In the 1980s, the company declined. Machines running Microsoft
Windows with Intel chips were faster and cheaper and began to win
over the rational organ (the brain). Word and Excel became global
standards. You could play most games on the Intel computers, not
Apple’s. This was when Apple began its move down the torso, from the
brain to the heart and genitals—and just in time: the company was
destined to sink below 10 percent market share from over 90
percent.^13
The Apple Macintosh computer, launched in 1984, had attractive
icons and a personalized look that appealed to the heart. A computer,
it turned out, could be friendly. It talked—at its introduction the
computer famously wrote “Hello” on its screen. Artists could express
themselves on the Mac, create beauty, and change the world.^14 Then
the big breakthrough: desktop publishing. Adobe software was
uniquely suited to the Mac’s precise, bitmapped display.^15
Owning an Apple, as embodied in the infamous “1984”
commercial, reinforced our belief that Apple users were NOT another
brick in the wall.^16 The result was that I, and the employees of my
start-ups, struggled through two decades of underpowered and
overpriced products just so we could claim we were thinking
differently.
But it wasn’t sexy. Most people back then didn’t go anywhere with
their computers. They put them in computer rooms. And dragging a
potential mate in there to show off some hardware wasn’t practical or
romantic.
To become a true luxury item, the computer would need to shrink,
learn new tricks, be more beautiful, and be in, near, or on your person
to signal success to peers in public and private. The transformation
began with the iPod, a glossy white block the size of a deck of cards
that placed an entire music library in your pocket. Among other mp3
players, all of them awkward gray, navy, and black, the iPod was also a
technological miracle—5GB of memory vs. the second largest
competitor, Toshiba’s 128MB. Apple searched the electronics industry
to find a company willing to make a disk drive so tiny, almost jewel-
like.
Eventually, Apple would drop “computer” from its corporate name
in recognition that the concept of the computer was anchored in the