Surprise and Delight
The Aerial screensaver has always been one of my favourite quality-of-life details of the Apple TV box, and I was happy to see it arrive on macOS, with the bonus touch of slowing and becoming the desktop background when you unlock the computer.
For a long while I stuck with the default Sequoia forest video, but recently I fancied a change, and opening up Settings I came across an absolute gem that I had no idea was there, the “Macintosh” screensaver.
This consists of extreme, animated close-ups of UI from the original 1984 Mac, slowly panning over a colour gradient background. Not only is the effect superbly executed, but the content is well chosen — recognisable applications such as MacPaint and MacWrite, the iconic cursive “hello”, and (slightly anachronistically) the “here’s to the crazy ones…” text.
I’m not entirely sure how this ended up in macOS. Apple are now a globe-spanning behemoth serving an incredibly broad customer base. Most of their customers weren’t born in 1984, and I’d imagine most of those who were wouldn’t recognise what they were seeing. The fact that something so niche made it through the big company machinery is surprising, and it delights me a little every time I open my computer.
Update 2025-07-18: This morning I noticed another nice touch; the time on the virtual Mac is correct, and updates live. I’d assumed it was basically a layered motion graphic, but apparently they’ve gone to even more effort than I thought. Brilliant.