Richard Kay
Sat, 11 Sep 2004 22:12:07 +0800
On 11/09/2004, at 9:09 PM, a lonely and friendless Reg Whitely wrote:
A friend (if I only had one... ;-) told me recently that Steve Jobs was inspired by a Jetsons computer when designing the first iMac. Did he design that iMac? Was it Jetsons-inspired? What is the design base for subsequent models up to the latest white slab.
From: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,1111276,00.html
"Shortly afterwards Ive went to the US and drove from San Francisco to Cupertino to present the new laptop to Apple. The firm liked his ideas so much they offered him a job. Given his success now, it's hard to imagine that Ive found the Apple job so frustrating at first that he almost quit. It wasn't until Steve Jobs, Apple's co-founder, returned to take charge of the firm in 1997 that Ive's career took off. Former Tangerine colleague, Peter Phillips, recalls: 'Jobs realised he had a jewel in Jonathan. There is a rumour Apple had designed the iMac years earlier but the existing boss was not interested, so they put it away. When Jobs returned and asked what ideas they had Jonathan brought it out and the rest is history' ... Friends say the roots of his success lie in his lateral thinking - finding the true appeal of an object, often ignoring the traditional approach to design. Inspiration comes from almost anywhere. The original candy-coloured iMac had its roots in gumdrops. The popular transparent Apple mouse came from thinking about how drops of water sit on a flat surface. An angle-poise desk lamp helped inspire the new iMac. The see-through outer casing of recent iBooks came from the look that food has when wrapped in clingfilm. The iPod is like a cigarette pack for those addicted to music instead of tobacco".
rmkay