HQ people who didn't know what they had in PARC. I think it was probably the PARC people who first considered that Apple stole all their ideas.
- pconf 15y ago
  Before the Mac there was the Lisa, also an Apple product, which had a GUI. Before the Lisa there was Sun (suntools, sunview). Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI and when Apple sued Microsoft the judge threw it out based on the obvious (Xerox, Sun, ...).
  - greyish_water 15y ago
    Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI That's disingenuous. Apple v. Microsoft stemmed from their existing licensing agreement. It also didn't claim "ownership of the GUI", but tried to assert copyright over the "look and feel" of the Macintosh UI specifically.
    - pconf 15y ago
      Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found, those are the facts.
      - greyish_water 15y ago
        Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. I'm not going to engage you on this, because I don't know what it has to do with anything I wrote. You seem to have just jumped on the idea that I'm trying to have some kind of stupid fanboy argument with you. I wasn't. I was trying to point out that your description omitted a relevant fact: saying "Nobody but Apple sued another company..." has a different interpretation when the actual basis of the suit is considered. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial... The existing licensing agreement was why they sued in the first place and one of the main reasons the courts cited in the rulings. It can't possibly be immaterial: it's central to their case! You make it sound like they just came out of nowhere and claimed to own all GUIs or something, but the actual case revolved around the existing licensing agreement and the (then untested) claim that "look and feel" as a whole was subject to copyright. *...as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found..." That's not what the court found, though! Yes, Apple lost the case (rightly), but it was on the basis that most of what they claimed was subject to the prior licensing agreement and that the broader "look and feel" wasn't copyright-able at all, by anybody. Not even Xerox.

41 points by ukdm 15y ago

Wonder why the story for decades was that Apple stole it from Xerox then Microsoft stole it from Apple while developing for the Mac? For most of my life, that's the story people would say to me.

mrsebastian 15y ago
'Stole' is just standard fanboy/zealot terminology. As we all know, technology is all about sharing, borrowing, and building on top of other innovations.
nirvana 15y ago
Because, for decades, Apple haters have been curiously following the strategy of claiming that Apple is not innovative at all, and thus, by "stealing" from Xerox, it justifies Microsoft's theft of the UI. The fact that Apple compensated Xerox with pre-IPO stock, and more importantly, had a license agreement from Xerox, and even more importantly, Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. In fact, it was only a couple months ago, on this very site, where a bunch of fandroids were attacking Apple on this same issue, and despite responding, with a citation to the real story, showing that Apple had licensed the technology, I was down voted to oblivion and repeatedly people asserted I was wrong (yep, just asserted.) I remember one, memorable response: "Just stop, its been widely accepted by us that Apple stole the GUI from Xerox". Its rare that someone uses the popularity of a myth as justification for its truth, but there it was.) Already, the same people are claiming that multi-touch has existed for years before the iPhone, and pointing to single-touch panels of the crossed wired style, or stylus driven interfaces as "proof". From this I conclude that most people who oppose patents and innovation do not understand technology well enough, or do not have any engineering background, and thus cannot tell the difference between two sheets of plastic with a grid of intersecting wires where pressure causes the wires to connect, and a capacitive touch panel, that maps out the shape of each picture, uses an accelerometer to determine the orientation of the device and then figures out which finger of the hand is touching it and thus from that, which pixel in the amorphous blob of contact the user is intending to touch. To them, they're both the same, and thus Apple's not innovative because its all been done before, and we should shut down the patent system. I just wouldn't expect that kind of ignorance on a site dedicated to High Tech Startups where, you pretty much have to have at least one founder who knows how to write software.
- recoiledsnake 15y ago
  >The fact that Apple compensated Xerox with pre-IPO stock, and more importantly, had a license agreement from Xerox, and even more importantly, Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. kenjackson's comment is pretty insightful in this regard. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3206454 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3206454
  - afterburner 15y ago
    So, it was because Xerox PARC was using a mouse + GUI interface that Apple went in that direction. In other words, what everyone thought before.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  Fandroids? Wow, had to check if I was on Reddit. >From this I conclude that most people who oppose patents and innovation do not understand technology well enough, or do not have any engineering background, and thus cannot tell the difference between two sheets of plastic with a grid of intersecting wires where pressure causes the wires to connect, and a capacitive touch panel, that maps out the shape of each picture, uses an accelerometer to determine the orientation of the device and then figures out which finger of the hand is touching it and thus from that, which pixel in the amorphous blob of contact the user is intending to touch. Are you claiming that Apple invented capacitative touch? > Xerox didn't' have the GUI to steal (that being an invention of Apple made based on being awakened to the possibility by Xerox) is still ignored or claimed to be false, even here on hacker news. Are you for real?
- wmf 15y ago
  The history of multitouch isn't easily summarized, but I see capacitive multitouch in 1985 and then again in 1998: http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html http://www.billbuxton.com/multitouchOverview.html
- agumonkey 15y ago
  Funny note aside, Apple GUI Regions were added by Atkinson based on what Jobs thought he saw on the PARC system. Turns out this was kinda imaginary (IIRC) .. it's all a wonderful mistake build on faith, passion and Atkinson insights.
smackfu 15y ago
I heard Apple copied Xerox, and Microsoft copied Apple, rather than stole. The funny thing is that Apple always felt justified in their copying, when they really just they pulled a fast one on the Xerox HQ people who didn't know what they had in PARC. I think it was probably the PARC people who first considered that Apple stole all their ideas.
pconf 15y ago
Before the Mac there was the Lisa, also an Apple product, which had a GUI. Before the Lisa there was Sun (suntools, sunview). Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI and when Apple sued Microsoft the judge threw it out based on the obvious (Xerox, Sun, ...).
- greyish_water 15y ago
  Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI That's disingenuous. Apple v. Microsoft stemmed from their existing licensing agreement. It also didn't claim "ownership of the GUI", but tried to assert copyright over the "look and feel" of the Macintosh UI specifically.
  - pconf 15y ago
    Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found, those are the facts.
    - greyish_water 15y ago
      Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. I'm not going to engage you on this, because I don't know what it has to do with anything I wrote. You seem to have just jumped on the idea that I'm trying to have some kind of stupid fanboy argument with you. I wasn't. I was trying to point out that your description omitted a relevant fact: saying "Nobody but Apple sued another company..." has a different interpretation when the actual basis of the suit is considered. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial... The existing licensing agreement was why they sued in the first place and one of the main reasons the courts cited in the rulings. It can't possibly be immaterial: it's central to their case! You make it sound like they just came out of nowhere and claimed to own all GUIs or something, but the actual case revolved around the existing licensing agreement and the (then untested) claim that "look and feel" as a whole was subject to copyright. *...as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found..." That's not what the court found, though! Yes, Apple lost the case (rightly), but it was on the basis that most of what they claimed was subject to the prior licensing agreement and that the broader "look and feel" wasn't copyright-able at all, by anybody. Not even Xerox.