Old satirical article

[I just rescued this fun old piece from the Web Archive site. It was indeed written in 1999.]

02 December 1999

by Del Miller and Eolake Stobblehouse

Contributing Columnist and Guest

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This astonishing document fell through a wormhole in space, arced through the space-time continuum and took a hard left turn at a temporal discontinuity. The postmark indicated an origin in the year 2015 and careful study showed it to be the transcript of an interview with Steve Jobs. The unknown interviewer has given us a remarkable glimpse of the future of Apple and a look at things to come. Here is an excerpt:

Interviewer: I just caught the latest HyperQuickTime broadcast of MacWorld Expo. Quite a spectacle. Whose idea was it to rent Hawaii for the keynote?

Jobs: Well, it was either that or Manhattan, and the evacuation was much simpler... How did you like the G10 demo?

Interviewer: Well it was pretty impressive, generating a DNA enhancement right there on stage that cured Malaria was certainly impressive, and having a reluctant Phil Schiller test it in that mosquito chamber was pure brilliance.

Jobs: Yeah, Phil's a real sport, he's always saying that "Apple loves games." I just hope he's back in time for San Francisco.

Interviewer: On a sadder note, we've heard about the fate of the once-great Bill Gates. I know you knew him back when. Have you visited him lately in... in... in the place?"

Jobs: "Yes, poor Bill, he never was the same after his C:-ectomy...it really took it out of him. He never did get the hang of the Graphical User Interface, now he sits and stares at at that same old blue screen, looking for that long, lost command line ....It's sad, really sad. It's a good thing he invested in Apple all those years ago or else the poor guy would be penniless.

Interviewer: So what are Apple's plans for the new Microsoft Division?

Jobs: Well, Microsoft is only a shadow of its former self, of course, but we have great respect for what they used to do, and for the character they have shown through the takeover. In short we don't really know what we'll use them for, but I am sure they'll be good for something.

Interviewer: Was there any bad blood about the move?

Jobs: Maybe a little at first, but they've all settled rather nicely into Bill's old house - although we call it the Macintosh Porting Facility now.

Interviewer: Are you concerned about the United Nation's move to file anti-trust charges against Apple?

Jobs: [Visibly reddens] Absolutely not!

Interviewer: But how can Apple claim it isn't anti-competitive when its almost the only computer company around?

Jobs: What! Anti-competitive!? Why, Apple is behind all the innovation in the computer business--just look at all the pretty colored mice, printers and modems, just look at the transparent power cords. If that isn't innovation I don't know what is! [sulks]

Interviewer: Well sure, but when nearly all the software in the world has to run on a Macintosh, doesn't that eliminate consumer choice?

Jobs: There's lots of choice out there and plenty of opportunity for alternative solutions--take BeOS and Linux for example.

Interviewer: BeOS? Linux? But Gasse and Torvalds are living out of the same cardboard box on the Embarcadero. They sure don't seem to be much of a threat.

Jobs: Hey, they're just keeping their costs down to be even more competitive. I'd just say that they're "Thinking Different."

Interviewer: Speaking of that, what prompted Apple to drop the aging "Think Different" motto and replace it with the new "Apple Everywhere" slogan?

Jobs: Well you know, "Think Different" is the kind of marketing you'd apply to a young struggling company. Now that Apple market has matured we just thought that we needed something a bit more, er uh, mature, yeah that's it, mature.

Interviewer: Some people think that maybe you don't want people thinking different now that Apple owns ninety-five percent of the computer market.

Jobs: Certainly not! We want the whole world to Think Different - and we only have another five percent to go.

Interviewer: I must say, you certainly have a fine tan, you must be getting into the great outdoors more often these days.

Jobs: No, I just forgot the SPF 30 the last time I demoed one of our new G10 processors. The clock rate on those babies puts the RF into the low ultraviolent range, its like computing with a sunlamp.

Interviewer: That doesn't sound so environmentally benign, is that what the crowds in the parking lot are protesting?

Jobs: Oh no, they're all concerned with polycarbonate outgassing and the greenhouse effect. They claim that all the Macs out there might cause global warming.

Interviewer: That sounds serious.

Jobs: Nah, we've just completed a very serious study that shows that as soon as we saturate the market with our planned G11 "El Nino" processor, the cumulative heat output will warm the Humbolt current enough that resulting increased rainfall will cool everything down just fine. Don't worry about a thing. And believe me, a hundred million AirPorts won't melt the icecaps either--that's nothing but idle conjecture.

Interviewer: I see. Well, moving on, what about the rumors of the new MacOS release, code-named "Kubrick?"

Jobs: Damn, it seems that public floggings won't even keep a lid on things around here. Oh well, it was bound to get out anyway. I suppose everyone knows about the "artifact" they found on the moon.

Interviewer: Oh that big, black monolith thingy? What's a monument from an ancient, alien species got to do with Apple?

Jobs: Well it appears that the aliens have been listening in to Earthly broadcasts for a long time and they seem to have developed a bit of an obsession with computer commercials. Seems they thought that Earth was some sort of computer paradise and they spared no pains getting here. When they arrived, though, they were plenty miffed with what they referred to as violations of the Galactic truth-in-advertising laws.

Interviewer: Uh, what exactly were they expecting?

Jobs: As nearly as we can figure out, "Where do you want to go to today" translates as a rather racy proposition and they think that behind some "blue door" it's possible to "fall in love with a computer." I don't know where they came up with all that stuff, but since Apple is practically the only computer company on the planet these days, they sort of expected us to fill a pretty tall order.

Interviewer: So what did you do?

Jobs: Well, portablility seems to be pretty important to any spacegoing species so we gave them a bunch of iBooks and they just loved them; which is the problem.

Interviewer: I don't understand, how could it be a problem that they loved the iBooks.

Jobs: [pause] Ask a blow-up doll.

Interviewer: Sputter.

Jobs: Voids the hell out of the warranty.

Interviewer: So that's what's behind the mysterious "Moon" project, eh? I heard that Jonathan Ive just went on "vacation" there...

Jobs: Johathan who?

Interviewer: Errr.... Your, uh, chief designer?...

Jobs: Oh him. Yes. Well, he seems to get along well with our "customers," mainly because he's so stuck on that tired-old, candy-colored look. We're trying to transition our styling to a new look and we decided that Jonathan could help out the most if he took care of the legacy styling in a more, say, remote location. You know, somewhere a bit more isolated... like the moon.

Interviewer: Aha... OK. Well, looking at the artwork around your office I see a definite "Alien-noir" look--right out of the 1980's. Is that a portent of things to come?

Jobs: Yes, the alien look is going to be the next big thing. The public can only take so much cutesy and we have some *really* nasty designs coming up.

Interviewer: Nasty? What do you mean by "Nasty."

Jobs: [in a whispered voice] Now this is entirely off the record, but did you see that pretty little thingamabob that my aide rushed out with as you came in?

Interviewer: You mean that thing that looked like somebody's spleen?

Jobs: That is the upcoming new Mac, the implantable "iMac GI"

Interviewer: Oooh! Er, "GI"?

Jobs: Yeah, it stands for "gastro-intestinal" You just swallow the little bugger and it swells up like a sea sponge somewhere in the vicinity of your duodenum. It sends the I/O out your bile duct directly into your sacral ganglia and from there to your central nervous system. We call it "Invasive Computing.

Interviewer: [coughing, turning a light Bondi green] I see... wonderful. So, er... does it do mail?

Jobs: [wriggles uncomfortably] Well... yes, of course. We still have some work to do on the interface though. The cable needs a bit of... refinement. And the reset switch needs to be rethought. That paper clip is a tad problematic.

Interviewer: I hope... that that does not have anything to do with the ambulance that pulled away as I arrived?

Jobs: No, that was probably just another case of heartburn we've been having down in the cafeteria. [muttering to himself] Pesky Lithium batteries... So! Are we about finished!?

Interviewer: I guess so... Say, you wouldn't have a mail appliance lying around I can borrow? Mine seems to have gotten a case of "the windows".

Jobs: Here, take this [throws a ballpoint-pen-like device over]. It's the new prototype iBall. Stick it in your ear, and you can surf the web in 3D. Oh, and please report any problems. The alpha version sometimes messes with the brainwaves.

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This was written in a single chat session between the two authors, and expanded by Del. Based on an idea by Eolake Stobblehouse.