I meet a depressing number of people who have never ever heard any of this history. I was at Xerox in the late 80s when they were trying to remain relevant. There were all kinds of things wrong with the Star, for all its innovation, but the business model was the real problem. It made no sense uniless you bought dozens of them and then bought laser printers and file servers... Also, sales force incentives (bonuses) were principally based on how much paper and toner the sales rep could move through all the other products they sold. So you could sell a staggeringly complex and expensive network of workstations, fileservers, printers, and applications etc. and hardly make a dime until you had lots of adoption and people still printed out paper docs on the laser printers... or you could just sell more copiers that used paper and toner and have immediate, simpler and more predictable stream of consumable sales to line up with your monthly mortgage and car payments :)
I knew about this remarkable group and being actively involved in engineering projects in science I understand and respect these creative people even more.
As a keyboard specialist who has solid typewriting skills, I was not given chances to become employed and capture exposure to the microcomputer and the word processor, except at school. Now I believe that Xerox (PARC) has played an integral role in developing the microcomputer, laser printing, especially in color, and network systems, all of which are computer technology at its finest. Now I can appreciate it even more and need not to search for regular work again. I can continue to do such work right in the privacy of my home.
You sold Douglas Engelbart short in omitting his 1968 GUI presentation in the "Mother of All Demos". A demonstration of not just a GUI interface, but word processing and video-conferencing as well.
They sold a lot of things short in this video. It's what I hate about these superficial low-budget presentations. It almost seems like it was AI-generated. Too many things were glossed over and/or were not properly synced between audio and video, and key details were ignored or incomplete.
They did release a GUI machine before Apple did, it was called the Xerox Star, but it bombed in the market, in their defense so did the Lisa and the first Macintosh, took a while for people to accept GUIs as a new standard and not just a gimmick
How did you get the pronunciation of "why-z-wig"? 😖 It's "wizzy-wig"! Otherwise I enjoyed this video. Not many people know how much a "copier company" changed the face of computing, or how Apple's marketing genius popularized all the ideas they stole.
Xerox came out with Star Workstation Computers in 1980 But each computer cost 25 000. Many companies decided to purchase an ibm pc because it cost 6000.. Xerox had another chance to dominate the computer industry but they failed again
@erikreider not everyone are computer nerds or geeks. This is the reason why Windows and Android are the most used OS. Their policy is keep it simple. Even some linux distros are moving to GUI post the huge success of Android which itself is based on Linux Kernel. Best example of Linux distro is Zorin OS which can adapt & blend like Windows & Mac making it easy for Apple and Windows user attract to Linux who are using it for first time.
I meet a depressing number of people who have never ever heard any of this history. I was at Xerox in the late 80s when they were trying to remain relevant.
There were all kinds of things wrong with the Star, for all its innovation, but the business model was the real problem. It made no sense uniless you bought dozens of them and then bought laser printers and file servers... Also, sales force incentives (bonuses) were principally based on how much paper and toner the sales rep could move through all the other products they sold. So you could sell a staggeringly complex and expensive network of workstations, fileservers, printers, and applications etc. and hardly make a dime until you had lots of adoption and people still printed out paper docs on the laser printers... or you could just sell more copiers that used paper and toner and have immediate, simpler and more predictable stream of consumable sales to line up with your monthly mortgage and car payments :)
I knew about this remarkable group and being actively involved in engineering projects in science I understand and respect these creative people even more.
they changed the world forever with the automatization of data processing
As a keyboard specialist who has solid typewriting skills, I was not given chances to become employed and capture exposure to the microcomputer and the word processor, except at school. Now I believe that Xerox (PARC) has played an integral role in developing the microcomputer, laser printing, especially in color, and network systems, all of which are computer technology at its finest. Now I can appreciate it even more and need not to search for regular work again. I can continue to do such work right in the privacy of my home.
Fascinating.
You sold Douglas Engelbart short in omitting his 1968 GUI presentation in the "Mother of All Demos". A demonstration of not just a GUI interface, but word processing and video-conferencing as well.
and hypertext too
They sold a lot of things short in this video. It's what I hate about these superficial low-budget presentations. It almost seems like it was AI-generated. Too many things were glossed over and/or were not properly synced between audio and video, and key details were ignored or incomplete.
Lovely collection of stock footage
Timely upload! Taking a course on Operating Systems, and the instructor mentioned that Xerox were the first to implement a GUI.
I saw the movie (pirates of silicon valley).
great history, thanks for this amazing documentary
Legendary.
They could've been Apple and Microsoft combined. But the leadership dropped the ball.
They did release a GUI machine before Apple did, it was called the Xerox Star, but it bombed in the market, in their defense so did the Lisa and the first Macintosh, took a while for people to accept GUIs as a new standard and not just a gimmick
Metaphor Computer Systems represent! We beat the Mac to market. :)
Xerox PARC was the first machine with an undo function
How did you get the pronunciation of "why-z-wig"? 😖 It's "wizzy-wig"! Otherwise I enjoyed this video. Not many people know how much a "copier company" changed the face of computing, or how Apple's marketing genius popularized all the ideas they stole.
Thanks Sushi. That pronunciation was driving me crazy as well.
👍👍👍
good content ...slow down and e-n-u-n-c-i-a-t-e!!!
Xerox came out with Star Workstation Computers in 1980
But each computer cost 25 000.
Many companies decided to purchase an ibm pc because it cost 6000..
Xerox had another chance to dominate the computer industry but they failed again
I recommend reading "the innovator's dilemma".
Gooey!
You cannot have two point ninety-four. It's two point nine four!
A fucking photocopier destroyed the xerox alto :- s
This was good BUT it’s pronounced WIZZY-WIG!!! 😊
Why use a gui when you can have a Linux terminal? :)
my dad couldn't use the terminal, so have some respect
@@AlamoOriginal dude, it was a joke...
@erikreider not everyone are computer nerds or geeks. This is the reason why Windows and Android are the most used OS. Their policy is keep it simple. Even some linux distros are moving to GUI post the huge success of Android which itself is based on Linux Kernel. Best example of Linux distro is Zorin OS which can adapt & blend like Windows & Mac making it easy for Apple and Windows user attract to Linux who are using it for first time.
WHY SEE WIG???
ITS pronounced "WEE SI WIG"
Whizzy-Wig as in "Gee whiz!"
I’m sure this matters