Macworld Boston 1997-The Microsoft Deal
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN returns to it as a legendary moment in tech history and as a precedent for strategic deals between rivals, such as in the Nokia and Microsoft story.
What it is
Footage from the Macworld Boston 1997 keynote where Steve Jobs announces Apple's deal with Microsoft, with Bill Gates appearing on the big screen. The almost bankrupt Apple took Microsoft's investment, and the crowd reacted badly, including booing over Internet Explorer as the default browser.
Recommended by 3 HN commenters across 3 different months, 2010 to 2024.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec ugh · 2010-05 · on “Microsoft to invest $150 million in Apple (1997)”
What? A link to this story and no one linked to the legendary video of Bill Gates appearing on the big screen at the Macworld Boston Keynote 1997, looming large over Steve Jobs and the crowd booing? Here, I will do that: [this video] (skip to 3:30 if you want to see how the investment is received, skip to 4:40 if you want to see Bill Gates)
Strong rec tambourine_man · 2020-09 · on “New Steve Jobs recordings from the '80s released”
I've seen this many times, so great. Imagine Cook taking random developer's questions at WWDC today. In that same year, the famous Gates at the big screen speech. The audience was booing. Can you imagine something even close to that today? [this video]
Recommends charleso · 2011-02 · on “Mike Elgan: Why Nokia is toast”
All of this 'Nokia is doomed because of their Microsoft partnership' talk reminds me of when Apple announced something similar back in 1997. Anyone remember this Steve Jobs talk from when Apple was on the financial ropes? [this video] If you think Nokia is doomed, you might want to re-watch that video. Things didn't turn out quite so bad for Apple.
Recommends charleso · 2011-02 · on “Nokia to get 'huge' payments from Microsoft ”
How much in the minority am I for thinking this is a good plan for Nokia? Echoing my post in another thread, Apple received $150 million in financing from Microsoft back in 1997 in exchange for including IE on the Mac (among other partnership goodies). If you don't recall that period of computer history (when Apple almost went bust), you may want to watch this Steve Jobs Macworld 1997 presentation discussing their joint venture: [this video] "Kneeling before Zod" didn't turn out too badly for Apple.
Cites thedudeabides5 · 2020-10 · on “Microsoft Excel’s 35th birthday”
Pour one out for Visicalc, the precursor to Excel/Lotus and the 'killer app' of 1979 for the Apple II! [LINK] Flash forward to 1997, and a key part of the deal for MS investing in Apple is...you guessed it, Excel on the mac. [this video] Funny to think about next time some engineer is telling you how this or that new cloud software will 'totally replace spreadsheets.' Spreadsheets powered the personal computing revolution - single handedly determined the winner of the OS wars (when people fled to first DOS and then windows after MSFT build Lotus into Excel). Like em or hate em, spreadsheets are here to stay.
Cites Lammy · 2021-03 · on “Internet Explorer is evil (1996)”
I always thought tabs were an Opera invention, or maybe one of those IE shells like Maxthon or Neoplanet? IE5:mac was a fantastic browser though and was widely regarded as having the best CSS1 conformance of its time, as well as some cool features like an eBay auction tracker sidebar that seem quaint today but were very useful to me at the time: [LINK] On the flip side, the only time I can remember hearing an entire crowd boo Stebe Jovs was when he announced that IE 4.5 would ship as the default browser in Mac OS 8: [this video]
Cites veidelis · 2021-03 · on “Internet Explorer is evil (1996)”
"And as if forcing IE on all Windows users wasn't bad enough, Microsoft forced Apple to bundle IE for Mac as their default browser instead of Netscape. If Apple refused, Microsoft would discontinue MS-Office for Mac. Steve Jobs was loudly BOOED as he announced that IE would be the default browser." [this video]
Cites Lammy · 2021-07 · on “Microsoft exec: “Summary of meeting with Steve Jobs"”
Mac OS 8.x and 9.x shipped with both Netscape and IE4, 4.5, then 5, but IE was the default for the "Browse the Web" alias on the Desktop of new installations. Mac OS X 10.0 shipped with a very early Carbonized IE 5.0 that was unstable enough to earn a "prerelease" label on the startup screen. At the time I remember a lot of people did actually prefer to use the Classic OS version of IE 5.0 over the IE beta, at least until OmniWeb 4.0 came out around the same time as OS X 10.1 [LINK] Announcing the browser deal is the only time I heard an entire crowd boo Stebe [this video] It's also amusing how Steve was still obviously using Concurrence instead of a Mac to do these early iCEO-era presentations [