Newton Poetry

Indeed.

[Via John from NewtonTalk.]

“Wow, it’s so big!”

In low-brow humor circumstances, that would seem like a compliment. But in relation to the Newton, it’s kind of embarrassing.

I whipped out my MessagePad at work one day to scribble in something I didn’t want to forget, and my boss saw it over my shoulder.

“What the heck is that?” she asked.

“It’s my Newton. I use it to keep my memory straight,” I said.

I told her it was the first PDA, invented by Apple, and hails from the early 1990s. “That thing is huge,” she said. I didn’t blush, but I did agree that we’ve come a long way since 1994. She knows I’ve been saving up for an iPhone, so I told her the Newton was my stand-by.

Newton users get a similar reaction fairly often, from what I’ve read. It’s happened to me twice. The other time I brought my Newton to a friend’s house while working on Newton Poetry. Someone saw the MessagePad and couldn’t believe it was so bulky. He switched it on, played with the handwriting recognition, and called it a “giant green brick.” I explained what it was, too, and we had a good laugh about the advance of technology.

And it’s true. When I rest my iPod on top of the MessagePad, it still amazes me the size difference. My iPod has a 30 GB hard drive and the ability to hold thousands of songs. The Newton, on the other hand, needs a 2 MB flash card to store data. Plus it’s monochrome and lacks the lush, movie-playing screen of the iPod.

But still, having the Newton around is a great conversation starter. Everyone has an iPod these days, but Newtons are so rare they inspire outbursts like…well, like the one above.

Part of the “Who,” “What,” and “Where is Newton?” commercials from the early ’90s.

I like the Isaac Newton reference, and how these commercials just recycle footage from each other.

Wonder what they’ll say about the iPhone and iPod Touch commercials 20 years from now?

There it is. The video that launched a green revolution. Well…not that green revolution. The earlier one.

Love the haircuts.

Don’t you wish you had 4,000 Newton modems to play dominoes (excuse me, “modemoes”) with?

Says MacLife:

When the engineers at Apple’s Newton division weren’t polishing up their resumes, they were going for the world record in Newton modemino setups.

[Courtesy of Cult of Mac.]

Untitled, by Hank McCoy, aka Beast

There comes octiml twixt life qnd tenth,
When all men stop to cutih their brick.
We ask the stars “Why?” We question our lot.
The hequens open wide and reply “Why not?”

[I first read this poem way back in “X-Men” issue 11, when I was 12 or 13 years old, and – being the comic dork I was/am, I memorized it. It’s nice to see, thanks to Marvel’s wiki, that my memory hasn’t failed me. “Yeats?” Wolverine asked. “Nope,” came the reply. “Beast.” Also, find out why this poem is misspelled.]