No Virginia, touch was NOT invented by Apple
How many times have you seen on the web a mention of the great invention of the touch interface that Apple gave us with the iPhone? I have seen it so many times that I almost ignore it now, and that’s not a good thing. Touch screen interfaces on devices have been around for a long, long time. Long before Apple’s iPhone. Admittedly Apple improved the technology quite a bit with gestures and other features but they did NOT invent touch on gadgets. Heck, Apple’s own Newton was produced years before the iPhone and it had touch. It wasn’t the first gadget with touch either as far as that goes. Devices were produced by Palm and others with touch interfaces long before the iPhone so let’s quit saying how Apple invented touch. Please. Even big publications who should know better make the Apple invention claim, like a recent item by Gearlog:
Touch was a revolutionaryconcept when it debuted with the iPhone, in part because it wasimplemented so well with gestures.
Not even close to being correct. Does anybody know what was the very first mobile gadget with a touch interface? If you do then chime in and let’s set the record straight.
Here’s one claim.
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bltouch.htm
Very interesting stuff Warner. Now, what was the first mobile gadget released commercially that had touch?
I’ll go with a product from HP. Am I getting warm?
Probably but I don’t know for sure. That’s why we need someone who knows to chime in.
Oh, in that case, let’s go with Wikipedia for starters and take it from there with proof of correctness or inaccuracy.
“The HP-150 from 1983 was probably the world’s earliest commercial touchscreen computer. It actually does not have a touchscreen in the strict sense, but a 9″ Sony CRT surrounded by infrared transmitters and receivers which detect the position of any non-transparent object on the screen.” Sounds more like the first Surface computer now that I re-read it.
im tempted to say palm, but i suspect the newton was out before then.
not that any of those was touch in the way the iphone uses it, as they where stylus devices with resistive screens.
wikipedia puts the HP-150 as “probably the earliest commercial touchscreen computer”:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touch_screen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP-150
heh, to slow…
btw, there is a mobile phone around that uses a similar system to the HP-150.
dont recall its name at the moment tho
You are WAAAAAY missing the point. It’s an exciting Easter Egg hunt to figure who brought touch on board first, and totally irrelevant unless you’re only goal is to discredit an obviously ignorant and poorly researched claim that some guy posts on the Internet. If that’s you’re goal in life, then you are going to be BUSY.
The real item that people don’t ever cover, and it should be brought up in every conversation involving the iPhone and touch, is that the technology wasn’t developed by Apple. Apple purchased a company called FingerWorks to acquire their technology. It was a great company with great technology developed by some very smart academics. They killed that company and its products which was a loss for many loyal customers. This is the kind of corporate suffocation that Microsoft usually takes heat for. Do some research on FingerWorks and their touchsteam line. Think about Apple as a company. See if you can connect the dots. See if you can figure out that a multitouch trackpad wouldn’t drive sales of MacBooks because those consumers are feature-inelastic. See if you can figure out how to pay down those acquisition costs before introducing the the gesture technology into the trackpads.
You’d also be well-advised to hold your blog-mate accountable for the error. In med school, there was this mildly racist girl that would make you cringe when she opened her mouth. We never left one of her rants learning more about X people or why Y people drove better than Z people. We didn’t quckly run to the library to try to dispute her claims. We just left learning more about her as a racist. Similarly, perhaps the better response to the Gearlog piece is to come away realizing that they’re part of the Apple hype machine. Seems to be the most truth that can be squeezed out of that article.
Finally, if this is the kind of stuff that you do for a living then you’re welcome for the help. If you want to reciprocate then I’ll see you in surgery in one hour. I’ll flail about excitedly and you can help my hands make precision contact with the patient.
Apple didn’t invent the mp3 player either. Creative pioneered the mp3 player and invented the GUI, which Apple stole from them. Creative’s first player was out a year before the iPod came out. Apple’s iPod unfairly dominates the market and Creative doesn’t get any recognition. Creative’s ZEN player kills the iPod with it’s higher resolution screen, supports more windows audio & video formats and has better sound quality thanks to it’s X-Fi technology.
@Patsayjack:
” Apple purchased a company called FingerWorks to acquire their technology. It was a great company with great technology developed by some very smart academics. They killed that company and its products which was a loss for many loyal customers. This is the kind of corporate suffocation that Microsoft usually takes heat for.”
from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fingerworks
“In June 2005, FingerWorks officially announced they were no longer in business.[5] The founders continued to file and process patents for their work through late 2007.[6] And as of August 2008 they still file patents for Apple, Inc. [7]“
Seems like the leads might be inside Apple’s very lucrative and interesting environment managing the gestures R&D effort for Apple.
What part of this is suffocating?
Oh, do you mean suffocating as in developing, marketing and patenting innovation, leaving MSFT in the shadows, glimpsing Apple’s tail lights?
In that case, I totally agree that Apple is one tough 800 lb gorilla and (you betcha) they have cut off MSFTs air supply.
Shoot, I was playing games and making restaraunt reservations via touchscreen monitors at EPCOT Center ten years before the Newton showed up.
@pk de cville:
Yeah & how did Microsoft find its way into what you were saying?? Your comment clearly shows who you are, a mere Apple fanboy!!
@Davin Peterson:
Apple actually admitted that they stole.. err… I mean used the designs of a british inventor in UK for their iPod. This was during a lawsuit which was filed against them on the iPod by someone & Apple had to fly that guy over to US to give testimony in their case. It so happened that this british inventor had drawn up designs for an MP3 player & patented them 30 years ago but didn’t have money to extend the patent in 1980s so his patents went into public domain & that’s where Apple picked them up from & created their *innovative* product iPod!! And they acknowledged this only when their own skin was on the line!! And aren’t these the same guys who always moan & cry that Microsoft stole their ideas??!! Huh!! Talk about sour grapes!
I remember, when I was a young teenager, that my girlfriend’s breasts were extremely mobile and touch sensitive. That was 35 years ago! Does that count? In fact, I believe they were also multi-touch.
Heh…yeah, it is kind of funny how when Apple pulls a stunt like buying someone out and killing the technology, they’re (well, Jobs) is called “innovative” and “ahead of the curve”. On the other hand, when Microsoft does it, they’re called anti-competitive and promoting monopoly.
Still.
You’d think the past 10 years might have set the records straight but I guess people see what they want to see, reality be damned.
I find I’m really enjoying this blog, and think you normally make excellent point, but in this case I must confess I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
There’s been “touch” on ATMs and gas pumps for what seems like forever. So what? Is it your contention that these are the same as Apple’s MultiTouch?
Even something that LOOKS similar, such as Microsoft’s Surface, is just a series of cameras and projectors underneath the table top. It’s technology that’s been around for years. You think you can get that technology in a small device? Good luck.
Apple’s MT was developed by them, and patented all over the place. They surely borrowed ideas from elsewhere (as EVERY new technology has), but Apple made it, perfected it, and brought it to market. A sure sign it’s something truly new is that everyone around them is trying to copy it (because It’s not already “out there” somewhere to be used). To claim that my neighborhood’s gas pump or some end table at a Vegas casino has the same technology is ridiculous.
I don’t think you’re giving Apple anywhere near enough credit here. Perhaps you also think PARC invented the Mac interface?
Yes terrible thing Apple Touch didn’t invent touch but gee they sure as heck developed it to a fabulous level. The pleasure of using something so well executed is well a joy. Good design that entices customers is about development, that’s something that Apple embraces and Microsoft and Palm seem to forget!
I try to stay out of these, but…
@Tom: enjoy living in the RDF? Sure Apple developed APPLE’S MultiTouch. You’re missing the point. Little or no credit goes to the pioneers who actually did most of the gruntwork. Instead, all history is erased in the greater public’s mind and it turns into “Apple’s innovation.” That seems a very Microsoft-ish thing to do.
@Davin Peterson
I don’t think Creative “pioneered” the MP3 Player.
I can remember when I bought a flash memory based MP3 player called the Diamond Rio like way way back in 1998. It was an extremely light player that had a huge 64MB DRAM and held about 1 CD worth of music encoded at 128kbps (10 to 12 songs). I thought is was so cool because it had no moving parts, super lightweight, about the size of a pager and held as much music as my Walkman cassette player. Also, I remember the Record Companies sued to stop the sale of the Rio but lost !
Anyway, my point is that Apple was YEARS behind other companies in the MP3 player market and quickly blew them all away.
Also, I remember shortly after buying the Rio I bought a 20GB hard disk based player that held thousands of songs in the palm of my hand, used 4 rechargeable/replaceable AA batteries and it was made by a company called Archos in Europe, I can’t remember the exact year I bought it, but I know it was way before the Apple iPod came out.
So, Apple hardly invented portable MP3 players but I think they sure perfected them.
PalmPilot was very much after the Newton. Palm initially got their money from selling Graffiti for the Newton. Too bad Xerox in their greed shut that down, so new Palms use the awful Graffiti 2. The invention of single-stroke handwriting was sort of obvious. The practicality of it, not so much.
Along that line of thought, the convergence of computer-based hierarchical arrangements of MP3 tracks and computer-based portable MP3 player was sort of obvious. Boo on Creative and their entire corporate/legal team.
Along that line of thought, the convergence of computer-based touch screens and computer-based portable computer was sort of obvious. It was just a matter of seeing if technology could make it work reasonably, yet, and working out which UI was optimal.
According to Dan Bricklin:
http://www.bricklin.com/tabletcomputing.htm
Apparently the first was the GRiDPad from 1989, running a 10MHz 8086 and DOS. Its development seems independent of other efforts such as GO Computing’s PenPoint (released 1992), which inspired Windows’ support for pens.
PalmPilot was very much after the Newton. Palm initially got their money from selling Graffiti for the Newton. Too bad Xerox in their greed shut that down, so new Palms use the awful Graffiti 2. The invention of single-stroke handwriting was sort of obvious. The practicality of it, not so much.
Along that line of thought, the convergence of computer-based hierarchical arrangements of MP3 tracks and computer-based portable MP3 player was sort of obvious. Boo on Creative and their entire corporate/legal team.
Along that line of thought, the convergence of computer-based touch screens and computer-based portable computer was sort of obvious. It was just a matter of seeing if technology could make it work reasonably, yet, and working out which UI was optimal.
According to Dan Bricklin:
http://www.bricklin.com/tabletcomputing.htm
Apparently the first was the GRiDPad from 1989, running a 10MHz 8086 and DOS. Its development seems independent of other efforts such as GO Computing’s PenPoint (released 1992), which inspired Windows’ support for pens.
In 1982, in Normandy, working for a French Newspaper, i made a report on a restaurant with a touch box on each table to order meals.