By Jessica Ravitz
CNN
(CNN) -- Long before fish swam in Macquariums, hipsters got Apple logo tattoos and thousands camped out for days to get into computer store openings, there was a machine.
Saturday marks the 25th anniversary of the original Macintosh, the first personal computer to draw masses, introduce the mouse and incorporate a graphical user interface, relying on images instead of text.
The Apple Inc. watershed product entered American consciousness amid fanfare, with a $1.5 million commercial, made by Ridley Scott, wowing audiences during Super Bowl XVIII. The piece's title, "1984," invoked author George Orwell's message and stood as a warning against conformity.
Two days after the ad ran, the Macintosh became available and life, as people knew it, changed. No longer were computers viewed as toys with which to play primitive games or as untouchable tools reserved for degreed engineers. We began to think different.
"The Macintosh demonstrated that it was possible and profitable to create a machine to be used by millions and millions of people," said Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, research director for the Institute for the Future, a Palo Alto, California, think tank, and chief force behind "Making the Macintosh: Technology and Culture in Silicon Valley," an online historical exhibit. "The gold standard now for personal electronics is, 'Is it easy enough for my grandmother to use it?' People on the Macintosh project were the first people to talk about a product in that way."
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more:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/01/23/apple.macintosh.anniversary/index.html
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