{"id":1546,"date":"2011-04-28T21:13:04","date_gmt":"2011-04-29T01:13:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/?p=1546"},"modified":"2013-08-03T16:56:08","modified_gmt":"2013-08-03T20:56:08","slug":"aofm-mwu-flashback-1994s-concept-of-tablet-computers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quackingalone.com\/blog\/2011\/04\/28\/aofm-mwu-flashback-1994s-concept-of-tablet-computers\/","title":{"rendered":"AOFM-MWU – Flashback: 1994’s Concept of Tablet Computers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hey guys, the big guy here.<\/p>\n

Think back to almost a year ago when I told you that the tablet computer (the iPad, et al) was nothing really new<\/a>. It was simply a culmination of several computing and communication technologies that had finally become affordable and reliable enough to put into one marketable device.<\/p>\n

Well, today Mary Anne found proof of this via Twitter<\/a>, in the form of a fascinating video made by the Knight Ridder News\u00a0company\u00a0back in 1994<\/a>.\u00a0In it they describe\u00a0what they believed the future of newspapers would look like: a\u00a0tablet device called an \"electronic newspaper\". The device they depict has many uncanny resemblances to, you guessed it, an iPad.<\/p>\n

This is an amazing feat of prognostication, considering that the first recognizable Windows web browser (Mosaic<\/a>) had been invented only a year prior to the video's release, and there was really no such thing as Internet video or animation at that time.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Granted, Knight Ridder didn't get everything right. Note the constant need for a stylus, the laughable kiosk data distribution system (wi-fi and mobile broadband were not even dreams then), and, worst of all, the newspaper-brand-centered paradigm - to wit:<\/p>\n

Over the last 15 years there have been many attempts to develop electronic newspapers, and many of the technologists who have been pursuing these objectives assume that information is simply a commodity and people really don't care where that information comes from, as long as it matches their set of personal interests. I disagree with that view.<\/p>\n

Roger Fiddler, founder of the Knight Ridder Information Design Lab.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Oh Roger, you were so wrong, wrong, wrong. The Internet, the most enormous storehouse of information that mankind has ever built, where newspapers<\/em> now get their<\/em> information... that's all it is!<\/em> Piles upon piles upon piles of the personal interests<\/em> of people who incessantly jabber on and on about Star Trek, Star Wars, furries, anime, politics, religion, and any other subject an OCD-infested pedant can latch onto!<\/p>\n

You still did pretty damn good there, Roger. Check it out:<\/p>\n