Apple watch from 1995

Apple Watch — these two words no doubt bring to mind the sleek, smart device that puts a computer on your wrist. It’s a piece of technology that has permeated our lives. But the one Tim Cook debuted in 2014 (launched in 2015) wasn’t the first Apple Watch. A littleknown, largely forgotten relic of the World Wide Web era came two decades earlier.

Steve Jobs, the Apple cofounder and prickly visionary, had been ousted. In the ensuing years, the company endured a level of innovationstasis, iterating on the same technologies year-in and yearout. As a result, it slowly began losing market share as rival Microsoft began preparing its true arrival onto the scene.

In 1991, it released “Macintosh System 7” — a new operating system built on the original Macintosh interface. Unlike previous versions that required inserting a floppy disk into the computer to run, this was the first to utilise CDS. From 1991 to 1995, Apple made small adjustments to the OS, culminating in System 7.5 set for release in May 1995. It offered all manner of new features including “one-stop access to email, faxing, and the Internet”. It set the price for Macintosh System 7.5 at $134.99. If you were to buy a new Mac computer, the OS would come standard — but if you were just upgrading on your computer, you had to pay up. Likely realising the price was high, Apple decided to bundle their new product with some extras.

So here was the incentive. If you bought System 7.5, you would get — at no extra cost — your choice of either a piece of software, Conflict Catcher 3 (meant to help alleviate issues with third party applications running on the Macintosh), or … an Apple Watch.