When Woz gave the world the Apple II along with the floppy drive to allow for DOS to boot the inexpensive master piece from Cupertino, California, it would set up a standard for the small company that many would hold it to for years to come. Major successes came after, like the Macintosh, but has the last twenty years been as great as the first ten? Sure, the iPod, only in its infancy, is a success like none Apple has seen since that Apple II but what about the years before that? Has there been anything to really celebrate over the course of the thirty years of a very colorful history?

It seems when Wozniak was forced to leave the very company he co-founded just a year after the release of the Macintosh, things started to peter out for Apple. Sure, it had the color Mac, the AV Mac, the clones, and even the cube, but what really can Apple write home about in-between ‘84 and ‘04?

You know, every company goes through spells of lulls. Apple is no exception. It started off with a bang, no doubt, but after the fireworks are done, everyone goes home. That kinda happened with Apple for awhile until Steve Jobs came back in the late 90’s. His first order of “clean up” was ditching the clones that really didn’t seem to do much for Apple other than take money away from its bottom line. Guess IBM could have learned from that as it now no longer makes a single PC…which it invented. Second thing Jobs did was introduce a budget line of computers and while the iMac did a lot to change the industry it did not having quite the same effect the original Mac had on the computer world as a whole. Next was the update of the operating system, a BIG update, which became known as OS X. Again, even with the help of the Switch campaign, it didn’t have a huge impact on the computer world but what a master piece it was and continues to be. Then the iPod and now the Mac on Intel chips.

The Intel move is probably the biggest news in Apple’s history since Woz felt Motorola was the way to go way back when. It’s too early to tell if this will be one of the most monumental moves for Apple in it’s 30 year history, but it sure is to make some tremendous marks in the computer industry for sure.

So, has the last twenty been as good as the first ten? Probably not but take a look at other companies last twenty and you might find that Apple rather does shine in comparison. Here’s toasting to another thirty, Apple!

One Response to “Has the Last 30 Years at Apple Been as Good as the First 10?”

1. mark Says:
   March 29th, 2006 at 7:45

   Instead of looking at the 10/20 split, I’d just say that the years with Jobs and Wozniak are better than the years without them.

   1976-1985: Apple II, IIe, IIc, Mac, MacOS, MacPaint/MacDraw, Laserwriter
   1997-2006: iMac, MacOS X, iPod, iTunes/iTMS, iLife (iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, not-so-much iDVD)

   I include the software apps (MacPaint, MacDraw, iLife) because they were important in bringing much more costly/complicated solutions to the mainstream user for the first time – spurring innovation outside of Apple as well. MacPaint/Draw led to things by others such as Pagemaker, Illustrator, Director – they led people to see that PCs could be used for things other than text. I think the iMac was important in that it broke the beige-box mentality, and now computers could actually be evaluated on design and aesthetics. Mac OS X is a dramatically different beast than OS 9, and a solid base for the future; Pink, Taligent, Rhapsody, Copland were all OS projects that failed to deliver. The iPod/iTunes/iTMS established a completely new market.

   During 1986-1996, I think the highlights were the Powerbook, Hypercard, Newton, Inkwell. The middle two were great ideas that were ahead of their time (and poorly understood by Apple mgmt as to how to develop/parlay/market them further), and eventually failed. The people who established PDAs (Palm, Handspring) came from Apple. Inkwell, which started under Newton, might still turn out to be useful someday.