24 Years Ago: Apple's First Phone Never Made It to Market

Dan Knight - 2007.07.19 - Tip Jar

Low End Mac Reader Specials

Download Typestyler, still the Ultimate Styling Tool for Internet, Print and Video Graphics. Works great in Classic with a Native OS X Version on the way. Free Tryout: www.typestyler.com

LA Computer Company: LA Computer Company: Specials on AppleCare, Apple Displays, MacBooks, iMac's, MacBook Pros, Laptop and iPod accessories and more. Apple A/C Adapters for laptops starting at $25.00 Call 1-800-941-7654 or Click Here.

OWC: Burn DVDs, DVD-DL, CDs, DVD-Ram - FAST! Superdrive upgrades from OWC starting from $31.99 with options for nearly every Mac. Models with Lightscribe, Blu-Ray too!

Mac users can finally play Party Poker for Mac. Not only that, they can also learn how to play PokerStars for Mac.

Laptop Hardware Provided by TechRestore - Overnight Mac & iPod Repairs.

Compare products like desktop computers, laptops, and LCD TVs side by side! All the information and reviews to make the best purchasing decision for a new cell phone GPS products or MP3 players. The Ciao network makes searching products easy for you.

New iMac 800Mhz Memory 4GB $98, 2GB $50. Click to Maximize your Macs...

If you've been on the Mac Web the past few days, you must have Fudder's article about "Apple's first iPhone" - or at least stories about it or links to it. The mock-up (below) was created by Frog Design and bears more than a passing resemblance to the Apple IIc.

1983 mock-up of an Apple telephone.

This was 1983. Before the Macintosh. Well before the Newton. When the Lisa was a US$10,000 computer. Yet the Apple Phone looks like it has a graphical user interface with a touchscreen, much as seen in the Newton 10 years later.

There's not a lot said about this phone, but from it looks like it has a built-in checkbook program. Whether this was just a check register or was intended to allow users to use an early form of online checking is a mystery, but it is intriguing. I wonder if it had an address book as well, which would allow users to scroll through a phone list, click with the stylus, and place a phone call.

It's amazing how far we've come in 25 years. Phones that plug into a wall jack and handsets wired to the phone are so 20th century, and we can't imagine a mobile phone today without a screen - although few have touch screens.

Steve Jobs still worked at Apple when this project was underway. It only took technology 25 years to move from the Apple Phone design to the iPhone, which gives us a color display, doesn't need a stylus, lets us watch video and listen to music, connects to the Internet, takes photos, and functions as a mobile phone as well.

As the author of Ecclesiastes said thousands of years ago, there's nothing new under the sun.

Recent Mac Musings

PowerPC's last chance: The Mac's history with the G5 CPU, 06.24. The introduction of the G5 Power Mac in June 2003 promised a bright 3 GHz future, and failure to achieve that paved the way to today's Intel Macs.
16:9 computer displays: Let's not go there, 06.17. "...there's no reason our computer displays should match the proportions of our television displays."
Left behind by Mac OS X or up to date with Linux?, 06.04. If you wanted up-to-date software, you may need to run the latest version of Mac OS X. But what if it won't run on your hardware?
More in the Mac Musings index.

Recent Content on Low End Mac

Mac Pro overclocking, Windependence with Darwine, Blu-ray for Macs, and more, Mac News Review, 07.04. Also more on running Leopard on non-Apple hardware, Ubuntu on a Mac mini, the first autofocus webcam with Zeiss optics for Macs, and more.
Wouldn't life be great with an iSlate?, John Hatchett, Recycled Computing, 07.04. PDAs and smartphones are too small for some tasks, full-fledged Tablet PCs are overkill, and ebook readers are too limited. Apple has the tech to own this niche.
Mac of the Day: Original iMac G3/233, Aug. 98 - The Bondi blue wonder that bounced Apple back to profitability and into the public eye.
List of the Day: Mac Pro List is for those using a Mac Pro.
July 5 in LEM history: 98: The iMac: First of a family? - iMac Perfect for schools - 00: Apple is not your friend - 01: 75 Mac Advantages - Do you trust me? - 02: The joy of X with Classic - The good, the bad, and the intrusive - 05: No Quartz Extreme for Pismo - A brief history of NeXT - 06: Education iMac - iTunes and the French interoperability law - TopXNotes - Apple's secret battery reset utility - Misleading hard drive capacity
The Macintosh Portable started a notebook revolution, Carl Nygren, Classic Macs in the Intel Age, 07.03. Before Apple introduced the Mac Portable, notebook computers were text-based and ran MS-DOS. Ever since, graphical interfaces have been the norm for laptops.
More links in our archive.

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2008 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, PowerBook, MacBook, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.