It'll Never Catch on

How extraordinary it is to think that one person invented the computer mouse. Something that is so commonplace in work, schools and homes and something we take so much for granted. Yet the computer mouse hasn't been around for that long. I remember with fondness joining Churchill Insurance in 1989 and working my way into the IT department. There were certainly computers then and Churchill pioneered the use of IT back then which drives much of UK industry today. The computers back then were all text based, running UNIX and what we now refer to as 'green screen' terminals.
I recall one particular day when we were all asked to attend an IT department meeting. We were told that some people from a company called 'Microsoft' were visiting to showcase a new computer system they were calling 'Windows'. I think we saw it as yet another company trying to jump on the Churchill bandwagon, given that Churchill was at that time the UK's fastest growing company.

I remember a projector and a computer set up in a meeting room and the now familiar Windows desktop. On the desk was a standard looking keyboard and another device attached to the computer by a long thin cable. We were shown by the very excited representatives of Microsoft how the pointer on the screen responded to movements of the device on the desk. They called it a 'mouse' and it became clear why given its appearance. They demonstrated how programs were executed by double clicking an icon on the desktop and how it was possible to grab an item and move it to a desired location. Dropping an item in the recycle bin caused the computer to make a paper scrunching sound. The people demonstrating the system were clearly very excited by it, but were we? Well the answer is no. In fact our head of IT at the time stated to his assembled team that 'it'll never catch on'. We all agreed and so things remained the same for a couple more months.

Then slowly, things began to change. Managers began to have their computers replaced. One by one, computers running the Windows 3.1 operating system by Microsoft began appearing all over the company. Someone had clearly been impressed by what they had seen, though it is more likely that our biggest rival Direct Line, just down the road in Croydon, had begun installing them. The preference throughout my time there was to wait for Direct Line to do something, give it a few months to make sure it didn't flop, then do it ourselves, only ten times better.
Excel seemed to be the favorite application at the time though it didn't take long before staff had found Solitaire. The star field screensaver was also popular as was the Marquee screensaver which allowed staff to type their own message to scroll across the screen whenever they left their desks, messages such as 'Mel's Computer', 'Back in 5 minutes' and 'Don't even think about it'. For those witnessing the coming of Windows, these were exciting times.
So I find myself giving thanks to Doug Englebart. For his invention changed forever the way we interact with computers. If Windows hadn't been invented by Microsoft, maybe we would never have known about the mouse, for it was really Windows that exploited its full potential and made it an essential aid to using Windows 3.1 way back then. Long may we continue to point and click.