The History of the Apple Tablet Rumor
Posted 07/30/2009 at 6:52pm
| by Michelle Delio
November 27, 2003: Pay no attention to what that silly Steve Jobs told Mossberg a few months back. Robert Cringely, blogging for PBS, reports that an Apple tablet computer is on its way. "Quanta, the Taiwanese company that makes many Apple notebooks, has been apparently switching its production to the new tablets…," Cringley writes, suggesting that Apple may introduce the tablet "as early as January." Cringley notes that response to PC tablets has been tepid but predicts that Apple will revolutionize the market by making the tablet "a digital hub." Tablet owners will be able to "watch TV in your bathroom, access your audio and video collection from anywhere in the house, control your big screen TV and route video to it from your desktop or the Internet. Take a dozen movies and your entire music collection with you on a trip. Strap the gizmo to the back of your car headrest and entertain the kids. Grab e-mail from a passing WiFi hotspot. Surf the web. Play video games
August 13, 2004: The Register’s Tony Smith ferrets out a European design trademark filing by Apple for a vaguely named "Electronic Device." Illustrations for the gadget show what Smith describes as Apple’s "long-awaited tablet computer" a justifiable assumption since the patent directly references several PC tablets. Rumor sites debate whether the device is actually a tablet or a "giant iPod."
August 24, 2005: Apple posts a help wanted ad for a "Handwriting Recognition Engineer … passionate about providing handwriting solutions to end customers" who strongly believes that "using a stylus and a tablet is the way to interact with computers." Endgadget’s Peter Rojas wearily comments that "We should probably resist the temptation to read too much into this" but goes on to wistfully note that "Apple did receive a patent for a tablet-style computer earlier this year and so we wouldn't be surprised if it turns out that one of the reasons they switched to Intel was so they could build an ultralight, ultrathin Tablet Mac."
February 2, 2006: Apple is granted a new patent for a tablet computer apparently intended for use by zombies. The 52-page "Mode-based graphical user interfaces for touch sensitive input devices" patent filing (US 0026535) shows a hybrid tablet/notebook being poked and prodded by scary ghoul hands. Nearly and newly deceased Apple fans are thrilled.
May 14, 2007: AppleBlog’s Eddie Hargreaves lists the Apple Tablet as one of the “Ten Biggest Apple Rumors That Never Came True.”