The Apple Wireless Keyboard is now shipping. Here's the unboxing of one of the very first, sent by a Giz reader. Looks as razor-sharp as when we had our first grope, but of course, still no sign of the "Apple" on the Command key. All thanks to Steve Jobs and Swedish campgrounds full of sculptural blue-eyed blondes:

Yes, blame the Swedes and Steve for the disappearance of the Apple logo on the Command key, a move that has been delayed for decades. When the Macintosh was first created, the pirate crew behind it thought they needed a special key that would call commands without using the mouse, directly from the keyboard.

They called it the Apple key and they embedded a little Apple logo plus a letter next to each command in every menu. The objective was for expert users to learn this combinations to become faster while working. According to Andy Hertfeld, one of the geniuses behind the original Mac, one day Steve Jobs came into the software area in Bandley, III. Zeus was upset, and with thunderous voice he said:

"There are too many Apples on the screen! It's ridiculous! We're taking the Apple logo in vain! We've got to stop doing that!"

They explained to him why they had the Apple logo there, but he was adamant. It had to be eliminated and replaced by something else: it diluted their brand and it just was bad bad bad. At that point Susan Kare had to pull one of her amazing graphic stunts. Susan, the artist who was mainly responsible for the bitmap icons in the Mac operating system, had to come with a solution fast because the symbol had to be used in everything: menus, manuals and, of course, the keyboards.

Finally she came across a floral symbol that was used in Sweden to indicate an interesting feature or attraction in a campground. She rendered a 16 x 16 bitmap of the little symbol and showed it to the rest of the team, and everybody liked it. Twenty years later, even in OS X, the Macintosh still has a little bit of a Swedish campground in it.

So there you go, there may not be an Apple logo in the Command key anymore, but at least you kept your Swedish campground. The sculptural blue-eyed blondes, however, are yet to be found.

[FolkloreThanks for the photos, David]

5:45 AM on Fri Sep 14 2007
By Jesus Diaz
17,386 views
14 comments

Comments

MickeyMoo at 09:58 AM on 09/14/07
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I hope the BT isn't crippled to be mac only like the last version of the Apple BT keyboard because I rather like this one.
Joseph at 10:45 AM on 09/14/07
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Where is mine! I ordered one a few weeks ago :).
med at 11:30 AM on 09/14/07
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I see it!... it's riiiiight behind the keyboard, on the little white piece of paper...

see it?
gunbu at 12:20 PM on 09/14/07
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I got mine in the mail on Wednesday. It's so light and compact compared to the original mac wireless board. I use it with my mac mini on my tv and it fits really well (and takes up less room on the coffee table). One thing I had to do once I had the keyboard linked to the mini, was do an update for it. Before I did the update (which didn't show up on the list until I had paired the new keyboard) it wouldn't display the battery life and the new volume control buttons didn't work. Now everything is peachy though.
CaptLonestar at 01:07 PM on 09/14/07
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Am I the only one that likes to have the 10 key on the right?
gunbu at 01:41 PM on 09/14/07
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@CaptLonestar:
I agree I wouldn't want this for a desktop or a workstation. It's great for a mac mini used as a media center, but I really couldn't see myself using this as my only keyboard. I wonder if they'll eventually release full size wireless one...
Reverov at 02:06 PM on 09/14/07
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It's on the underside of the keyboard... too bad that big white panel is not just a huge command key... erhm Apple key.
ianken at 02:26 PM on 09/14/07
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There's some style over substance right there. That does not look like a comfy keyboard at all. For a company all about ease of use Apple sure puts out some painful looking kleyboards and mice. You might end up with RSI but you'll look good doing it.
navstar at 03:15 PM on 09/14/07
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Anyone know if this will sync with a PS3? It would be a great lil keyboard when sofa surfing.

(I couldn't get a Mighty Mouse to sync with a PS3, however)

I don't understand the big deal about the Apple key. The first Macs didn't have an Apple key, it just had the Command cloverleaf.
MobileMilitia at 04:55 PM on 09/14/07
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@gunbu: i'd really like to discuss your setup if you read this. i've been planning on getting a mac mini to set up with my tv (46" samsung lcd, hdmi inputs) but i'm worried about the resolution not being very good.
daftrok at 06:07 PM on 09/14/07
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@gunbu, your resolution should be fine so long as you don't try to play any graphic intensive games (oblivion, bioshock, etc.)

I wish for three things on this laptop.
1) Removable rechargable batteries included
2) A USB output so you can hook the keyboard up wired in case you run out of juice.
3) A DETACHABLE number pad with its own little rechargable battery that snaps onto the side of the laptop, so if you need the number pad its there.
B. Whaler at 06:54 PM on 09/14/07
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This is one of the best image mock-ups in some time.

Not sure why I think so. It just made me laugh and laugh.

Maybe it's the combination of the hot sweedish chicks, that look on Steve's face and the way he is placed at the edge of the pic. With a nice TFSU there.

Whatever it is, Gizmodo is really starting to come into its own with this new line of humor. Good stuff.
gunbu at 07:04 PM on 09/14/07
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@MobileMilitia:
Sure thing,
I have a mac mini which I upgraded to a core 2 duo with 2 gigs of ram. I have a DVI to HDMI cable going into the tv (42" Samsung) running at 1920x1080. So basically I have a 500GB Newertech mini stack underneath which I have dvd rips on. Since the mini is running at 1080p, movies run at that res. Emails can be a little tricky to read sometimes but I usually enlarge the text or do the awesome "zoom" feature (hold control and move the mouse wheel forwards to zoom, backwards to zoom out). The mini is awesome because it's whisper quiet and I never turn it off, I just have it set to go into sleep mode after an hour. Its been on since December and it's only crashed twice when I was messing around with some third party apps.
MobileMilitia at 10:57 PM on 09/15/07
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@gunbu: do you or have you tried streaming videos from another computer to the mac mini? there's this media center app for the mac that i'm looking into, but playing videos and music for parties will be my main use for it. internet browsing will probably be a big thing too, and i'm not planning on running games or doing any sort of video editing on it. thanks for the comments, i'm inching closer to getting a mac mini.