The ashes of 9/11 were still falling across America three months later, in December 2001. Everyone was depressed and business was lousy in most corners of the world. Even in Silicon Valley, which had fueled the national optimism for so many years, technology companies—and worse, the entrepreneurs who powered them—were on the ropes.

I was just as depressed as everyone else, when my boss called: Steve Jobs wanted to give Time Magazine an exclusive look at his next big thing. Would I like to write the story? I was ambivalent. Despite having written about tech since the early 1990s, I was not a proper “computer guy.” I was an Internet guy! My interest in Steve Jobs ran mainly to the historical. And, like too many other idiots at the time, I had written Apple off as little more than a (failed) hardware company that had totally missed the really important stuff, which was happening in the network, not the machines.

Still, I showed up in Cupertino, at 1 Infinite Loop, a few days later (it’s a living) and was brought into a conference room, where I met the legendary Steven P. Jobs. I am an ADD, fidgety kind of guy, and it was immediately and sadly clear to me that this was not going to be a fast, in-and-out kind of story. No, I was stuck here. A prisoner of the most controlling control freak the world had ever produced.

For the next three days, I was Steve’s personal project, and he orchestrated every second of my visit, right up until 10 a.m. of the morning of the last day, when I was frantic to catch a plane back to NY to write my story. My notebooks were full. I had 10 times as much as I needed for a cover story, and I was pretty cranky at having to come back to Steve’s office, yet again, for an exit interview. He was late — 15 minutes, and I was ready to walk. Just as I was gathering up my things he came in and, with all of his considerable charm, apologized. What had kept him? He was editing copy for some ads Apple was running around the new iMac computer that Apple was about to launch!

The guy paid attention and no detail was too trivial to escape his notice. And nothing was more important than Apple. Actually, that’s not true: The most important thing of all was secrecy. Steve REALLY cared about secrecy. He understood that keeping things secret had two enormous benefits to a great tech company: Secrets kept competitors at bay, and it kept your market crazy with anticipation.

I tell you all this to set up the enormity and horror of what happened next. I flew home and cranked out my story, toiling through much of the weekend to get it done. TIME had agreed to embargo the story, which wouldn’t be on newsstands until that Monday. That was when Steve was going to unveil the new product—it was the first, flat-panel iMac, which sat on a half-dome base—at the annual Macworld conference.

But at some point well after midnight Sunday in New York, my phone rang, rousing me from sleep: “Josh? It’s Steve Jobs. We have a really BIG problem,” he said.

I do not recommend this as a way to wake up. And it got worse: Apparently, the cover story had accidentally been published on Time Asia’s website. And now, of course, it had travelled around the world and back to Apple fans everywhere. We were able to pull down the story, but the damage had been done. Steve was pretty freaked out. For the first time, he wouldn’t be unveiling a new product—we had inadvertently done it for him.

Many years later, an Apple employee who was very close to the situation told me that Steve was so upset by the whole affair, he refused to go on stage at Macworld and show off his new creation. “What’s the point?” he reportedly complained. It was indeed a BIG problem—for his handlers, who had to convince him that the show must go on.

But here’s a side of Steve Jobs that you might not have heard about. He was actually a very sweet and stand-up guy and never held that awful escapade against me. In fact, a few months after Macworld, I was named editor of Business 2.0, a struggling magazine in San Francisco that was by no means on Apple’s radar. (They wouldn’t even talk to us for stories.) But one day shortly after I arrived, my publisher said that a neighbor of hers, a top-level executive at Pixar, had arranged for a number of us to take a tour. We all trundled out to nearby Emeryville to have a look around. Soon after the tour began, our guide said, “There’s someone here who wanted to see you guys,” and we were led into a small auditorium. There, seated in the middle, with his legs flopped up and over the seat in from of him, was Steve. “I wanted to say hello personally and welcome you to California, Josh,” he said. Then he graciously showed us around the place.

Josh Quittner is editorial director of Flipboard. Previously, he was the executive editor of Fortune and the editor of Business 2.0. Check out Flipboard’s tribute to Steve Jobs here.

Image courtesy of Flickr user acaben.

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The last time I paid attention to rechargeable batteries was probably back in the early 1990s. We had this huge recharging tech that allowed you to recharge all sorts of batteries – none of which we owned – so we were limited to recharging the D cells we had and used in, as I recall, some kind of remote controlled boat.

Anyway, Energizer has brought the battery charger into the 21st century by adding an LCD display that shows current charge level and, get this, hours left until a full charge.

There’s not much to say here. You can charge AA and AAA batteries – not at the same time – and the $19.99 kit includes four AA batteries, which is nice.

Slow charge rate prevents damage to battery during charging and extends
number of life cycles
· Large LCD Screen displays charging progress via a countdown clock and fuel gauge
· Charges 2 or 4 AA or AAA NiMH rechargeable batteries
· ENERGY STAR®-certified
· Disposable and bad battery detector

Bottom Line
Well, the charger works and it has an LCD read-out. We are truly living in the future.

For only $22,500 you can own the robotic hand shown in the video above. That’s nothing for a piece of NASA history.

This impressive early prototype demands an important place within robotics history as the first motorized dexterous robotic hand. It represents one of the early steps towards making robots more anthropomorphic. The Omni-Hand was designed and built in the early 1990s by robot pioneer Mark Rosheim with funding from NASA contracts NAS8-37638 and NAS8-38417. Two prototypes were made. The first was a “test bed” whose features were then incorporated into this complete unit. Both had the same power and control system.

The more I watch the video above, the more I’m amazed that it was developed in the early ’90s. It seems that if it had artificial skin while holding that ostrich egg, it would make headlines even today. [ebay via luxarylaunches]

The Sega Genesis, put on the market to challenge Nintendo, turned 20 on Friday. And after a long and enviable stint, it became a classic game console that, to this day, is remembered as one of the few that made its mark without actually leading the market by the end of its generation.

The 20-year-old Sega Genesis.

(Credit: GiantBomb)

Sega has had one of the most tragic histories in the video game industry. In the early 1990s, it had Sonic; Nintendo had Mario. It had high-quality, third-party titles; Nintendo had high-quality, third-party titles. It had the Sega Genesis; Nintendo had the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

Battles over which console was better were waged on playgrounds across the world. The Nintendo fans said Mario and the SNES were the kings of gaming. Sega fans said Sonic and the Genesis held that crown.

Today, the Genesis (and Sega’s console business) are relics of the past. In the 20 years that has lapsed between the Genesis’ release and today, despite Mario’s enduring presence, the video game industry has changed dramatically. Nowadays, battles are waged over price as much as they are waged over games. And Sega, the once-beloved organization that kept a blue hedgehog as its mascot, is a third-party developer.

But it’s the Genesis–and its success–that we remember today.

…

Originally posted at The Digital Home

Apparently the space boxes that send GPS data down to our waiting TomToms and iPhones are breaking down. The entire system could start failing next year, sending all of us into a strange hell of missed turns and aimless driving.

The satellites are overseen by the US Air Force, which has maintained the GPS network since the early 1990s. According to a study by the US government accountability office (GAO), mismanagement and a lack of investment means that some of the crucial GPS satellites could begin to fail as early as next year.

“It is uncertain whether the Air Force will be able to acquire new satellites in time to maintain current GPS service without interruption,” said the report, presented to Congress. “If not, some military operations and some civilian users could be adversely affected.”

Remember: this is a US commissioned study and they’re basically trying to get more than the $2 billion they’re already getting to upgrade the system. The first replacement satellites should have been sent up in 2007 but failed. New satellites should hit the airwaves this year or we could end up using Russia or China’s homegrown solutions.