Retro Tech Tuesday: John Sculley

It's always a little jarring to see/hear an Apple CEO who isn't named Steve Jobs. Today we take you back to the strange, dark days of the John Sculley era with this clip from The Computer Chronicles. Sculley talks in very non-Jobsian terms about the future of the Apple II , ten years after its release. Think about that for a second: Imagine Apple designing and selling the same iMac ten years from now. I told you it was a strange era:

Rearden Personal Assistant Digital secretary does it all - 2009 Knowledge Navigator

I don't know about you, but I don't have a secretary. No one to make me copies, book my appointments, schedule my travel, book my hotel, or make my dinner reservations. But soon my woes may come to an end thanks to a kick ass company in San Jose (just down the road from Apple BTW). Rearden Commerce is developing a software package, the Rearden Personal Assistant, that will intelligently take your plans and make modifications on the fly. For example: If your flight is delayed, the software will notify you of the delay, modify your dinner reservations (notify your guests . . . it would be tragic if they didn't get the memo) and then let you know once all attendees have responded.

This software is based on a military application developed by SRI International (up the road from Apple in Menlo Park). Now I know you're thinking . . . how can I get my copy and what will it cost me. Good question. Rearden Commerce hasn't made their product openly available. It's currently only released to a few partner companies, but will be rolling out to Chase card members as a service (likely paid, but we'll have to keep an eye out to confirm) in the not too distant future. Chase has an equity stake in the company and as part of the deal their card-members will benefit.

Personally I think the concept is great, but all it's going to take is one miss and someone doesn't make their flight or stands up a client because they didn't get the meeting change notification and it's a deal breaker. I'm a Chase card-member so I'll be looking to get my hands on Slipstream and will write a full review. Until then checkout the Knowledge Navigator from 1987.

Perhaps John Sculley was onto something...