Apple's board of directors decided NeXTSTEP was a better choice and purchased NeXT in 1996 for $ 429 million, bringing back Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

Ports of the game were released for the Commodore 64, Sinclair ZX Spectrum, Amiga, Atari ST, MSX, Amstrad CPC, Sharp X68000, PC ( MS-DOS, 1989 and 1996 ), Apple II, FM Towns Marty, Sega Master System, Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation, Sega Saturn, Nintendo Entertainment System, Famicom Disk System, Sega Game Gear, mobile phone ( Sprint PCS ), Texas Instruments TI-8x series of calculators and UltraCade's Taito Arcade Classics.

Digital Ocean, Inc. an OEM licensee of the Apple Newton, offered the Seahorse product, which integrated the Newton handheld computer, an AMPS / CDPD handset / modem along with a web browser in 1996, winning the CTIA's hardware product of the year award as a smartphone, arguably the world's first.

* 1996 – NeXT merges with Apple Computer, starting the path to Mac OS X.

Apple purchased NeXT on December 20, 1996 for $ 429 million and 1. 5 million shares of Apple stock, and much of the current OS X and iOS operating systems are built on the OPENSTEP foundation.

Apple Computer announced an intention to acquire NeXT on December 20, 1996.

In April 1996, Apple discontinued the Macintosh LC 580 ( released in 1995 ), the last remaining desktop model of the 68k-based Macintosh line.

Apple recovered from the 5300 debacle in 1996 and 1997 by introducing three new PowerBooks: the PowerBook 1400, intended to replace the 5300 as a general-purpose PowerBook ; the PowerBook 2400, intended as a slim, sleek sub-notebook to replace the PowerBook Duo ; and the luxury model PowerBook 3400.

Following an announcement on December 20, 1996, on February 4, 1997, Apple Computer acquired NeXT for $ 429 million, and used the OPENSTEP for Mach operating system as the basis for OS X.

In 1996, Marathon 2 was ported to Windows 95 ; both the original Marathon and Marathon 2 were ported to the Apple Bandai Pippin console under the title of Super Marathon ; and the third game in the trilogy, Marathon Infinity, was released ( for the Macintosh only ), built on a slightly modified Marathon 2 engine.

AltiVec was developed between 1996 and 1998 by a collaborative project between Apple, IBM, and Motorola.

Apple garnered international acclaim for her 1996 debut album, Tidal, which was a critical and commercial success.

Since Apple Inc's merger with NeXT in 1996, EOF has evolved into a fully integrated part of WebObjects, an application server also originally from NeXT.

Escape Velocity is a single-player role-playing space trading and combat video game series first introduced in 1996 by Ambrosia Software for the Apple Macintosh.

To support the RS / 6000 and RS / 6000 SP2 product lines in 1996, IBM had its own design team implement a single-chip version of POWER2, the P2SC (" POWER2 Super Chip "), outside the Apple / IBM / Motorola alliance in IBM's most advanced and dense CMOS-6S process.

In 1996, Amelio accepted invitation from Apple Computer, a customer of National Semiconductor, to join its board of directors.

Troubles at Apple later prompted the board to invite Amelio to take on the position of CEO, which he accepted in February 1996.

Its cube shape is reminiscent of the NeXTcube from NeXT, acquired by Apple in 1996.

The band has appeared in the Tournament of Roses Parade ( 1996 ), the National Cherry Blossom Festival parade, the Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival parade and field show competition ( which it won for three consecutive years, 1990 – 92 ), as well as several other festivals and Disney Magic Music Days at Walt Disney World.

Following an announcement on December 20, 1996, on February 4, 1997, Apple Computer acquired NeXT for $ 427 million, and used OPENSTEP as the basis for OS X. Traces of the NeXT software heritage can still be seen in OS X.

Apple released Cyberdog 1. 2 on December 4, 1996.

Apple released a first alpha version on December 21, 1996 with new features such as frames, cookies and animated GIF support.

* Mona Simpson's A Regular Guy ( 1996 ) is a fictionalized version of the life of her biological brother, Apple Computers co-founder Steve Jobs.

By the spring of 1996 WebTV Networks employed approximately 70 people, many of them finishing their senior year at nearby Stanford University, or former employees of either Apple Computer or General Magic.

In 1996, a tenth anniversary edition was released.

Ter-Petrosyan was re-elected in 1996.

Extreme poverty was defined in 1996 by Joseph Wresinski, the founder of ATD Fourth World as:

The second generation was led by Fernand Braudel ( 1902 – 1985 ) and included Georges Duby ( 1919 – 1996 ), Pierre Goubert ( 1915 – 2012 ), Robert Mandrou ( 1921 – 1984 ), Pierre Chaunu ( 1923 – 2009 ), Jacques Le Goff ( 1924 – ) and Ernest Labrousse ( 1895 – 1988 ).

A modified infrageneric classification of Amaranthus was published by Mosyakin & Robertson ( 1996 ) and includes three subgenera: Acnida, Amaranthus, and Albersia.

Their lower level Minor League Baseball teams began play in 1996 ; the expansion draft was held that year as well.

After the Soviet withdrawal, between 1992 and 1996, he was minister of defense in the new government of the Islamic State of Afghanistan under president Burhanuddin Rabbani, and acted as its military leader in the civil war against competing militias around Kabul.

The compelling rationale for this was the integral role technology now plays in our lives, which was not present in 1996.

For the centenary of the VFL / AFL in 1996, the Australian Football Hall of Fame was established.

The elite Legend status was bestowed on 12 members of the Hall of Fame in 1996: Ron Barassi, Haydn Bunton Senior, Roy Cazaly, John Coleman, Jack Dyer, Polly Farmer, Leigh Matthews, John Nicholls, Bob Pratt, Dick Reynolds, Bob Skilton and Ted Whitten ( see above list for further details ).

The first South Asian a cappella group was Penn Masala, founded in 1996 at the University of Pennsylvania.

The study of apoptosis brought on by Bunyaviridae was initiated in 1996 when it was observed that apoptosis was induced by the La Crosse virus into the kidney cells of baby hamsters and into the brains of baby mice.

In 1994, the State Compensation Law ( 国家赔偿法 ) was passed, followed by the Administrative Penalties Law ( 行政处罚法 ) in 1996.

In 1996, two-tier local government was abolished and Angus was established as one of the replacement single-tier Council Areas.

The musical was also revived with great success in 1996, starring Nathan Lane as Pseudolus ( replaced later in the run by Whoopi Goldberg and also by David Alan Grier ), Mark Linn-Baker as Hysterium, Ernie Sabella as Lycus, Jim Stanek as Hero, Lewis J. Stadlen as Senex, and Cris Groenendaal as Miles Gloriosus.

The song was later featured in the film The Birdcage ( 1996 ) and performed by Robin Williams and Christine Baranski.

Revision 1. 2 was the last version of the APM specification, released in 1996.

During his visit to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Manila in 1996, he was saved shortly before his car was due to drive over a bridge where a bomb had been planted.

In a July 2, 2011 editorial the New York Times opined, " The Defense of Marriage Act was enacted in 1996 as an election-year wedge issue, signed by President Bill Clinton in one of his worst policy moments.

The 1996 United States campaign finance controversy was an alleged effort by the People's Republic of China ( PRC ) to influence the domestic policies of the United States, before and during the Clinton administration, and involved the fundraising practices of the administration itself.