The Woman Who Gave the Macintosh a Smile (2018) (opens in new tab)

I love this video of Kare giving an introduction to the Mac interface on "Computer Chronicles" back in 1984 [1]. At first it seems quaint to see how slowly and carefully she explains what we now consider to be basic UI features. But then you realize that for many people in the world, a desktop computer is just as strange and confusing to them now as it was to most people back then. I think some of us (me included) would do well to keep this video in mind when explaining technology to non-technical people.

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=x_q50tvbQm4

Of course. Everyone should know who Susan Kare is. She's made most of the famous user interface icons - Apple's, Microsoft's, Facebook's.

http://kare.com/

> Every fifteen minutes or so, as I wrote this story, I moved my cursor northward to click on the disk in the Microsoft Word toolbar that indicates “Save.”

I guarantee the author did not use MS Word but rather some cloud platform to author this.

I always wondered who came up with that slowly pulsing light on sleeping first generation ibooks. It seemed like someone had put a lot of thought into that: It was very calming.

She gave a great talk recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lx9Wtd2P48

That whimsical and idealistic nature is just completely gone from Apple, it died sometime in the 90s.

Past related threads:

The Story Behind Susan Kare’s Iconic Design Work for Apple - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17290055 - June 2018 (48 comments)

Susan Kare designed the suite of icons that made the Macintosh revolutionary - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16883633 - April 2018 (74 comments)

Behind the Icons: An interview with Susan Kare - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12258469 - Aug 2016 (19 comments)

MoMA Recognizes Susan Kare, the Designer of the Macintosh's Original Icons - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9159021 - March 2015 (2 comments)

The Sketchbook of Susan Kare, the Artist Who Gave Computing a Human Face - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7864129 - June 2014 (10 comments)

Classic Mac icon designer Susan Kare takes the stand: live from Apple v. Samsung - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4352627 - Aug 2012 (1 comment)

The Sketchbook of Susan Kare, the Artist Who Gave Computing a Human Face - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3266499 - Nov 2011 (1 comment)

I think there have been others as well...

> Through their work, and now hers, one can see a legacy of personal touch that one hopes will continue into our digital future on a deeper level than fingerprint readers. She gave the Mac a smile—where’s the smile now?

I‘m not really sure how literally this question is meant. The finder icon on macOS still has a smile.

Kare's art is full of character. The Solitaire cards are different from everything else in Windows. I recognize the Chicago font immediately upon seeing like three words for a split second (it's still used a lot in headings on videos and presentations, and sometimes even physical lettering). This is despite never having used the classic Mac or iPod.

Every time I need a good icon for my personal interfaces, I mourn that the art of 16x16 icons seems to be lost. In image search, ‘icon’ now means something like 256x256.