1987, VistaMac, and Apple's Strange Predictions

Looking into the crystal ball is an activity that no industry giant can fully escape. We've already heard about predictions from companies like IBM and AT&T, and we've also seen futuristic concepts from Microsoft. In 1987, Apple tried its hand at fortune-telling, and in a seven-minute short, it decided to mix a bit of humor with some ideas that ended up light-years away, including a certain accessory called "VistaMac"...

The year was 1987. The debut of The Simpsons in short format, the first Rugby World Cup, Reagan's famous "tear down this wall" to Gorbachev, and Michael Jackson's album "Bad" were some of the things that defined that era. The computing world was still covered by that chaotic growth storm, in which giants and small players could swap places in a matter of days. At that time, Apple was entering a kind of "internal dark age."

VistaMac and the future according to Apple in 1987

It had been just over two years since Jobs left, and although the PowerBook gave the company some breathing room, other projects caused significant economic damage, especially the development of the Newton platform. Now, what was Apple doing in 1987? Something like this:

"From news to stand-up comedy" is more proof that Apple should never, ever get involved in anything related to humor, a warning that applies to almost every modern company.

The video explores a rather strange vision that Apple had for the next ten years. John Sculley, who was fully functioning as CEO, appears in the first few seconds, while Steve Wozniak himself has a cameo at the three-minute mark.

The perpetuity of the Macintosh and its presence everywhere, from public terminals to third-world countries, is a recurring theme.

It also mentions a "VistaMac," essentially a Macintosh compressed into a glasses format (a phone for Google Glass), with "microdiskettes" as the storage unit.

I think the only part where the video isn't wrong (so much) is when Woz highlights a "computer that listens" as a true advance. The virtual assistant announcing the system failure could have some connection to what Siri is today, but that would be stretching the rules too much.

The video then ventures into the field of holography, touches on the "Internet of Things" with a Mac installed on a kitchen wall, and even takes a cheap shot at Jack Tramiel, whom they describe opening a new restaurant.

Despite all this, 1997 was indeed an important year for Apple. After all, it was the year the jokes ended, with Steve Jobs walking the hallways.

(From the NeoTeo Archive, article originally published on July 2, 2019)