Computer of the future

Back in 1984, when Steve Jobs unveiled the first Macintosh, he was mocked mercilessly.

The Mac was derided as a “Fisher-Price computer,” a toy machine designed for unserious tinkerers and artsy-fartsy types who couldn’t master programming.

Many of the technorati thought it was just a toy because of its accessible point-and-click interface. At $2,495 — more than $7,400 in today’s dollars — it was also extremely expensive. And it shipped without any professional apps.

There was an element of truth in these early criticisms. The Mac was a very expensive toy without a “killer app” that made it an essential purchase, especially for businesses.

That changed with Aldus PageMaker, the first page-layout sofware, and the LaserWriter, one of the first laser printers — a combination that launched the desktop publishing revolution in 1985, a year after the Mac was introduced.

Looking back, there’s no doubt that Jobs’ original vision for computing that was accessible to all was right on the nose, even if the first product to articulate that vision was almost a massive business failure.

The same is true of Vision Pro. Yes, the headset is heavy, uncomfortable, isolating and lacks a killer app. No wonder lots of people are returning it to Apple.

But thanks to the amazing visionOS user interface, it is without a doubt a glimpse at the computers of the future.

Ten years from now, lots of computers will trace their ancestry to Vision Pro.

Who says Apple can’t innovate anymore? This is why computers in 2034 will be like Vision Pro.

And here’s why one of our writers is wavering about returning their Vision Pro. They can’t really afford it, but they love it and use it every day.

Also in today’s newsletter:

• The first trojan to circulate on iOS is out in the wild. Don’t worry, it just steals your banking info.

• We have a great deal on Babbel, the app that makes learning languages easy. The flash sale ends tonight.

• This is a fascinating project I’m sure Apple’s legal team is totally cool with: The iPod has been reborn as a crowd-sourcing project that’s raising a ton of money to get off the ground.

• If your iPad is getting long in the tooth (like my old iPad Pro), maybe it’s time to upgrade to this M1 iPad Air. It’s almost as good as an iPad Pro, at a fraction of the price.

— Leander Kahney, EIC.

^{A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team}

^{A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team}

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