Newton Poetry

‘Tis a sad day, Newton fans.

Today is the ten-year anniversary of the death of our beloved MessagePad platform.

John Sculley’s dream was dashed when Steve Jobs arrived back on the scene. Says AppleMatters.com:

Having hastened Sculley’s departure or not, the Newton made it through two more CEOs and hundreds of thousands of wasted development dollars before it was spun off as an independent company. he world will never know if the Newton could have stood on the merits of the product without Apple’s backing, and true Newton fans cried a bitter tear on February 27, 1998, when Apple announced that further development of the Newton would cease.

*Tear* Poor sales, lack of development, Palm chipping away at market share – it was all too much for the newly refurbished Apple to deal with.

CNet.com has a great breakdown of the announcement on the day it happened, so check it out for the full story.

Now? The Newton community is still alive and well, thankyouverymuch, thanks to folks like you and me.

But remember, remember, the 27th of February…or something like that.

Two weeks ago, I decided to dedicate all my GTD, notetaking, scheduling, and day-to-day tasks using nothing but my Newton MessagePad 110.

I originally bought my MessagePad on eBay just to play around with, and see what all the fuss is about.  As I’ve worked on this Newton Poetry blog, however, I’ve developed quite an affection for the green machine.  Maybe it’s contagious, I don’t know.  But I figured if I really wanted to get to know my Newton, I had to use it everyday – not just for translating poetry.

The project began on Monday, Feb. 4, though not with a bang.  That first Monday, I mainly got acquainted with setting up calendar dates and making appropriate folders to store my notes.  Nothing special; just the basics. More… »

Before Apple got so paranoid about licensing its operating system software, it tried letting other companies borrow the Newton OS for other devices. Like Sharp’s ExpertPad.

Sharp’s model featured a different case than Apple’s MessagePad, without the rubberized feel, and a side-hinged screen cover like the later 2×00 MessagePad series (check here for good pictures). Software-wise, however, it was just like Apple’s model.

Sharp gave the ExpertPad 4 MB in ROM, 640k in RAM, a 336 x 240 pixel LCD, and the model version went up to PI-7100. The ExpertPad ran Newton OS up to 1.3, but never stuck around long enough to take advantage of the 2.0 OS (though some on the Newtontalk list have wondered).

Luckie’s Newton Gallery says Sharp bowed out of the Newton family because of lack of demand:

Sharp Electronics discontinued manufactering its ExpertPads as well as the Apple models in late 1994. It had expected to make millions in the first year and quietly exited the Newton world due to the poor sales of Newtons in general and ExpertPads specfically.

Other Newton clones included the Motorola Marco, the Digital Ocean Tarpon, and a German Newton-phone hybrid called the Siemens NotePhone.

The United Network of Newton Archives (or UNNA) is probably the perfect place to grab package software for your Newton.

But there are alternatives. Check out the Newton Package Downloader, a list maintained since 2001, for a not-so-organized list of packages available for your MessagePad. It’s arranged grid-like, and offers tons of software. But if you want something specific, you’ll have to do some searching. There’s no rhyme or reason to the site’s arrangement.

The other links “Ed” (as the site’s author calls himself) provides time out, meaning they may not be in operation anymore.

If the packages are downloading weird, you can check out this handy method for configuring your pre-OS X Mac to download the files correctly.

Just got accepted as a member of the Newted Newton community. Thanks to Grant for accepting my associate membership. He’s still taking members, which is good to hear.

My membership gets me 10 MB of server space for e-mails and web stuff, a free web site (under construction, of course), FTP access, and the ability to hunt through members-only message boards. Right now I’m just finding my way around the place, but it’s pretty cool. Sadly I get the feeling I’m in an abandoned part of town, because the message boards haven’t had many new topics posted, but the info I did find was pretty cool.

Grant is, of course, kind of famous around the Newton community for all he does and the help he provides.

More to come as I play around some more.

Want to install a package on your MessagePad – like, say, an update to the Newton’s OS – but wondering how to get started?

I noticed that my Newton 110’s OS was still stuck at version 1.2. I knew Apple.com kept a comprehensive list of old software and driver downloads, so I started there first. This is a good starting page for Newton inquiries; it breaks down your MessagePad model, and leads you to its listing of Newton OS software. Here you’ll find updates, connection software (like the Newton Connection Kit and Utilities), modem drivers, and much more. Browsing through the listing, I found my OS 1.3 listing here:

I clicked on the “read me” file just to see what I was getting into. Then I clicked on the “MP_110_1.3_345333.sea.bin” file and the download started right away. More… »

Screw you, Wired.com:

Arguably the most famous Apple flop of all, the Newton (which was actually the name of the OS and not the device) started out as a top-secret project with a lofty goal: to reinvent personal computing. During its development, the Newton took on many forms, such as the tabletlike “Cadillac” prototype, before its eventual release in 1993 as a smaller and considerably less revolutionary PDA. Although the Newton was available for six years (longer than most other Apple flops), it was a prime example of an idea that was simply ahead of its time, and sales never lived up to Apple’s expectations. When Steve Jobs resumed his stewardship of Apple in 1997, one of the first things he did was to axe the subsidiary Newton Systems Group. By the following February, the Newton was dead.

From their “Learning from Failure: Apple’s Most Notorious Flops” lineup.

A good point about what makes the MessagePad so accessible, from the newtontalk.net mailing list:

A sudden nasty angle to any revival of the Newton came to my mind as I was thinking about how incredibly fortunate we are. The Newton that we know and love has survived the cruel rejection by its parent, Apple, because its construction is such that it’s relatively straightforward to dismantle and otherwise tinker with it. Even if such hardware tinkering isn’t to all our tastes, it’s doable for enough of us that all of us can benefit, and the results are a thriving user base a decade after Apple stopped supporting it, and a machine that’s stable even if it’s no longer cutting edge.

This is a good time to stop and thank all the Newtonians who comprise that hard-core of hardware (and software) fixers, modders and hackers, who help us all fight off Newton-entropy. I hope some day I get a chance to buy all you guys a drink — though perhaps I’ll need to do that a little at a time.

Christian, the smart guy who came up with all this, said a modern-day Newton would be a Mac Mini-style PDA: closed, non-upgradeable, and therefore less fun.

Smart stuff, and I think that’s what makes the Newton so fun to tinker with – namely, you can tinker with it!

Check out the NewtonTalk archives here.

Steve Jobs introduced new iPod Touch features that are bringing it closer and closer to a modern-day Newton. “Now there’s even more to touch” touts the new Apple.com page, and it’s true: Mail, Notes, Maps, etc. It all adds up to a more Newton-like device than the previous iPod Touches.

The iPod Touch is now a true iPhone-clone, without the phone and subscription model.

It makes me wonder what the GTD crowd thinks of this updated Touch (Macrumors has a forum dedicated to just this subject). The Newtonlist has been buzzing with Newton software packages that make the MessagePad a handy tool for GTDers.

And I suppose that, after the SDK comes out for the iPhone and iPod Touch, developers will be builder 43folders-ish software all over the place. Jailbroken iTouches already have these kind of capabilities.

But does all this spell the end of those Newton 2.0 rumors that were flying pre-Macworld? John Gruber thinks, perhaps, not:

I am nearly convinced that this product exists, at least as a project in development. My hunch is that AppleInsider has it spot-on: it’s in development, but not yet ready to launch, and, perhaps, never will if Apple can’t get it right…A successful tablet-like device from Apple, I think, would clearly be designed as a secondary computing device — a satellite attached and synched to a Mac or PC (probably, of course, through iTunes).

What’s missing, says Gruber, is the “why should I buy this?” factor that accompanies most new Apple products. Tablets have failed to catch on, he argues, so why release one if it doesn’t blow people away?

(Gruber’s predictions of Macworld were, by the way, spot-on, except for his plea for new Cinema Displays. Everything else he got right. Kudos.)

So here we Newton fans still sit, stuck between a maybe-it’ll-happen Newton 2.0 and an iPod Touch that, as it adds features, becomes more and more like Apple’s long-abandoned PDA.

I was hoping that, after Tuesday’s Macworld keynote, I would be rushing to Ann Arbor’s Apple store to pick up my iPhone. But no such luck.

Why not? I’m one of those guys waiting for the 3G.

It didn’t come yesterday. What did come, however, were some pretty cool features: the where-the-heck-am-I feature, the new homescreen capabilities, the multiple-person text messaging. It all sounds great.

It just doesn’t sound great enough. iTWire.com feels me – saying that Apple isn’t listening to its fans like it should be. And if it wants to hit that magic 10 million number…:

According to Apple, the company has sold 4 million iPhones in its first 200 days. For any other company, this would be a phenomenal figure. However, at Macworld 2007 Jobs envisioned sales of 10 million units in the first year, so Apple has some work to do over the next 165 days. It is beginning to look as though Apple has to release a 3G iPhone very soon in order to move 10 million units [by the end of 2008].

Right. Even if Cupertino wants to sell just one, to me, it better make the speed bump.

I have a cellphone, and a good cellphone carrier, that I like. I have my Newton. I have plenty of Macs. In reality, I don’t need an iPhone. But boy… I’ve already been in situations where, standing in the grocery line or waiting for someone, I can imagine whipping out the Jesus Phone and wasting a bit of time.

At work, we had an annual goal, and I reached it, and got a hefty bonus. I was going to use that money toward the purchase of an iPhone, pending the 3G announcement. But no 3G came.

Salon.com’s Farhad at the Machinist says that past and current iPhones are all created equal because they keep getting updates via free iTunes software. The phone is evolving, and it doesn’t cost any extra. But the actual hardware I’m waiting for can’t be downloaded via Software Update. I need a whole new phone.

So the wait continues. I’m thinking of putting a time limit on the 3G iPhone announcement – say, this spring. Maybe April, or before I head out on my New England driving tour at the end of May.

So there you go, Apple. You’ve got $400 sitting in the credit union with your name on it. All you have to do is deliver.