In 1996 Apple needed a new operating system and looked hard at BeOS. It chose NeXT instead, and Steve Jobs came back with it. Be, led by former Apple executive Jean-Louis Gassée, carried on alone. BeOS could play several videos and audio tracks at once without stuttering, something Windows and the Mac struggled with. When Be went public in July 1999, it was still betting that people would install a second operating system for media work.

Built for Media

Gassée founded Be in 1990 with Steve Sakoman, another Apple veteran, who became its chief technology officer. They built BeOS from scratch. It used multiple processors at once, protected each program's memory, and handled audio, video and images with ease. Be first sold its own computer, the BeBox, then moved the software to ordinary PCs. The bet was that a clean, modern system could win over creative users. Few software makers wrote programs for it.

Six Dollars a Share

Be priced 6 million shares at $6 in July 1999 and listed on Nasdaq as BEOS. The money bought time but not users. In 2000 Be turned toward software for internet appliances, small devices for browsing the web. That market never took off. In 2001 Be sold its technology and intellectual property to Palm for about $11 million, and the company wound down. Fans still keep BeOS alive through an open-source rebuild called Haiku.

Cover: The Peasant Attacked by Bees, from The Caprices, Jacques Callot. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a swarm of bees (Be).