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And Steve Jobs Invented Computers

June 19th, 2012

I was reading up on the new Microsoft tablet, and found this paragraph in a story from one of the major networks:

The company has been hit and miss in the hardware market, and when the company misses, it does so epically — remember the Zune? But Microsoft’s hardware successes have become billion-dollar innovations, such as the Xbox or the mouse, which Microsoft pioneered.

Yes. Microsoft pioneered the mouse.

Forget about Douglas Engelbart inventing it in the 60’s. Forget about Xerox being the first major company to design a GUI computer using one. Forget about Apple being the first to successfully deploy it, putting it in the public consciousness. Forget about Microsoft not even being in the hardware business until much, much later.

The Xbox has seen success, but if you pile up Microsoft’s successes and failures in hardware, it’s kind of hard not to notice the dominance of the latter category.

Then I saw who published the story. If they get everything else wrong, why not this? Small wonder they don’t allow comments on their stories….

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  1. Troy
    June 19th, 2012 at 12:36 | #1


    shows how Microsoft had MS Word 1.0 that worked with the Microsoft Mouse in 1983.

    Microsoft was given one of the first Macs in 1982 so they could start development on their apps.

    Gates was first shown the Mac in 1981:


    Gates had hired Simonyi from PARC by then and Simonyi had plenty of experience with the WIMP metaphor.

    What Microsoft was missing prior to 1990 was the graphical part of the GUI, not the mouse.

  2. Troy
    June 19th, 2012 at 12:51 | #2

    wow, Apple demoed the Mac to Gates just immediately prior to the release of the IBM PC (August ’81).

    Goes to show how different things were in 1981, Apple vs. Microsoft.

    Apple had sold 80,000 Apple IIs in 1980, 210k in ’81:


    and would still outsold the IBM PC in ’82.

    weird to think now what an under-appreciated privilege it was (for me) that my high school got one of the first million PCs (Apple II or IBM) shipped. That was an advantage that has helped me my whole life.

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