Bites from the Apple: For the Rest of Us...

Twenty-five years ago this weekend, an upstart computer company bought some ad time during Super Bowl XVIII (during which Jim Plunkett led the then Los Angeles Raiders to a win over the Redskins) and started a long journey of changing the face of personal computers and how they interact with our lives.

It's pretty amazing to reflect that what started out as a digital word processor and illustrator that sat on the desk has now become an information and entertainment hub that not only extends through the entire home to TVs and home servers but also outside the house with portable digital media players and phones--something we all take for granted now, but was definitely very sci-fi 25 years ago. For a bit of perspective, check out this original Apple Macintosh 18-page brochure via DigiBarn (hat tip to CNet News).

As you might expect, the Apple wing of the gadgetosphere is swimming in nostalgia (obviously, we've jumped in as well), and here are some of the more interesting tidbits surfacing around this rather nerdy anniversary:

• Boing Boing Gadgets takes a look at a review of the original Mac from the LA Times.

• Macworld takes a look at 10 standout Macs (in chronological order) from the past 25 years (I still have my PowerBook 140 hanging around my office) as well as the 6 worst Apple products of all time (I really think the iMac "hockey puck" mouse should be number one with a bullet).

• Caroline McCarthy at CNet's The Social blog delves into the backstory of the 1984 commercial.

• Cult of Mac shares the story of a rescued original Mac, which is still operable (with the pictures to prove it).

• Time Magazine chimes in with its Top 10 Apple moments.

There are a number of articles and posts theorizing what Apple's future might look like from a hardware and software standpoint, but I wanted to point out a passage from this week's earnings call with acting CEO/full-time COO Tim Cook, who gave a short speech about what Apple stands for (called the Cook Doctrine by Fortune) that reminds me of Kevin Costner's "I believe..." monologue from Bull Durham.

We believe that we're on the face of the Earth to make great products, and that's not changing. We're constantly focusing on innovating. We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.

We believe in saying no to thousands of projects so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to us. We believe in deep collaboration and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to innovate in a way that others cannot.

And frankly, we don't settle for anything less than excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we're wrong and the courage to change. And I think, regardless of who is in what job, those values are so embedded in this company that Apple will do extremely well.

I'm confident that Apple is going to continue to be an innovator and a major player in consumer electronics for the foreseeable future, whoever is at the helm of Apple following Steve Jobs' medical leave. Alright, enough nostalgia and heady corporate philosophies... it's time for news from the now from the week that was in Apple-y goodness:

• In this week's quarterly earnings call (in which Apple announced a pretty stellar quarter despite the current economic landscape), acting CEO/full-time COO Tim Cook pooh-poohed the idea of an Apple netbook (one of the new breed of smaller laptops that are primarily focused on Internet usage, such as the Eee PC)--though Wired notes that Cook's vagueness doesn't mean that Apple is ruling it out entirely. However, if you're up for a hacking challenge, the MSI Wind netbook seems a good choice for overhauling to run OS X--check out the posted video over at Cult of Mac.

• Another rumor that got killed during the earnings call was the iPhone nano. Said Cook: "You know us, we're not going to play in the low-end voice phone business. That's not who we are."

• The earnings call also noted that Apple TV sales have tripled over the last year thanks to the introduction of HD movie rentals (however, as per usual, no ATV sales figures were released), and thusly the "hobby project" will continue. The TG Daily blog reports that we could see the Take 3 revision of the ATV software as early as next month--along with the possibility of new hardware--and speculates on some of the features we'll see (including built-in TV tuner, App store access and ability to run iPhone/iPod touch apps).

• Apple's already diversified from being just a computer maker to becoming a full-fledged consumer electronics icon. Slate Magazine's Karim Bardeesy offers a new direction for Apple--start a bank with some of its $28 billion cash reserve (via TUAW).

• If you're not a prime time hacker, but you want to still have a bit more control over your Mac, the Secrets preference pane from Blacktree helps you avoid the scary Terminal to make changes ranging from Time Machine intervals to how your dock minimizes (via Cult of Mac).

• Apple TV Junkie gives a step-by-step for creating an Apple TV home media server (you'll need another computer to run iTunes). Jeff Carlson at TidBITS also wrote recently about using the Remote app on his iPhone to control his Apple TV and use it as his music hub.

• The Boy Genius Report lists its Top 10 things that bug him about the iPhone (many of which--copy and paste, no custom sounds for notifications, etc.--I agree with completely).

• The Mac-loving Obama administration entered the White House on Tuesday and found PCs still running Windows XP and Windows 2000 (via Ars Technica).

• And finally, a glimpse of Jonny Ive's playground courtesy of film director Gary Hustwit, who hopes to do for industrial design in his next film Objectified that he did for fonts in Helvetica (via Macworld and IntoMobile).

  

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

In topics: Apple