Adobe debuted ATM. John Warnock told the press:
“This should give all PostScript applications a much better WYSIWYG effect. Type is the blood that circulates in the computer system. We want one kind of blood in computers.”
Robert X. Cringely recalled Adobe's stance:
"Adobe's underlying hope was that quick market acceptance of ATM would dissuade Apple from even setting out on its separate course."
It was too late. Apple had secretly built its own font system, Bass.
ATG boss Larry Tesler says, “You don’t have a degree, and we don’t know where to put you” So Larry was a no, but Harry Vertelney says, 'No, no, no, he's great. He's going to do exactly what we need him to do.
“Software is the glass through which the majority of our users see the Apple. If it doesn’t work right, the Apple isn’t working right."
Jef Raskin.
@csilverman @octothorpe fwiw many people only agreed to be interviewed or quoted after Jobs passed. Such was the shadow (and myth).
@csilverman @octothorpe From my research Sculley would fund multiple options and then make a decision when needed. Scribe, Swatch and Newton came down to one. He axed Jonathan and BigMac and went with Milwaukee for the Mac II. When JLG delivered the Mac Portable, he gave it 5 months then axed it and Gassée. On the other side of the ledger, trying to build a RISC chip was a waste of millions, axing A/UX for an IBM product was silly and Newtown was poorly managed from the get go. IMHO My 2c.
"Steve Jobs's leaving was like a breath of fresh air. Many of the Skunkworks projects and next- generation technology efforts that had to be hidden away and kept secret from Steve were now out in the open.Among the people I worked with, the post-Jobs era was liberating, a Renaissance, one of those times when the gears were engaged, and you turned the crank as fast as you could."
@csilverman @octothorpe Mis-written. In Jobs' opinion, "...anything approved by Sculley - while he was a NeXT - was bad." IMHO Sculley was a grown up and did many good things.
@csilverman @octothorpe fwiw ATG had laid the groundwork for FaceTime, Apple TV, digital video editing, Google'like Search + iCloud backup and iPad (just to name a few - the book has many more) while he was away but IMHO anything approved by Sculley was bad, no matter what. And there were many projects that were lost in the weeds - think Newton. To his credit tho', Jobs kept and supported QuickTime. It was too good to shutter.
CEO John Sculley presided over phenomenal sales growth, taking a rapidly growing, young company and multiplying its revenue by 900%.
Tim Cook has 'only' grown Apple sales by 285% however the absolute dollar value for Sculley is $7.2b while Cook hits $310b or 43 times greater!
@tenzochris The car would not start. The rescuer's car had to pull the big Oldsmobile until the engine triggered.
First Man. The Life Of Neil Armstrong. James Hansen.
@octothorpe @csilverman that's a shame. ATG arguably did its best work when 'he' was at NeXT 😉
@csilverman thanks. many of the true stars at apple - north, krakower, vertelney, gilley - are not household names nor knighted or idolized. in fact few people at apple even knew of them. but this book is about and for them.
@csilverman I believe one and the same 'lunatic'. Sadly passed away. RIP Rob Moore. https://tinyurl.com/ycx4tsap
Bring back BIX aka Apple is Listening. https://inventingthefuture.ghost.io/apple-connection/
Hat tip to @csilverman
@csilverman too true - and when the same apple folk went online to solve problems.
Former former Head of Software Engineering at Apple, Mike Potel:
"For so many of the people named in this book, Steve Jobs's leaving was a breath of fresh air. The skunkworks projects and next-generation technology efforts that were hidden away and kept secret from Steve, were now out in the open. All these people started finding each other and were suddenly free to pursue all these ideas that were previously off-limits. It was a renaissance."
https://books.by/john-buck/inventing-the-future
@cyberpunklibrarian thanks for appreciating steve’s work.
