One interesting way to explore a company's past is to see how it imagined the future decades ago. And in Apple's case, Cupertino harbored some curious ideas, including the Knowledge Navigator concept that then-CEO John Sculley described in 1987. In an attempt to present it to the public, Sculley authorized a series of videos with a limited budget, and the result was initially widely rejected…
The 1987 Vision
The year was 1987. Apple was still picking up the pieces after Steve Jobs's departure, and its direct competitors were gaining traction. But even with all its difficulties in facing the present, the masterminds in Cupertino were betting on the future, especially on a market as delicate as education. That brings us to CEO John Sculley, who took the stage at the EDUCOM '87 convention and presented the Knowledge Navigator.
The Prototype
To fully understand the Knowledge Navigator, we must mention Alan Kay and his two concepts, KiddiComp in 1968 and Dynabook in 1972. Basically, his idea was to develop a personal computer for children of all ages, which later materialized through the OLPC program (in which Kay participated). Tablet format, touch interface, portability, and extraordinary voice recognition were the pillars of the Knowledge Navigator, which more or less looked like this:
A fundamental “problem” in the video is the way the professor interacts with his computer. The speech recognition is on par with science fiction, but the most incredible thing is the assistant's ability to understand context, pauses, interruptions, and all secondary semantic details. In other words, there are no errors in using the Knowledge Navigator, and its built-in assistant behaves too much like a person.
Needless to say, the computing world of 1987 rejected any possibility of such technology becoming a reality in the short or medium term. And from a certain point of view, both sides were right. Touch screens and virtual assistants are very common today, but Apple's vision needed thirty years of development.
Source: Business Insider
