Both Willow and #USVideo advertise their products as if reasonably knowledgeable people who aren't computer experts can use them. We make no doubt at all that this is true, but it's not simple. It’s going to take time. As Roberta says, before you can #genlock, you have to understand what genlocking is all about; and you only think you know that.

First came the# Willow manual: she reports that in 12 pages of text, there was not one single sentence that she understood, Part of it is the terminology, but some of it is the English: she’s not at all sure some of the sentences actually say what Willow thinks they say. The USVideo manual wasn’t a lot better. (j p) #Byte #ByteMagazine #Anno1990

But I'll break this off at Koko’s behest. #Koko (born 1971, with a potential span of more than 50 years) is the world’s most studied gorilla, and bids fair to be its most pampered Mac user.

She has an American Sign Language vocabulary of over 600 words. The pet of the #GorillaFoundation, she uses “a standard #MacII enclosed in a special gorilla-proof housing,” constructed of ½-inch polycarbonate for bolting to the floor of her trailer.

Apple's #Vivarium Program has even designed a customized inch-thick touchscreen “to withstand, the 2,000 pounds of force an excited gorilla can potentially generate.”

The problem, you see, is that angry or excited gorillas tend to “run full speed and backhand the object of anger,” and Koko's arm-swing is comparable to “a 10-pound shotput traveling at 100 miles per hour.” No wonder Project Koko helped the team to “a better understanding of human-computer interfaces.”

Some users do get _mad_. (h k) #Byte #ByteMagazine #Anno1990