Steve Ballmer

Yep. These are now companies like OpenAI, Airtable, Scale, as well as large e-commerce companies. So it's not just that they have the experience across startups. They can also keep working with you as you scale to the growth phase and beyond.

So if your company wants to go back to focusing on what makes your beer taste better, go on over to pilot.com slash acquired and tell them that Ben and David sent you. All right, so David, why are we talking about the Mac?

So if your company wants to go back to focusing on what makes your beer taste better, go on over to pilot.com slash acquired and tell them that Ben and David sent you. All right, so David, why are we talking about the Mac?

Totally. Far and away, the first thing to point out is the first version of Microsoft Excel was for the Mac. It's especially crazy for all the finance people today who are like, oh, Mac Excel isn't real Excel. Excel has to happen on Windows. No, Excel was on the Mac. That was it. Yes.

Totally. Far and away, the first thing to point out is the first version of Microsoft Excel was for the Mac. It's especially crazy for all the finance people today who are like, oh, Mac Excel isn't real Excel. Excel has to happen on Windows. No, Excel was on the Mac. That was it. Yes.

And the logic basically was Microsoft was really coming around to the idea that the next big thing in computing was the graphical user interface. And the reason they were coming around to this was because They knew from Xerox PARC just as well as Apple did, and they were rapidly trying to figure out how to get all of that Xerox PARCiness into their product line too.

And the logic basically was Microsoft was really coming around to the idea that the next big thing in computing was the graphical user interface. And the reason they were coming around to this was because They knew from Xerox PARC just as well as Apple did, and they were rapidly trying to figure out how to get all of that Xerox PARCiness into their product line too.

That's the other half of this sort of untold Xerox PARC story. And one of the first ways that they see to bring the graphical user interface to their products is launching Excel for the Mac, because they basically see... The way that we got destroyed with Lotus 1.2.3, we can't compete with Lotus on the IBM PC. So we're going to shelve multi-plan and kind of start over.

That's the other half of this sort of untold Xerox PARC story. And one of the first ways that they see to bring the graphical user interface to their products is launching Excel for the Mac, because they basically see... The way that we got destroyed with Lotus 1.2.3, we can't compete with Lotus on the IBM PC. So we're going to shelve multi-plan and kind of start over.

And Excel is going to come out in the graphical user interface. And we're going to try to be first and best on the GUI.

And Excel is going to come out in the graphical user interface. And we're going to try to be first and best on the GUI.

Yep. And of course, Apple loves this. The Macintosh came out in 1984 and everybody remembers the great intro video and the hello script. And I've watched that Steve Jobs keynote because of course I have. And it's this magical moment in computing history where finally something that's insanely great comes out. And it's like, The beginning of Steve Jobs' unbelievable presentation prowess.

Yep. And of course, Apple loves this. The Macintosh came out in 1984 and everybody remembers the great intro video and the hello script. And I've watched that Steve Jobs keynote because of course I have. And it's this magical moment in computing history where finally something that's insanely great comes out. And it's like, The beginning of Steve Jobs' unbelievable presentation prowess.

It's so fun to watch it. And it's, of course, a product that eventually people really loved. But at first... It doesn't have the killer app. No. It's a product that was supposed to ship in 82. It didn't. It shipped in 84. And so at the time, what they were targeting for 82 was like a pretty great set of technologies. By 84, it's kind of an aging set of technologies.

It's so fun to watch it. And it's, of course, a product that eventually people really loved. But at first... It doesn't have the killer app. No. It's a product that was supposed to ship in 82. It didn't. It shipped in 84. And so at the time, what they were targeting for 82 was like a pretty great set of technologies. By 84, it's kind of an aging set of technologies.

So it debuts with 128K of memory, which basically isn't enough to create any interesting applications. And so developers are kind of ignoring it as an interesting platform to develop on. Within 12 months, they kind of figure it out and come out with a better version that's 512K. And that's kind of the version that people now really think about

So it debuts with 128K of memory, which basically isn't enough to create any interesting applications. And so developers are kind of ignoring it as an interesting platform to develop on. Within 12 months, they kind of figure it out and come out with a better version that's 512K. And that's kind of the version that people now really think about

Yes, exactly. But in the meantime, Microsoft, the applications group, is working their ass off to make something really great for the Macintosh, and they come up with Excel. And so what ends up happening is Apple's really trying to promote the sales of this machine, and... they kind of view Excel and PageMaker as the killer apps, as reasons that people should buy this thing.

Yes, exactly. But in the meantime, Microsoft, the applications group, is working their ass off to make something really great for the Macintosh, and they come up with Excel. And so what ends up happening is Apple's really trying to promote the sales of this machine, and... they kind of view Excel and PageMaker as the killer apps, as reasons that people should buy this thing.

Because once you run through a lot of the demo apps and the stuff that Apple built, you're like, okay, what else is here? It's kind of crickets.