Defying Gravity: The Making of Newton

I can still remember when I first opened a Newton MessagePad 130 with backlighting for my 13th birthday. I had heard before I received the 130 that the Newton was notorious for its bad handwriting recognition and its frequent crashes but I decided to give it a shot. After I got aquainted with my MessagePad 130, I began to wonder what all the fuss was about. It worked almost flawlessly. I decided to purchase this book to learn about the development of the product that I adored and loved. I was very impressed with the pictures and was equally impressed with the writing to go along with them. If you want to learn about what it takes to become a computer programmer/engineer, this book is for you. It lets you know about the struggles and the rewards of being part of a team and developing a finished product with a corperate deadline. However, the reason I only gave it four stars is that somebody who had no idea about the Newton wouldn't really know how everything turns out. The book leaves you hanging by letting you know that the Newton DID begin to ship, but thats all. Thats not the authors fault though. As many Newton fans know, Steve Jobs discontinued the Newton because of its lack of sales and basically said it was a drain on the company resources, but thats another story. This book was put together almost flawlessly and deserves more recognition than it has.

On my shelf in its protective case is an original Newton (actually a MessagePad 100, the "retooled" version of the original). It is big, clumsy, slow, chews through its batteries in 20 minutes of use, and crash-prone. It is also a miracle of organization and intelligent function, especially when compared with my trusty Palm (which nevertheless runs circles around Newton in usefulness and functionality).DEFYING GRAVITY deepened my appreciation of Newton (even down to the little red wire that seems to be escaping from the case ... a manufacturing boo-boo that makes sense in context). Taking the late-1980s visionary doodles of John Sculley, Apple's Pepsi-bred CEO, and "productizing" them under the pressure of internal competition and external expectations, required a deep-thought-driven development effort that ground down the members of Newton's team. One young engineer committed suicide not long before the launch -- though a Newton connection can't be proven, the 18 hour days and constant frustrations could not have helped him.In this volume, with an unconventional page numbering scheme based on counting down the days until product launch, the reader experiences with the team the pressures that came from failure; from trying to pull together too many new technologies in a first-ever device; from communicating a totally new paradigm and avoiding the inevitable attempts to have that paradigm "pigeon-holed" into more familiar existing concepts.The photographs are sometimes grainy and stark, just like the late nights spent with troublesome components and misbehaving code.They drew me in: I celebrated with the team when Newton had its first successful public demo, after misbehaving right up to the demo time. The authors bring the reader right up the threshold of the new era: product launch.Fortunately, they don't have to deal with the later market failure of Newton: 30,000 original Newtons bulldozed into a California landfill, incremental improvements but no marketed attempt at a smaller form factor, and the abrupt demise of the platform under the "new Apple"'s Steve Jobs just as a fast-enough MessagePad, an incredibly cute and functional eMate, and a critical mass of software development had been achieved.Just as well -- this book is unconventional, and much more effective than a dry case study in showing just how much work goes into a new product category. I think it works in that regard, and also doubles as an unusual and attractive "coffee-table" book. Mine is staying with my Newton, to keep some history with this curious device when my grandchildren stumble across it in 40 years.

Follow the Newton from conception to birth. It's a facinating look at how creativity and business clash and merge to form a unique product for profit. Our post-Newton perspective only serves to make the story more poignant.

This book is an excellent look into how the computer industry operates, from the CEO's time, to product delays, and product design and introduction issues. I only wish the book was 5000 pages. A *MUST* read for a Newton user. A *MUST* read for any Apple Fan.

I miss the days when the computer industry had new, exciting and innovative ways to change our lives. Ok, the Newton didn't change the world but it was a damned glorious attempt. And the herculean effort to get this product from myth to the shelves is a terrific story (partly because we know the ending). Let's hope the new Apple can overcome its' demons of the past. If it was better written, it would be a Roman Tragedy... It still is a great chronicle of a great time past..