We’re running a little behind around here. Witness last week’s tribute to Buck Owens — who died two weeks ago — on the Meat Puppets blog. This week, we offer a slice of Apple history on the occasion of it being a week after their 30th Anniversary. (Our apologies to first time visitors Googling for housecleaning tips.)
A quick glance at the photos from this old Apple IIc manual holds the key to Apple’s success in the late 70s and early 80s. The message here is clear: buying a computer will get you laid. What woman could resist the lure of a roaring fire, a great bottle of wine, and the promise of a romantic evening spent fighting with cables? It also makes a great fashion accessory. Imagine how smart you’ll look lugging your new Apple IIc home on the subway in your matching flats, sweatshirt and fleece throw-on?
I bought my first Apple computer — a Macintosh IIci — from my neighbor, using per diem money I saved up while touring in 1994. It had ten megs of hard drive space and 4 megs of RAM (which I later maxed out at a whopping 16 megs, for an astronomical cost), and originally sold for upward of six grand. Those were the days! Twelve years and thousands of dollars later, I still use Apple products. Hell, if it weren’t for Macintosh, there would be no Bostworld. And as you all know by now, life without Bostworld would be unbearable.
But Apple isn’t the only once celebrating an anniversary in April. Ten years ago this month, I finally rose to the challenge of turning a long distance online flirtation into a face-to-face meeting with the woman who would become my wife. So Apple wasn’t wrong: my computer did indeed get me laid.
For those of you more interested in computers than sex, I uploaded scans of the entire manual to Flickr.
Yeah, you should definitely throw that out. My first computer was a Macintosh Performa 430 with a new thing called AOL.
And then did you “join the dark side?”
I still have my old IIci. It’s useless, but so cute! I’d rather throw out my wife’s old Intel white box.
If by “dark side” yuo mean PC, then yes I did. I guess I got a Mac at the wrong time. In the early nineties, there was not much software out for it and it seemed like everything new was coming out for PCs, not Macs. then the iMac came out. Oh well. My Mac was thrown out about 2 years ago after it became completley useless.
Yeah…The Performa line was NOT cute.
http://lostbrooklyn.org/apple/
all for sale! trade barter – make an offer!@ no no apple IIc sorry lol
I threw out the packaging for my i-book,now I cannot return it.Which sucks because themacbook is coming out.:(
Depends on whereyou bought it. Most places hire trained monkeys who wouldn’t notice if you returned the box empty.
Hey Derrick,thanks for the sentiment.I atually did wind up replaciing my new I-book for the new Macbook,after paying a 200$ cdn. surcharge.Now if I could only figure uot garage band.By the way I was “Tonka” on the old pups chatroom.