We know Matt Groening for the obvious: he is the creator of the classic ‘The Simpsons’ and ‘Futurama’, but before becoming an animation legend he did other jobs for which he also deserves a mention. He usually goes unnoticed in his story, but Groening did a job for Apple.
The artist collaborated with the apple brand to create a promotional brochure in the form of a “Student’s Guide”, showing the main negative situations of someone who has just started higher education and how they could be resolved with a Macintosh of the time.
“It’s three in the morning. Do you know where your brain is?
In the pamphlet, titled ‘Who needs a computer anyway’ which you can see in its entirety in this Flickr gallery, uses the characters from the ‘Life in Hell’ comic strip with which Groening achieved some popularity at the beginning of his career. Each of these characters finds themselves in a difficult situation that the Macintosh or its applications can solve. Here is an example with someone who is overwhelmed by the volume of work he has:
“The Overtaken”. Characteristics: high-pitched cries of despair, cursed and constant stare. Attention: non-existent love life.
This is one of the situations described in the brochure, to later explain how you can better organize your day-to-day student work with the tools of the Mac OS from the late eighties. There are more situations like ‘The Procrastinator’, ‘The Imperfectionist’, ‘The Unemployed’, ‘The Hungry Student’ or ‘The Technologist’, who is fascinated by everything that happens in the world “except how to dress well“.
The brochure, published in 1989 and with only 16 pages, has become one of the most sought after collector’s items. This is demonstrated by a recent RRauction auction, where its price was estimated at around $200 and the winning bid ended up exceeding $650. At $41 per page, no less.
Brochures like this no longer exist, they are unique: nowadays they have become campaigns for social networks, viral videos or promotions on the brand’s official website. Nothing on paper. Keeping them will be increasingly difficult, and therefore their value will continue to rise as the years go by.
Image | Pablo Martinez
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