Originally published at: Bill Atkinson Diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer - TidBITS
Although I generally refuse to interact with Facebook, I’ll follow a link there when it seems important. I was thus saddened to read this post from Bill Atkinson, one of the key figures in the initial development of the Macintosh and the inventor of HyperCard. I quote it in its entirety for those who boycott Facebook.
Request for Prayers
November 12, 2024I am asking friends and well-wishers to pray for me.
I believe that group intention can actually make a difference.On October first, I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Because of vascular involvement, surgery is not possible. I am taking weekly chemo treatments to shrink the tumor before surgical resection. I am tolerating the chemo pretty well, and I am in good spirits. Every day I make a point of getting out in the sun and walking with Cai and Poppy.
I am receiving excellent care for my physical body from a team of doctors and nurses at Stanford and UCSF. I am also receiving several different modalities of holistic treatments for my emotional and spiritual health. The treatments are helping, and I am feeling much less pain now. I am even regaining a little of the weight that I lost.
From my Iboga experience seven years ago, I know for certain that my consciousness and memories will continue after I leave my physical body. I have no existential fear of death. Actually more anticipation and curiosity.
At 73 years, I have already lived an amazing and wonderful life. I have loved and been loved, beginning with my remarkable mother who believed in me. With my work at Apple and General Magic I am grateful that I could make positive contributions to the lives of many millions of people, and even affect the course of human evolution.
But I want more quality time to share life and experiences with Cai and with my friends and family. My bucket list is not filled with places to travel, but instead with quality time with those I love and those who love me.
I am living my life filled with gratitude. Each day is a special gift to be unwrapped, enjoyed, and cherished.
Thank you for praying for me.
Bill Atkinson
Many years ago, I had the pleasure of a lengthy conversation with Bill. In “Macworld Expo 2010 Reboots” (15 February 2010), I wrote:
The highlight of my week came the day before the show actually opened, when I paused to look at some gorgeous photographs spread out on a table in the speaker lounge. Before I knew it, Bill Atkinson (creator of QuickDraw, MacPaint, and HyperCard, and an accomplished nature photographer) appeared out of nowhere to explain how the photographs came from his new iPhone app, PhotoCard, which enables users to send an email (for free) or paper (for a small printing and mailing fee) photo postcard, using either a personal photo or one of 150 of Bill’s nature photos. And when I say “explain,” I mean it in spades. Without prompting, Bill explained in detail how he’d built the back end, tweaked the Indigo printing process for the ultimate quality, and created a system that could serve as a marketplace for other fine art photographers.
Needless to say, Bill had seen the iPad at its introduction, and he felt it was an extremely positive move for the future of computing, showing that much of the complexity of maintaining and using a computer can be eliminated by rethinking user interfaces. He said, interestingly, that Apple had been working on the iPad well before the iPhone’s release, but that the necessary technology just wasn’t available, so Steve Jobs decided that Apple would instead focus on the iPhone as the first member of a family of iPhone OS devices. And, reportedly, Steve told Bill that the hardest engineering task in iPad development was getting the price down to the $499 level; technology development may be hard, but doing it within tight price constraints requires more than technical wizardry.
After Bill finished his whirlwind technical discussion of everything related to PhotoCard and the iPad, we went on to talk about his goals with HyperCard, how I’d started TidBITS in HyperCard format back in 1990, and why he left Apple for General Magic in part to create a device that would facilitate the passing of short notes called “telecards.” It was fascinating to think about how his work was too early – the cellular infrastructure wasn’t in place – but how it presaged SMS text messaging and Twitter, and may have even informed some of Apple’s iPad design.
Somehow that segued into a conversation about features that he had pulled out of MacPaint and his efforts to create a “learning processor,” and from there into educational philosophies about how we learn. Nearly two hours after we started, I had to pull myself away to meet Tonya at a media reception, but the time spent talking with Bill was an utterly unexpected bonus. Obviously, that’s not something that can be replicated for everyone, but that sort of serendipitous meeting happens all the time at Macworld Expo.
Our lives as Apple users have been immeasurably enriched by Bill’s work. Without him, the Macintosh might not have caught on, and HyperCard certainly wouldn’t have existed. And without HyperCard, I wouldn’t have started TidBITS—the opportunity to do electronic publishing in HyperCard was integral to my decision to help with Tonya’s idea of writing a weekly tech newsletter to keep her colleagues up to date.
I’ll be thinking of Bill, and I invite you to join me.
