(gentle music)
- [Yalf] Today, computer
mice are everywhere.
From gaming to office work,
they have become a staple in the industry,
a necessary part of a
functioning desktop PC
but there was actually a point in time
where the computer existed
but the mouse didn't.
In the '70s, these old, clunky bricks
were the bleeding edge of technology
and none of them had a mouse,
They were only equipped with a keyboard.
In fact, a mouse really wouldn't
have even made any sense
for these PCs.
The interfaces on them were very simple
and there weren't many things on screen
that could even be selected.
They were worked almost
purely through typing.
You'd write out a command, hit enter
and get your response back.
That was it.
You could navigate
through the onscreen text
but that would also be
done using the keyboard.
So how did the mouse come into existence?
Hey, how's it going, guys?
Today we are taking a look at
how Steve Jobs stole the
design for the mouse.
It all started with a
company called Xerox.
Their business was mainly
in the printing and copying industry
and this was always their main focus,
however, due to their success,
they had a very well
respected research facility
where they would create
and test out many products
for home computing.
This was called the Xerox
Palo Alto Research Center,
better known as PARC,
and the idea behind it was
that their printers would
eventually go out of style.
If they wanted to stay successful,
they would need to be a big player
in the paperless world as well.
It was at this facility
that legendary engineers,
like Bob Taylor and Gary Starkweather,
would lead the innovation of computing.
Lots of technology that we
see today was invented here
like the graphical user
interface, laser printer,
ethernet, and, of course, the first mouse.
This mouse was actually made in 1970
by a man named Bill English,
but it wasn't for many years later
that it was implemented
into a computer system.
His device used a ball
to track the movement
which would become
the most popular mouse design for decades.
This is where Steve Jobs comes in.
In 1979, Jobs proposed a deal to Xerox:
in exchange for being
able to buy 100,000 shares
of Apple for $10 a piece,
him and a group of Apple
engineers would be allowed
to tour the research center.
Xerox agreed and they
traveled to the facility.
Jobs ended up seeing
many useful devices here
which taught him a lot about computing,
but one thing that stuck out
to him even more than the others
was Xerox's computer mouse
and how it worked with their interface.
While very clunky, poorly engineered,
and costing $300 a piece,
he saw it for what it could become.
If made properly and for the right price,
it could completely change
how people interacted with computers.
You see, Jobs had always
put a large emphasis
on the user experience
behind what he sold.
His belief was that the
key to selling anything
was to first figure out how the end user
would experience the product
and then simply improve that.
He saw how his own PC could
improve from what Xerox had
so he used that same technology.
- I was so blinded by the
first thing they showed me
which was the graphical user interface.
I thought it was the best thing
I had ever seen in my life.
Now, remember, it was very flawed.
What we saw was incomplete,
they'd done a bunch of things wrong
but we didn't know that at the time.
And still, though, they had
the germ of the idea was there
and they'd done it very well.
- [Yalf] Just a few days
after visiting the facility,
he took what notes he had from the mouse
to an industrial design firm
and told them he needed a
simpler design with one button
that could only cost $15 to produce.
Four years later
and the Lisa computer
by Apple was released,
retailing for $25,000,
adjusted for inflation.
And sure enough,
alongside it came a mouse.
- Unique item called a mouse.
By moving the mouse, we move the pointer.
To open my folder, I point to it
and click the mouse button, selected.
- [Yalf] It was the second
retail company to offer a mouse,
only being beaten out by
Xerox's own 8010 Star,
but the Star cost over ten
times what the Lisa did
and was only really sold to
businesses and universities.
However, neither one of
these did that well overall,
so just one year later,
Apple released the Macintosh home computer
with a much more reasonable price tag
and the same mouse alongside it.
This is the one that would
end up becoming very popular.
At only around $6,000 in today's money,
it was a computer that some
people could actually afford,
and after other companies saw
the success Apple got with it,
they started incorporating these new mice
and interfaces to their computers as well,
which leads us all the way to today.
Apple continues to innovate on their mice
and have created some pretty
cool ones throughout the years,
but you guys know about them.
So what happened to Xerox then?
Well, like I said before,
they were never really into
the making of home computers,
they were always more involved
in their printing and copying machines.
So after some unsuccessful
computer releases,
they slowly faded out of
the hot new-tech industry
and back into their roots.
And with some time, lots
of the best engineers
that worked at Xerox were
recruited to other companies,
like Apple, Microsoft, and IBM.
These people wanted to make
and invent newer products
and Xerox simply didn't do that anymore.
In 2002, the research facility split off
from the main company and
still works on advancements
in science and technology today.
And that is the story of how Steve Jobs
stole the computer mouse from Xerox.
So what do you guys think?
Is steal a little bit of
a strong word to use here?
Was Jobs simply innovating on the design?
Let me know your thoughts
in the comments down below.
That's all I have for today, guys.
If you enjoyed the video,
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Anyways, thanks for making
it to the end of the video
and I'll see you guys in the next film.
(upbeat music)
