Good lord! How old is Apple’s ergonomics page?!
Wow. It looks like Apple’s ergonomics web page predates the internet. Is that an Apple II that 1st guy is using? No wonder he’s suffering from “lightning bolt neck”.
Oddly, besides that Apple II-looking thing, there’s not a Mac to be found in any of Apple’s “ergonomic no-no’s” drawings. I suppose the indication here is that unlike PCs, it is impossible for a Mac to cause harm to a human. I think its the 1st law of Mac computing or something.
April 19th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
Hah - Great find…
Must of been an *especially* slow day for you if you spent it trolling the apple about pages
April 19th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Tell me about it, SirCrumpet.
You have no idea how hard it is to keep up this insane level of quality on a daily basis..
-The Doc
April 19th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
It’s even funnier than you think.
The terminal featured in the example on the lower left appears to be an IBM 3278, which means Apple was
actually flirting with the then-enemy IBM when writing the page!
(You still see the ghost of the old 3278 in the various banking and inventory control systems. Whenever you see
a screen with inscrutable prompts and fixed with fonts with a black background, you’re most likely looking at
a 3278 display, even when you’re seeing it on a PC or Mac).
April 19th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
Apple really can’t update those pages because the majority of their sales today come from ergonomic nightmares: notebook computers.
April 19th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
What is that thing with a wire coming out of the man’s ear? Is it part of his neural interface or is it some ancient communications device?
April 19th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
Actually, considering the majority of their sales are now portables, they should change those illustrations to a guy using a Macbook
April 20th, 2008 at 3:32 am
If I asked you to duck my sick,
reversing the s and d of course dummy.
In 30 years would you be wondering how OLD my request is?
Same diff moron.
April 20th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Anon,
Well, yes, actually. Probably even more than with Apple’s ergonomics page, in fact.
If I were into that sort of thing, odds are you would be pushing at least 50 or 60 by then, and odds are age would be an issue.
But then, I’m shallow.
-The Doc
April 20th, 2008 at 8:10 am
It seems that apple has actually removed the page and just written plain text now.
April 20th, 2008 at 9:41 am
LeAsrale, you need to click those side links to see the pics, they are on the sub pages.
April 20th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Using your own products on a page like this could lead to the legal argument that they were designed with known defects. The focus is clearly supposed to be on the problematic positions the human is using. Demonstrating that even your competitors’ products have these problems is probably the best way of giving advice without incriminating yourself.
April 20th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
It’s not as if this page really needs updating. All of the issues with good posture are the same as they were in the 1980s, so it’s hardly surprising that the images weren’t updated. It’s not as if the webpage looks like it was created with 1980s web design tools, it just has content that didn’t really need to be changed.
Slow news day, indeed.
April 20th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
“Lightning Bolt Neck” - I wish I had one of those.
April 20th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
Let me ask you a question: how much has the human body changed since those drawings were made?
The ergonomics are the same, even if the illustrations are lame.
April 20th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
maybe Psystar has a better ergonomics page
April 20th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
they list a common cause of having a bent neck when working, as being unable to touch type.
i love their simple to the point mac styled solution. “learn to touch type”
April 20th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
The drawing of the guy squinting at the PC (?) is a joke. The screens on the first Macs were so small you could hardly see the letters. You had to put your face right up to the screen.
April 21st, 2008 at 1:02 pm
The “PC” in the lower pictures could be one of several different models of old Apple and Mac machines. The Apple IIgs for example, or at least a dozen PowerPC types.
April 21st, 2008 at 3:31 pm
This is kinda a lame story. I didn’t know ergonomics were limited to Macs…
April 21st, 2008 at 4:02 pm
I hate lightning bolt neck! I’ve got an iMac though. The screen is so huge that it is impossible to get neck
pains though, pretty sweet. Good find.
April 21st, 2008 at 7:48 pm
apple seems to have “removed” these images, if they even existed in the first place ….
May 1st, 2008 at 4:04 am
Gordons: the images are on the linked pages accessible on the right of the page linked to. A little searching would have found them quickly.
Sheesh!
May 5th, 2008 at 12:51 am
I just checked on archive and the images still exist and all the dates are there if any of you go and check it out