A Brief History of Apple Innovation

A Brief History of Apple Innovation

by Larry MacPhee Associate Director, e-Learning Northern Arizona University

Disclaimers

The views expressed are those of the presenter and not necessarily the views of e-Learning or Northern Arizona University ? I have no relatives who work for Apple Computer, but I have made a fair bit of money buying and selling AAPL stock.

“It's really hard to design products by focus groups

A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them” -Steve Jobs, 1998

History

Apple leads the personal computer (PC) industry not in market share, but in innovation. Apple introduces more new technologies to the public than any other computer company, and most of these technologies eventually find their way into all computers. Apple has shaped the PC industry like no other company. Not IBM. Not Intel. Not Microsoft. Not Adobe. Not HP. Not Dell. The following is a list of Apple firsts. Want to see the future computing? Watch Apple.

1. The Personal Computer

1977

Apple II

2. The GUI

1984

Macintosh

3. Plug and Play

since 1984

Plug and play

4. The LAN

1984

AppleTalk

Local Area Network

5. Desktop Publishing

1985

WYSIWYG

Desktop Publishing

6. Hypertext

1987

Hypercard

7. AppleLink

1989

AOL

8. The Modern Laptop

1991

Powerbook

9. Multimedia

1993

Quicktime

10

The PDA

1993

Newton

11

Digital Photography

1994

Quicktake

The Dark Years 1995-97

Windows 95 Mac clones Brain drain Copland Performas Weak CEOs Sculley Spindler Amelio But finally…the return of Steve Jobs

12

The iMac

1998

Just in time for the Internet

13

Wireless

1999

Airport

14

Digital Video

2000

iMovie

15

MacOS X

2000 ->

MacOS X

16

Digital Music

2001

iTunes and iPod

17

The Switch to Intel

Processor parity Windows on Mac

2006

Intel

18

iPhone

Apple reinvents the cell phone

2007

19

AppleTV

Apple tries to repeat iPod’s success with movies

2007

20

iPad

Apple’s reinvents the computer…again

2010

The Future

The Post-Steve Era

More good stuff

http://www.apple-history.com http://www.folklore.org/index.py

Why Macintosh

Not a major target for hackers Very few viruses affect Macs Runs the most popular software Seamless Hardware-OS integration Low TCO (Total cost of ownership) High resale value Innovative industrial design Supportive user community High reliability High customer satisfaction The choice of creative professionals Runs Windows too iOS and MacOS are very similar

Why not Macintosh

Some websites will treat you poorly Some services come later to Mac Some applications may not be available Gaming is a drag Some hardware/drivers not Mac compatible Harder to get local repairs More limited shopping options International customers have to wait Costs more up front than a budget PC Mac haters will pick on you You can still use your iPod with a PC Apple can be fickle towards its users

Decisions, decisions

Is it worth it?