Steve Jobs describes iCloud experience at WWDC 1997

by tylerrooney • 15 years ago

129 46 15 years ago

There's also one choice moment before this point where a developer is asking what Apple can do about getting beat up in the press and the stockmarket.

For emphasis, in December of 1997 AAPL hit an 11-year low of $3.53 (split adjusted). Today, mainstream media eats out of Steve Jobs' hand and their stock price is, as I type this, $332.

forgottenpaswrd• 15 years ago

Yeah, he says something like:

"You should buy stock... it is what I have done"

ufuk• 15 years ago

Great find... If you continue listening to Steve ramble on about the what we now call "the Cloud", you can hear him mention hardware-thin/software-thick clients, eg. the iPhone and the iPad.

I wonder what held him back from achieving that vision is the first place. AFAICS, Apple is now playing catch-up to Google and Amazon in the cloud computing space.

dualboot2• 15 years ago

Doing it themselves and doing it right is my guess.

Just look at Sony for an example of rushing into doing something yourself (PSN.)

cmgarcia• 15 years ago

Exactly this, I think most would agree that Apple attempts to either do it right or not at all.

smackfu2• 15 years ago

What held them back? Probably two things:

1. They only had the Mac platform (and non-connected iPods). Can you change the world with a 5% market share?

2. They wanted to charge for it.

Now, they could have done this a couple of years ago after they conquered #1, but they were still hung up on point #2, and just tried to make a better pay service.

YooLi• 15 years ago

1. In 1997, technology held him back, not market share. The iPhone changed the world with no market share. The iPad changed the world with no market share. Etc.

2. Who gives their service away for free? Apple still charges for it. It's included in the devices you buy, etc.

ry0ohki• 15 years ago

In 1997, the lack of widely available high speed Internet was probably the biggest thing preventing this.

paramaggarwal• 15 years ago

A true visionary.

otterley• 15 years ago

This was Sun Microsystems' vision of computing in 1982, 15 years earlier.

dmix• 15 years ago

"It's not so new but to the average person its new" - Steve Jobs in the linked video.

Apocryphon• 15 years ago

I would love to watch a video of Bill Joy or whomever giving a talk about that.

namastasyai• 15 years ago

Bill Joy spoke of this at the Institute for Advanced Study, circa 1999. I don't know if anyone took a video of his talk, but he did it (and I was there.)

6ren• 15 years ago

He was even using NFS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_File_System_(protocol)

Your dreams may still be here tomorrow, but you may not.

Hoff• 15 years ago

And prior to that, Digital Equipment was using "the network is the system" back the late 70s.

But then ideas and slogans are rather cheap, and neither DEC nor Sun are around any more.

Apple is still around, and Apple is still executing on their ideas.

va_coder• 15 years ago

A coworker of mine worked with Eric Schmidt when he was at Novell. He was talking about the cloud back then. Now his vision is coming alive with Chrome OS.

lukifer• 15 years ago

Spooky to hear Jobs speak so well of Rubenstein ("I trust him with my life"), knowing that Palm will hire him away for WebOS a decade later.

padmanabhan01• 15 years ago

afaik palm didn't hire him away. He quit and after few months of break in mexico, he decided to join palm.

Steko• 15 years ago

It seems like he didn't really quit either but was let go gracefully. As head of iPod division it seemed as though he was more protective of the iPod's role as Apple's superstar product then of the big picture Jobs wanted to push. Rumor was he wanted to use the iPod OS for the phone and then he gave an interview about how converged devices were lame and 3 weeks later they announced his "reduced role" as a consultant and shortly after that he was out.

Granted that's mostly based on rumors but it gives an interesting contrast to Microsoft's failure in tablets because of things like the Office division's execs refusing to make it touch friendly.

ugh• 15 years ago

Exactly, a decade. Something like that is not really spooky. A decade is a long time.

saturdaysaint• 15 years ago

Funny when he corrected himself after saying "Apple controls the marketing and distribution... I mean the marketing" - perhaps Apple stores were on his mind back then?

JackWebbHeller2• 15 years ago

Fascinating to see how much more technical vocabulary he uses when speaking in '97. I don't remember any recent keynotes where he used so much tech jargon onstage.

I guess this is because now, every word he says is analysed and reported by mainstream media. He has to communicate to the entire world because of Apple's popularity, and not just a room full of WWDC developers.

JackWebbHeller2• 15 years ago

I actually remember when he was announcing FaceTime, he had a list of all the FaceTime protocols and technologies onscreen - H264, AAC, SIP, IMTC, STUN, TURN, ICE, etc.

I remember him pausing, then saying something along the lines of "... whatever the hell those are", or some quip like that.

powertower• 15 years ago

It's more of early adapters (1997) vs. mainstream (2012).

The first is much more techy. And the latter is much greater in numbers.

Apple wasn't even a blimp on the radar screen back in 1997. Now they are a continent.

snikch• 15 years ago

The experience he's talking about is the same experience domain based Microsoft networks have had available for a long time, and it was an awful experience as it relied on network connectivity for your files. It was nothing revolutionary.

What's happened in the last decade+ is the infrastructure to support all these devices, and their network connectivity, has increased so we can finally have a good user experience doing it.

Without the infrastructure to support it, the product would end up instilling a sense of hate in people who use it. And we all know Apple is about creating the most seamless and easy to use experience for the user.

jchrisa• 15 years ago

The key is they design for offline mode first. Then add connectivity.

mikecane2• 15 years ago

What's especially interesting in this video is when he's insulted by someone during the Q&A. How differently he handled that than what stars, politicians, and many business people would do and do!

Amelio was also still in charge of Apple, yet it seems Jobs already had his plans worked out for what he would do with Apple if he was in charge.

siglesias• 15 years ago

More like when he was in charge.

jonursenbach• 15 years ago

Where in the video is this?

mikecane2• 15 years ago

Sorry, I watched it several days ago and didn't note the time. I'm thinking of watching it again to extract that bit.

farlington• 15 years ago

It's at around 50:20.

jessedhillon2• 15 years ago

At around 50:10, someone asks him sarcastically to use his cloud to make sure than when TV commercials are made, they're good ones. Steve Jobs smiles, nods and thanks him.

jpadvo• 15 years ago

It sound more like he is describing Chrome OS, actually.

philwelch• 15 years ago

At the time, Larry Ellison was on Apple's board, and Oracle was pushing the "Network Computer" concept: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_Computer

edge17• 15 years ago

Fundamentally, the idea is the same to the end user, but this is true about a lot of ideas that started on the desktop, then were recreated in the web, and are now being recreated in mobile.

Like anything, ideas are a dime a dozen and execution is everything. Building network storage for tethered devices on reliable connections and building network storage for untethered devices on unreliable connections are two different problems.

The way this post is titled gives him credit for the idea, which is a silly thing. If iCloud works as advertised, kudos for the execution.

But I have no doubt in my mind that the architecture under the hood would be very different if it were 1997 and Apple was building cloud storage in the pc era.

peterquest• 15 years ago

wow, remember when keynote addresses contained technical information? When's the last time you heard Jobsy mention NFS at a conference?

sambeau• 15 years ago

Jobsy?

pathik• 15 years ago

El Jobso.

biot• 15 years ago

This could be a description of the iPhone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LEXae1j6EY&feature=youtu...

TechNewb• 15 years ago

Steve Jobs describes the iPhone experience at WWDC 1997 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LEXae1j6EY&feature=youtu...

Steve Jobs describes iCloud experience at WWDC 1997

Related Stories