[SIGCIS-Members] First instructional videos for Macintosh?

Paul N. Edwards pne at umich.edu
Tue Sep 9 07:51:16 PDT 2014


Just to be sure it’s clear what Peter’s saying:

"The tutorial was on a single 400K floppy disk which guided the user through a series of lessons to use the previously unknown mouse and desktop-metaphor computer-interface which we take for granted today. A separate audio cassette was required to describe the actions of the pre-recorded tutorial animations as computers were not yet capable of multi-media presentations of this type.”

(from the description on the YouTube video)

So one could have had the experience of listening to this sound track while watching these images, but it was not a “video” in the sense that we mean that today (images + sound) - it was a silent computer animation, plus an audio presentation on a tape cassette which one ran separately.

Best,

Paul

On Sep 9, 2014, at 10:05 , Peter Sachs Collopy <peter at collopy.net> wrote:

> I think I might have a copy of this audiotape, or maybe a later version. But in any case…
> 
> There is a video on YouTube which includes the sound from the audiocassette distributed with the Macintosh in 1984, and video from the tutorial disk. It also has a minute of color advertising video at the beginning which of course was not part of that tutorial, but the rest of it appears to be as one would experience it with the original media: https://www.youtube.com/user/Mac128DOTcom/videos.
> 
> I would be curious if similar audio tutorials exist for other machines or if this was a peculiarity of the Mac. Anyone know of other examples?
> 
> Peter
> 
> 
> On Sep 9, 2014, at 9:23 AM, Ceruzzi, Paul <CeruzziP at si.edu> wrote:
> 
>> I do recall an advertisement for the Mac, when it first appeared, that its users had no need to consult the manual, as the Mac’s use was intuitively obvious. At the time I was very skeptical of this seemingly-outrageous claim; I was a die-hard DOS user, with its accompanying thick users’ manuals and cryptic error messages. But I recall being intrigued by the ad. If correct, then there probably would not have been such an instructional video, at least not produced by Apple.
>> 
>> Postscript: Just looked at _Byte_, special issue, Feb. 1984: “Once you have bought it, though, you will probably be learning how to use the Mac on your own. Apple will help you in this process by providing you with a cassette/disk combination. You boot up the 3 ½ inch disk tutorial and listen to the interactive lesson provided on the cassette (Of course, you have to have a cassette player). Although I have not seen the cassette/disk tutorial program, I think it will work well; text-only tutorial programs are fine, but many buyers of the Mac will benefit from the warmth of a human voice teaching them.”
>> 
>> The National Museum of American History acquired a Mac almost on Day One; I’ll check & see if they got this cassette/disk combination. (Of course, if they have it, we will need to find a cassette player!)
>> 
>> Paul C.  
>> 
>> From: members-bounces at sigcis.org [mailto:members-bounces at sigcis.org] On Behalf Of Paul N. Edwards
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2014 7:50 AM
>> To: Luisa Emmi Beck
>> Cc: members at sigcis.org
>> Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] First instructional videos for Macintosh?
>> 
>> Luisa, do you have reason to believe that such instructional videos existed? 
>> 
>> It’s possible, but that was not so common in the 1970s or even the 1980s (the Macintosh was introduced in 1984). If they did exist, they would have been distributed on VHS tapes. Audio CDs were introduced until 1982, and DVDs were not invented until 1995. 
>> 
>> I would look instead for stories in the print press - newspapers, and perhaps such magazines as Byte (an early personal computer hobbyist magazine). Or perhaps public radio archives!
>> 
>> Best,
>> 
>> Paul Edwards
>> 
>> On Sep 8, 2014, at 23:28 , Luisa Emmi Beck <emmi.beck at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> Hi SIGCIS members, 
>> 
>> I'm working on a radio story about the history of personal computing.  
>> 
>> I would like to find instructional videos for the first Macintosh or other personal computers. The goal is to give listeners a sense for how new and incredible the idea of personal computing was in the 1970s. ​Does anyone on this list know of where I could find such videos? I haven't been able to find anything on YouTube but I'm hoping to be able to track down a few instructional videos (or at least the audio portion of the videos). 
>> 
>> Thanks! 
>> Luisa 
>> 
>> (510) 856.7475
>> http://luisabeck.com/
>> _______________________________________________
>> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are athttp://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members
>> 
>> ___________________________
>> 
>> Paul N. Edwards
>> Professor of Information and History, University of Michigan 
>> A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming (MIT Press, 2010)
>> 
>> Terse replies are deliberate (and better than nothing)
>> 
>> University of Michigan School of Information
>> 3439 North Quad
>> 105 S. State Street
>> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285
>> (734) 764-2617 (office)                  
>> (206) 337-1523  (fax) 
>> pne.people.si.umich.edu
>> 
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>> _______________________________________________
>> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members
> 
> _______________________________________________
> This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members

___________________________

Paul N. Edwards
Professor of Information and History, University of Michigan 
A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming (MIT Press, 2010)

Terse replies are deliberate (and better than nothing)

University of Michigan School of Information
3439 North Quad
105 S. State Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285
(734) 764-2617 (office)                  
(206) 337-1523  (fax) 
pne.people.si.umich.edu







































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