Sosumi
Sosumiis an alert sound introduced by Jim Reekes inApple Inc.'sMacintoshSystem 7operating systemin 1991. The name is derived from the phrase "so, sue me!" because of a long runningcourt battlewithApple Corps,the similarly named music company, regarding the use of music in Apple Inc.'s computer products.
History
[edit]Sosumi is a shortxylophonesample,which gained notoriety in computer folklore as a defiant pun name, in response to a long-runningApple Corps v Apple Computertrademark conflict.[1][2][3][4][5]The sound was long included in subsequent versions of its computer OS releases. However, in 2020 it was replaced inmacOS Big Sur.
During the development ofSystem 7,the two companies concluded a settlement agreement from an earlier dispute when Apple added a sound synthesis chip to itsApple IIGSmachine.[6]As a result, Apple Computer was prohibited from using its trademark on "creative works whose principal content is music".
When new sounds for System 7 were created, the sounds were reviewed by Apple's Legal Department who objected that the new sound alert "chime" had a name that was "too musical", under a1991 settlement.Jim Reekes, the creator of the new sound alerts for System 7, had grown frustrated with the legal scrutiny and first quipped it should be named "Let It Beep", a pun on "Let It Be".When someone remarked that that would not pass the Legal Department's approval, he remarked," so sue me ". After a brief reflection, he resubmitted the sound's name assosumi(ahomophoneof "so sue me" ). Careful to submit it in written form rather than spoken form to avoid pronunciation, he told the Legal Department that the name wasJapaneseand had nothing to do with music.[7][8][9]
InmacOS Big Sur,the original chime was replaced with a different sample, namedSonumi(presumably ahomophoneof "so new me", due to the change in versioning from macOS 10.15 to macOS 11). The original name was retained in the first public version of the OS, and was later changed to "Sonumi" as it appears in the System Preferences. The sound file itself in /System/Library/Sounds/ is still named Sosumi.aiff, and other alert sounds (such as "Breeze" or "Crystal" ) still have the same file names from the previousmacOSseries (Blow.aiff and Glass.aiff).
In popular culture
[edit]The term is in the poem "A Short Address to the Academy of Silence" byJay Parini.[10]
Apple used theCSSclass name "sosumi" for formatting legal fine print on Apple product web pages.[11][12]
In 2006,Geek Squadused this sound in their commercial "Jet Pack", in which a woman was frustrated over her computer.[13]
The sound can be heard prominently in the introduction toThe Simpsonsepisode "Homer's Phobia"(1997). The couch gag parodies theAOLDial-up Internet accesssign-on process, parodying it "America Onlink". On aSystem 7-like interface, the user clicks the "Load Family" button, getting to a stalled progress bar labeled "loading family". The unseen user, presumably frustrated with the delay, clicks an "Exit" button repeatedly, triggering "Sosumi" each time in response. At the time,AOLusers suffered significant issues accessing the service after AOL moved from hourly billing to a flat monthly fee, saturating capacity.
See also
[edit]- Apple Corps v Apple Computer
- Apple libel dispute with Carl Saganfor a similar revenge-by-pun anecdote
References
[edit]- ^Jennifer Lee (August 19, 1999)."The Sound and the Fury: Beating Back the Beep".New York Times.RetrievedJuly 23,2020.
- ^Greg Mancina (May 14, 2001), "Ding, dong, now I've got your attention",Saginaw News,MI
- ^Amy-Mae Elliott (October 18, 2010)."8 Classic Tech Sounds that Defined Our Digital World".Mashable.RetrievedOctober 8,2013.
- ^S. Derrickson Moore (April 2, 2006), "Sometimes all those bells and whistles just give us a headache",Las Cruces Sun-News,NM,
Sosumi "is such a strange word that I Googled it, searching for a definition, and got all sorts of references to lawsuits and defense attorneys. Really. I would have probed further but I don't like the sound anyway. So sue me.
- ^Owen W. Linzmayer (2004).Apple Confidential 2.0.No Starch Press.p. 283.ISBN9781593270100.RetrievedOctober 8,2013.
- ^Royal Courts of Justice (2004)."Judgment in Apple Corps Limited vs Apple Computer, Inc. - EWHC 768 (Ch) in Case No: HC-2003-C02428".courtservice.gov.uk.Archived fromthe originalon 2005-03-15.RetrievedOctober 8,2013.
- ^Jim Reekes describing the origins of the sosumi name (Vimeo)
- ^Xeni Jardin(24 March 2005)."Early Apple sound designer Jim Reekes corrects Sosumi myth".Boing Boing.Archived fromthe originalon 2005-06-01.RetrievedOctober 8,2013.
- ^Luke Dormehl (2012).The Apple Revolution.Random House. pp. 297–298.ISBN9781448131365.RetrievedOctober 8,2013.
- ^"A Short Address to the Academy of Silence"Jay Parini,The Sewanee Review,Vol. 112, No. 3 (Summer, 2004), pp. 344-345
- ^"The story behind" Sosumi "the Mac's startup sound".macamour.November 11, 2010. Archived from the original on 2010-11-25.RetrievedOctober 21,2016.
{{cite web}}:CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^"apple_legal_text_css.png".robertclarke.Archived fromthe originalon 2014-03-02.RetrievedFebruary 27,2014.
- ^Archived atGhostarchiveand theWayback Machine:"GeekSquad" Jet Pack "Commercial".YouTube.2006-06-19.Retrieved2020-07-02.
