Why Is Every Keyboard ‘QWERTY’?

Morning QWERTY!

Look at this keyboard:

Seem familiar?

It should cause your keyboard probably looks the EXACT same with ‘QWERTY’ up top…

But why ‘QWERTY’?

What’s wrong with another layout, like alphabetical?

Well, allow me to explain…

The year is 1864.

There’s this inventor guy, Christopher Latham Sholes…

He is working on an idea for a machine that can write for you.

Basically the first typewriter!

But he runs into a problem with the machine…

When he hits two keys close together too quickly, they jam!

And there is no way to fix it.

This happens A LOT because many commonly paired letters are positioned too closely together just because of how the alphabet is structured.

So this causes lots of jamming…

Not good.

But then Sholes has an idea!

He thinks of splitting letters that commonly occur next to each other onto different sides of the keyboard.

And into different columns.

So after a couple attempts… he came up with this:

QWERTY!

Or close to QWERTY, the M should be on the bottom row, and the C and X keys are flipped.

But other than that, it is the QWERTY we know and love!

It also totally solves Sholes’ problem because letters commonly used next to each other are split between left and right. 

And letters not commonly used together are placed in columns.

Not only does this minimize jamming, but it also prevents our fingers from muddling up with each other.

Thus, the first commercial typewriter was born!

And from then on…

(Minus a few tweaks) 

We were too lazy to change it… so QWERTY stuck!

Stay Cute,
Reece, Henry & Dylan 🌈

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