1 HN user recommended this demo1 month2011–2024score 1
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
HN cites it as an early vision of personal software agents and AI assistants, and as a fun retro look at predicted computing.
Apple's late-1980s Knowledge Navigator concept video, produced under John Sculley, showing a professor using a tablet-like device with a conversational software agent. It envisions hypertext, touchscreens and voice assistants.
These are always fun to watch. Here's one of Apple's versions if you're curious: [this video] Microsoft still maintains its "home of the future". I think they update it every 3-5 years or so. Here's a newer one I found on youtube: [link] . It's pretty funny to see how the set, from what I can tell, is basically identical. And here's another Microsoft video about the "future of productivity" made back in 2011: [link]
Are you sure you're not thinking of Apple's Knowledge Navigator concept? [this video] This video is allegedly from 1987. Edit: I changed the link to an expanded video from the early 90s(?) which contains the original video + some other mockup usage examples for OpenDoc
Apple's Knowledge Navigator concept from around 1987
This. Exactly this. A personal software agent will make a lot of "smart" devices and many apps irrelevant. See Apple's vision from early ’90s: [this video]
Apple's early 90s vision of a personal software agent
Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.
Plays via YouTube's privacy-enhanced embed
4 Hacker News comments
From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.
Citations, criticism and jokes