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Think you know everything about the world's most iconic tech company? Think again! Join us as we count down the most surprising, fascinating, and little-known facts about Apple Computers! From forgotten founders to unexpected design choices, the real story behind Apple is stranger than you'd ever imagine. Which fact blew your mind the most? Let us know in the comments!
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00:00And I'd like to announce one of our first partnerships today, a very, very meaningful one, and that is one
00:05with Microsoft.
00:07Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the Apple facts that reveal just how strange, bold,
00:12and unlikely the company's rise really was.
00:14That 10% today would be worth $22 billion if he was still there. What happened with Ron Wayne? What
00:20was that story about?
00:23Number 10. The original Macintosh mouse only had one button.
00:28Introducing Macintosh.
00:30It does all the things you'd expect a business computer to do.
00:34It does a lot of things you wouldn't expect a business computer to do.
00:38And it does some things no other business computer has ever done before.
00:43When the Macintosh burst onto the scene in 1984, it revolutionized personal computing,
00:48with its graphical user interface making computers accessible to millions.
00:52A key component of this paradigm shift was its sleek, cream-colored mouse.
00:55What many might not realize today, accustomed as we are to multi-button peripherals,
01:00is that this groundbreaking device famously featured only a single button.
01:03The real genius of Macintosh is that you don't have to be a genius to use it.
01:11Macintosh.
01:11The computer for the rest of us.
01:13This wasn't an oversight or a technological limitation.
01:16It was a deliberate design philosophy championed by Steve Jobs himself, inspired by minimalist
01:22work done at Xerox PARC.
01:24While competitors quickly adopted multi-button mice, Apple steadfastly stuck to its one-button
01:29design for decades.
01:30Only introducing a scroll wheel in 1998 with the multi-button Mighty Mouse in 2005.
01:35It does all the things you'd expect a personal computer to do.
01:40It does a lot of things you wouldn't expect a personal computer to do.
01:44And it does some things no other computer has ever done before.
01:50Of course, to do all this.
01:53Number 9.
01:54The Lisa Computer was named after Steve Jobs' daughter.
01:56When Apple invented the personal computer, we were all alone in the world.
02:01But soon it seemed that everybody was trying to build a better Apple.
02:07Well, somebody finally did.
02:10Lisa from Apple.
02:12So advanced it puts us right back where we started.
02:16Alone again.
02:17Long before the Macintosh, Apple launched another graphical user interface computer, the Lisa,
02:22in 1983.
02:24This machine, though commercially unsuccessful, was a technological marvel for its time.
02:28Featuring protected memory, multitasking, and a document-centric workflow.
02:32Well, I think Lisa, as compared with existing computers, is the difference between today's
02:36car and yesterday's car.
02:38Yesterday's car was a bit the get-out-and-get-under technique.
02:40You had to know how the car works.
02:42When I get in the car in the morning, I want to put my key in and go and get
02:45to where I want
02:46to get to.
02:47And that's what Lisa brings to the computer world, the ability to sit down and not even
02:53understand what's going on in the machine.
02:54It's so easy to use.
02:55But beyond its technical specifications, the Lisa holds a deeply personal and initially
03:00controversial connection to Steve Jobs.
03:02It was named after his first child, Lisa Nicole Brennan Jobs.
03:05For years, Jobs publicly denied paternity, even claiming the name was an acronym for Local
03:09Integrated Software Architecture.
03:11However, the truth eventually came out, most notably in Walter Isaacson's biography of
03:15Jobs, where Jobs himself admitted the machine was indeed named for his daughter.
03:19Behind my back at the office, you know what it stood for?
03:23Local Integrated System Architecture.
03:25I was five.
03:26Why couldn't you just lie?
03:28I did.
03:30Of course it was named after you.
03:32Local Integrated System Architecture doesn't even mean anything.
03:36Number eight, the original Apple logo featured Isaac Newton.
03:39Generally, most companies have their logo as just a logotype.
03:44And every once in a while, a company has a logo that's sort of a little jewel, a symbol.
03:50Before the sleek, instantly recognizable, bitten Apple became synonymous with innovation and
03:54design, Apple's very first logo was a remarkably intricate and surprisingly old-fashioned
03:59illustration, designed by the third co-founder, Ronald Wayne, in 1976, but more on him later.
04:05This initial emblem depicted none other than Sir Isaac Newton.
04:09Sitting beneath an apple tree, seemingly just moments before his legendary discovery of
04:13gravity.
04:14However, this complex illustration proved impractical for various implications, especially at
04:18smaller size or in black and white.
04:20Steve Jobs quickly realized it needed to be replaced, and within a year, the iconic rainbow-striped
04:25bitten Apple designed by Rob Yanoff took its place, forever cementing a cleaner, more modern
04:30identity for the nascent company.
04:32And at Apple, we had such a symbol.
04:33Matter of fact, at Apple, it was very rare because the symbol was the name of the company.
04:38Number seven, Susan Kerr designed many original Mac icons and fonts.
04:42There's a thousand little dots in half an inch, and you have the capacity, either real or magnified,
04:49to turn off and on each one of those dots.
04:52So in a screen that's fairly big, or a piece of paper, eight and a half by eleven, you've
04:57just got so many scads of dots.
04:58There's nothing, really, that you can't present on that screen.
05:04If you've ever used a Macintosh, you've almost certainly encountered the delightful, user-friendly
05:08graphical elements designed by Susan Kerr.
05:10Hired by Apple in 1982 to work on the Macintosh team, Kerr, with a background in art and calligraphy,
05:16brought a profoundly human touch to the cold, impersonal world of early computing.
05:20She meticulously crafted many of the original Mac icons, bitmap fonts, and user interface
05:25elements that gave the operating system its approachable and distinctive personality.
05:29And it's not that I wouldn't show things to lots of people, but I think there was some
05:36intuition behind some of the decisions that were made about what icons to use, as opposed
05:44to a lot of data, and that was probably a good match for me.
05:50Her innovative use of pixel art allowed her to create universally understandable visual metaphors
05:55that made the Mac incredibly intuitive. Fonts like Chicago, Geneva, and Monaco also sprang
06:00from her creative vision, becoming crucial components of the Mac's visual language.
06:04All you do to print, unlike most computers where you, you know, hit a control key and
06:10a print key sequence, you just hit one button. It says print, and it prints. And you can actually,
06:16Bill made it so you can watch on the screen the whole document gradually being printed and
06:22follow your progress. It's, it's pretty nifty.
06:25Number six, Mac OS is built on NextStep.
06:28We're going to show you some of the neatest apps that have ever been created for any desktop
06:34platform. We're going to show you the best color that's ever been. And we're going to talk about
06:44what we think is going to be the most important new application area of the 1990s called interpersonal
06:49computing. One of the most pivotal and perhaps surprising chapters in Apple's history is the
06:54very foundation upon which its modern operating system, Mac OS, formerly Mac OS X, is built.
06:59This robust and powerful architecture didn't originate within Apple's Cupertino walls,
07:04but rather from NextStep, the advanced object-oriented Unix-based operating system developed by Next
07:10Inc. People told us they loved NextStep and that it was three, four, five years ahead of anything else
07:15they'd ever seen in the industry. And they loved the fact that we built it on top of Unix. Because
07:20together, this gave them the multitasking that they really wanted. It gave them the transparent
07:26networking that they needed. It gave them the object-oriented development environment so that
07:32they could build applications in a third of the time." This was the company Steve Jobs founded after his
07:37dramatic departure from Apple in 1985. When Apple was struggling in the mid-1990s to modernize its aging
07:43classic Mac OS, it embarked on a desperate search for a new operating system. Apple made the monumental
07:48decision in 1996 to acquire Next, primarily to bring jobs back and critically to adopt NextStep as
07:54the basis for its next generation OS.
07:56The Next team certainly looks forward to being integrated into Apple and working with all the
08:00great people at Apple to come up with a next generation system that I think is going to be truly
08:05a
08:05breakthrough. And the great thing about it is that you can get your hands on it today to start
08:10developing applications so that when we start shipping this stuff in less than a year,
08:14your applications can be ready to roll on it. Thank you very much.
08:17Number 5. The Mac G4 Cube had no fan.
08:20The heart of the G4 Cube is incredibly complex. I mean, it's a super computer. But we were looking
08:26for a final design that was very simple. A design that left you with a sense of, well, of course,
08:32that's the most natural, the most elegant solution possible.
08:36In the year 2000, Apple, under Steve Jobs' renewed vision, unveiled the desktop computer
08:40that was as much a work of art as it was a technological statement. The Power Mac G4 Cube.
08:46Designed by Joni Ive, this distinct machine was an 8-inch cube elegantly suspended in a crystal
08:51clear acrylic enclosure. Its most astonishing engineering feat, however, was something it
08:55conspicuously lacked, an internal cooling fan. The G4 Cube is designed to go onto your desk,
09:00so we saw that it was crucial that we could remove both visual and audible clutter. So the
09:06team figured out a way to actually remove the fan. The product's air-cooled so that it's virtually
09:11silent. In a bold move to prioritize silence and aesthetics, Apple engineered the G4 Cube
09:16to cool entirely through natural convection. Hot air would rise out of a vent at the top,
09:21drawing cooler air in from below. This fanless design resulted in an incredibly quiet computer,
09:26a truly unique selling proposition in an era of noisy desktops. I think the thing that I'm most
09:31thrilled with is that the products are now very different, but that together they do relate as
09:37one very harmonious family. Number four, the Macintosh Portable's Unexpected Weight. And when you're
09:43ready to travel, Macintosh can easily go along. The durable carrying case is strong and waterproof.
09:50Your Macintosh, keyboard, mouse, manuals, and software all fit neatly inside. In 1989, Apple
09:57made its first serious foray into the world of truly portable computing with the introduction of the
10:01Macintosh Portable. The company's ambition was to create a full-featured Macintosh experience that
10:06users could take with them. And while it was undeniably portable in concept, its physical reality was
10:11something else entirely. Tipping the scales at a staggering 15.8 pounds, approximately 7.2 kilograms,
10:33this portable machine was heavier than many modern all-in-one desktop computers and certainly heftier
10:38than any laptop today. While its internal specs and display were advanced for a portable machine,
10:43the sheer bulk and a premium price tag of $6,500 meant it struggled to find a market.
10:48Oh, I think it's a milestone machine. It really is. And I think you will see
10:54portables in the future, even PC portables, having built-in pointing devices because we are moving into
11:01the age of graphical user interface. Number three, the Apple One was a circuit board kit. The Apple One
11:07released in 1976 wasn't a complete personal computer in the modern sense, but rather a pre-assembled
11:13circuit board kit. A rare Apple One is up for auction. Apple One helped spark the personal
11:18computer revolution. This particular Apple One set includes the original Apple One board,
11:23modified Apple Two keyboard, and modern Standcore power supply mounted on a wooden display board.
11:30Designed by Steve Wozniak, it was intended for electronics hobbyists and enthusiasts who would then have to
11:35supply their own power supply, keyboard, display monitor, and a casing. I learned a great deal
11:40from using this machine, and it was one of the very first opportunities one had to have own an
11:46actual computer. I had worked with computers for some time, but they were big mainframe computers,
11:51so this was a chance to have my own. So I, you know, I have a heavy heart a little
11:56bit to get rid of it,
11:57but time comes. Steve Jobs with his early business acumen saw the potential in selling pre-assembled
12:02boards rather than just schematics, convincing Wozniak to produce them. 50 of the produced units
12:07were sold to the Byte Shop, an influential computer store, for $500 each, which then retailed them for
12:13$666.66, a number Wozniak liked for its repeating digits, not for any sinister reason. And now this
12:19humble device, one of only 50 thought to still exist, and one of only six working, is up for grabs.
12:26Its original price, $666. Now, it's expected to go for up to $180,000 at Sotheby's in New York on
12:37June 15th.
12:38Number two, Microsoft's investment saved Apple. During the last several weeks, we have looked
12:43at some of the relationships, and one has stood out as a relationship that hasn't been going so well,
12:51but had the potential, I think, to be great for both companies. In 1997, Apple was in dire straits.
12:57Years of mismanagement, flagging sales, and a confused product strategy had brought the company
13:02to the brink of bankruptcy. It was at this critical juncture during Steve Jobs' dramatic return as
13:06interim CEO that one of the most unexpected and truly iconic moments in tech history unfolded.
13:11Microsoft, Apple's longtime rival, invested $150 million in the struggling company.
13:29The investment in non-voting Apple stock was part of a broader agreement that also included Microsoft
13:34pledging to continue developing Microsoft Office for Mac for five years. That was in addition to
13:40settling all outstanding patent disputes between the two companies. Jobs famously explained that for
13:45Apple to thrive, it needed to shed the idea that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose.
13:50Apple has decided to make Internet Explorer its default browser on the Macintosh.
13:58Since we believe in choice, we're going to be shipping other internet browsers
14:09as well on the Macintosh, and the user can, of course, change their default should they choose to.
14:14Number one, Ronald Wayne, the third founder. While most people readily associate Apple's
14:19origins with the visionary partnership of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, a critical,
14:24often overlooked figure in the company's genesis is Ronald Wayne.
14:27And he came to me and he said, look, there's this guy, he kind of respected Ron's thinking. Ron
14:32wasn't one of these arch conservatives reading all the conservative books of the time, you know,
14:37today he'd be considered a wacko. An experienced professional from Atari,
14:41he was brought in by Jobs to provide adult supervision and act as an arbitrator between
14:46the two ambitious Steve's.
14:47So Ron Wayne, all of his money would be at stake. So he was taking 100% of the financial
14:51risk for 10%
14:52of the company and it was too flaky and he sold out. He, you know, he didn't have a vision
14:58that was a big picture, but it was so early with just the Apple one, it was hard to see
15:03where Apple
15:04would go. The Apple two really changed the story and that came about three months later.
15:08However, just 12 days after Apple was officially founded in April 1976, Wayne decided to sell his share
15:14back to Jobs and Wozniak for a mere $800 and later an additional $1,500 to forfeit future claims.
15:19His decision, though entirely understandable at the time, given the high risk nature of startups,
15:24stands as one of the most poignant what ifs in Silicon History Valley.
15:27Wayne repeatedly stated he had no regrets preferring a quieter life.
15:31I knew exactly what would have been if I had stayed with the company.
15:35I would have wound up heading a very large documentation department at the back of the building,
15:42shuffling papers for the next 20 years of my life. And that was not the future that I saw for
15:45myself.
15:46Which Apple fact shocked you the most? Are there any we missed? Be sure to let us know in the
15:50comments.
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