Well, well, well...
I was attending an Apple Developer Conference in
London because I needed to test a NuBus Board I
had developed for the Macintosh (Mac II it
was then, or for those with lots of money Mac IIx).
At that time I didn't even know that something like
Newton existed although I was fairly up to date
regarding computer hardware. That much to marketing...
When I registered and got my badge, they told me to
hold on to it at all cost, but didn't tell why.
As they weren't going to let me in anywhere without
it, I thought this was the obvious thing to do
anyway and didn't think any more about it.
At the third day we had a joint informal dinner,
lots of hardware developers from all over the world
and many Apple employees.
Somewhere halfway through the main course some Apple
guy stepped in the middle of the room and started a
speech. Basically what he was trying to get across
(thought I) was that they were going to give
us a present, and this present was what looked to
me like a very cheap and useless plastic part remotely
resembling a ballpoint pen.
He praised this pen for some minutes, me thinking more
and more that this was some stupid kind of joke.
Then, mumbling, as a side note, he said "Ok, you can
have the Newton, too!".
Now imagine about 99 developers saying unanimously "Aaaahhh",
"Oooohhh", "Woooow", and one developer (me) looking fairly
stupid, asking "What the hell is this guy talking
about all the time, and what on earth is a Newton?"
Back then I was aware of two Newtons: Isaac and Helmut.
I strongly doubted that Apple was going to give either of
them to hundred hardware developers, so I was kind of
unsure as to what was coming. But I kept quiet because the 99
developers around me looked as if Santa Claus, including
sledge and all the reindeers, had just ridden across their
very plate. Most likely it was going to be a good thing.
A line began to form, and as I hadn't too much to do anyway,
I joined it. Slowly we proceeded towards the guy who had tried
to sell us the benefits of the ballpoint pen. Next to him was
a big cardboard box, and when it was my turn I was handed
a brand new OMP out of it. Originally sealed
(even the shrinkwrap would be worth a fortune at eBay these days).
Complete with four AAA batteries, handbook, video cassette
and ac adapter. Not to forget the two stickers that occasionally
pop up at eBay and are sold for up to $15, and the leather bag.
This was, by the way, where the badge came in. You had to show
it before you received the box, and afterwards they punched
a hole in it to make sure you wouldn't get in line a second time.
Around 15 minutes later hundred hardware developers were
beaming their business cards. No one really had
any idea of how far the infrared beam would reach, some would try
to beam across the room, Jesse James like, from their hip.
Which of course didn't work, just as beaming across a smaller
distance didn't (small wonder if the receiving Newton has an average
of 50 senders at the same time to choose from).
Nobody seemed to mind, though. Everyone, including me by then, still
very much looked like someone across whose plate
Santa Claus... (well, I think you get the picture).
After dinner I took this "thing" back to my hotel room. I hadn't
really established a relationship by that time, I thought it was a
nice toy. Then I found out about HWR, then I found out about
Calligrapher (a HWR game that was on a ROM card which was also
included in the package).
I played Calligrapher until the batteries were dead which was
around 3am. I contemplated going on with the ac adapter, but it was
the US version which was useless in a London hotel. As I had
to get up at 5:30 to make it in time for the next session, this was
probably a good thing.
The next morning saw me skipping breakfast, instead running
around with a Newton minus four dead batteries,
buying 3 sets of batteries at the hotel's kiosk at a price I would
have got 15 sets elsewhere (it was one of these hotels in which a
croissant is available for only $15, but of course that doesn't
include coffee).
From that time I was hooked. Not only to the Newton, but to the
philosophy of organizers in general. The OMP (which I still have)
was followed by a MP 110, 120, 130 and an eMate.
The last count has been
1 OMP
1 MP100
1 MP 110
1 MP 120 German
1 MP 120 US
2 MP 120 corpses
1 MP 130 with defective serial port
4 MP 130 corpses (if only I could fix the "Newton turns itself off" defect)
1 eMate
1 Psion 3a (still looking for a cable)
1 HP Omnigo 100 (still looking for a cable)
2 Palm III
Plus a bid at eBay for a package of 9 defective 120/130's to revive
some of the corpses.
Sorry for the long-winded post. Maybe I should have become a
writer instead of a hardware engineer. It's just that hardware
engineers are usually paid better. And writers are hardly ever
given anything by Apple that can be the beginning of a wonderful
friendship...
Cheers
Frank
-- This is the Newtontalk mailinglist - http://www.newtontalk.net To unsubscribe or manage: visit the above link or mailto:newtontalk-request_at_newtontalk.net?Subject=unsubscribe
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Sun Sep 09 2001 - 19:47:12 EDT