
Executive Computer: Mother of All Markets or Pipe Dream Driven by Greed? (1992) - dayve
http://www.nytimes.com/1992/07/19/business/the-executive-computer-mother-of-all-markets-or-a-pipe-dream-driven-by-greed.html
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_Codemonkeyism
Doesn't these two statements describe best how Apple and Intel succeeded or
failed in mobile?

Apple: "[..] John Sculley, the chief executive of Apple Computer Inc., who
says these personal communicators could be 'the mother of all markets.'"

Intel: "[..] Andrew Grove, the chairman of the Intel Corporation, [..] He says
the idea of a wireless personal communicator in every pocket is 'a pipe dream
driven by greed.'"

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TwelveNights
It's crazy how accurate this article was. How far along were mobile phones
during 1992?

Also,

> Once in the meeting, the executive could take notes on the device, and even
> order pizza for the group using a combination of custom electronic forms and
> wireless fax

Close enough :P

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flukus
> It's crazy how accurate this article was. How far along were mobile phones
> during 1992?

Mobile phones weren't very far along at all. PDA's (personal digital
assistants) on the other hand were slow, clunky, had hard to read screens and
were expensive, but if we transported a 20 year old back in time they'd
definitely recognize it as a primitive mobile phone. They gained actual phone
functionality 5-10 years later.

One of apples big innovations was to call them phones instead of PDA's, but
when you include PDA's (including the apple newton) the evolutionary history
is much more obvious.

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tudorw
I don't agree that PDA's were really slow, or clunky, that's hindsight, when I
bought mine, they were expensive, fast, lightweight and awesome. By the time
the Psion 5 came out around 1997 I was receiving email and sending faxes from
a Psion 5 > PCMICA Adaptor > PCMCIA Modem (Goldcard) > Data Cable > Nokia 8110
and it certainly felt like the future :)

~~~
flukus
I may be confusing them with the later windows mobile and cheaper Casio ones
(which I was rocking as a super sophisticated primary school kid at the time),
but I remember noticeable input lag and frame rates of approximately 1fps. As
amazing as they were at the time I still found them slow and clunky, was the
Psion noticeably better?

~~~
dagw
Both Psion and Palm where really great. I used a Psion 5 (and later 5mx) as my
main 'laptop' for a while. Working with text and spreadsheets was amazingly
smooth, and it had a battery life that most smartphones today would envy. Oh
and the keyboard design on the Psion 5 was one of the greatest pieces of
industrial design the computer world has ever seen.

~~~
tudorw
It's really difficult to talk about speed, it's clear we all experience it
quite differently depending on our path, so for me I'm here, it was smooth,
copy and paste just worked across apps, integration between calendar, todo and
email(i think?) just worked, the device form factor, widescreen clamshell with
the butterfly keyboard deserves a comeback, imagine the spec you could cram
in, for reading and writing a wider screen for me is preferable to a taller
one.

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thisisit
> At the other end is Andrew Grove, the chairman of the Intel Corporation, the
> huge chip maker based in Santa Clara, Calif. He says the idea of a wireless
> personal communicator in every pocket is "a pipe dream driven by greed."

Well, Intel never really made a mark in the smartphone era too. Atom
processors were a dud.

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gumby
On one hand, this is, as others have noted in this comment page, astonishingly
prescient.

On the other hand, Andrew Seybold was right in that it took 15 years for the
iPhone to arrive.

There was one "island of stability" with the amazing Palm & Psion devices
(which weren't really "connected" devices), and then a discontinuous jump to
the iPhone and its descendants.

A sobering thought on the speed of technology uptake.

~~~
mncharity
In the early 1990's, DEC (Digital?) Cambridge was demoing a tablet prototype,
with assorted Moore's law curves suggesting viability in early 2000's. Then
there was the wait for a market to gel.

When will software development get a screen-replacing HMD? One might manage it
with existing parts for under $1k... but absent a demonstrated market, no one
is bothering to build it. So maybe next year. Maybe _more_ capable systems
happen first, because some "companies will pay $10k for _this_ " has a clearer
market story.

Market prediction is hard. As is some tech path prediction. But some tech
changes are more predictable, and when those intersect clear and funded
needs... some forms of prescience seem less hard than others.

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hashkb
Personal flying machines: inevitable necessity or luxury?

~~~
thisisit
Self driving flying electric cars - inevitable or pipe dream?

~~~
ccozan
Well, I would say, the mother of all mobility market!

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matt4077
Driven by greedy descent!

