Posted on 03/07/2009 6:44:52 PM PST by Swordmaker
No they weren’t. Xerox PARC had no clue how to proceed, perhaps that’s idiocy to you, but it happens when you’re ahead of the curve. Nearly happened to Apple, too, with the Lisa.
Given that reality, shareholder value was well served by the return on Apple shares alone. Considerably more than they would have gotten otherwise.
Xerox was not — still isn’t — a company that markets to individuals. It’s not in their DNA. They specialize in big, shared machines and systems. But what Xerox had at PARC, like the late lamented Bell Labs and IBM’s labs (Armonk?), was a monster of pure research.
Their approach was “pursue it now, figure out how to make a product out of it later.” It served the larger economy well, even if the company didn’t get the biggest return it could have. If Bell Labs had kept a tight rein on its semiconductor innovations, the company could have gotten more out of them, but it would have stifled the staggering growth of the whole industry.
I don’t know where the next wave of really visionary, world-changing technology will come from. There are fewer places where geniuses can tinker away without worrying about the budget — impatient shareholders and fund managers have made the focus narrower and narrower, and there’s less tolerance for big expensive incubators that may yield marketable products several years out.
BTTT
new mac in my near future. I will keep in mind the cautions. thanks for your input & ideas.
I will still have the PC however
Please add me to your ping list
Finder on my computer does (OS X.5.6)... why doesn't it on yours?
Hm. Sounds like a religious tract to me. In fact, I think somebody took one of the paeans to Obama, and just substituted “Mac” in the appropriate spots.
I use VMWare Fusion and am very happy with it.
Yes, you have to have a copy of Windows, any version.
My kids computer died, I replaced it with a Mac, loaded Fusion, used the Windows disks from their dead system, and have had no problems.
WARNING - Only some high end Windows games will run under Fusion. I have had better luck getting them to run on a Mac using Boot Camp.
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