The ghost in the machine

In April 1991, almost 20 years before the launch of Apple’s iPad, the cover of the popular magazine Personal Computer World proudly displayed a photograph of a completely new category of computing product–a tablet computer called the ‘GO PC’. It was a breakthrough in the emerging field of ‘PenPoint Computing’ and, as the cover stated, had ‘The first natural user interface’. The photograph showed the product in use, being held by one hand in the manner of a clipboard, and being written on with the other hand using a stylus. This was no April Fool’s joke–typing commands into a computer, that anachronistic hangover from the typewriter, was soon to be a thing of the past. The accompanying article excitedly explored the ins and out of the unique pen-based user interface, concluding that ‘The men behind GO …. believe they’ve got something special. We should all take note’. This was to be the future of computing.