Apple Keyboard: Cleanliness Does Not Compute

For a company so concerned with keeping things neat & tidy, Apple had a long way to go with their keyboard design over the past few years. The big issue for me is that the previous generation of Pro keyboards become so incredibly gross so incredibly quickly as hair, crumbs, dust, and who-knows-what-else lands between the keys. Making matter worse, the front edge of the keyboard is clear, allowing all to see the gunk that has gathered. When one of our designer’s keyboard’s keys became stuck, I needed to pry the whole thing apart and nearly passed out from the sheer sight of what lay beneath. One would think that we did nothing all day here but eat biscotti, use shake n’ bake, and pull our hair out (well, maybe this part is true). Given that MSLK is a pretty darn clean place, I fault Apple for this collection of disaster. Kudos to Apple for improving the design of the new keyboards. They are sleek, slim, and svelte, featuring a low profile, leaving no gaps for life’s little messes to gather. Click below for more images of what we discovered beneath the keys of a two-year-old keyboard (not for the feint of heart…) Gross: And grosser: