One of the several movies that Apple loved to produce in 1987 to inspire and inspire visions of the future he shows a voice assistant.
A prototype that makes us understand how deep the perspective speculations of the Cupertino company were. The voice assistant in this 1987 Apple video is a sort of Siri in an embryonic state, well 25 years before the official one. From a device halfway between a tablet and a folding mobile phone, the voice assistant managed appointments, searches and calls while also counting on a front webcam.
All of this was the Knowledge Navigator.
To give you a small sample of the company's foresight, I am putting below a photo of Apple's most futuristic model in 1987, fresh from conception.
That's right, it's Newton, the unfortunate grandfather of the iPhone. A handheld that showed how far the mind of the bitten apple (and at the time multicolored) was ahead, too much for the time.
Consider voice search (25 years earlier). Multi-touch (20 years before), ultra-thin (22 years before) and color screens (10 years for LEDs, 11 for OLEDs).
A crystal ball? A mage? In spite of the vulgar that attributes visionary talent only to Steve Jobs, it must be said that in 1987 the lion's share was John Sculley Yes, that was the first year of an Apple without its founder, obsessed with the future (as you see successfully) but unable to keep your feet on the ground by designing real, contemporary, practical devices.
In a few years Sculley would have brought the apple to the brink before the welcome return of the "prodigal son" Jobs, who in the meantime had created Next and Pixar.
As for the web link, that's the only easy prediction. The video rides on an imminent revolution: the first internet contracts in the US would have been sold two years later, in 1989.
Moral of the story? It is not enough to think things first: you also need to think about them well, at the right time and focused on the user experience.
