The iPhone reshaped culture, media, and communication through innovation

The iPhone's impact in 10 charts

It's been almost 20 years since Steve Jobs first unveiled the iPhone, the device that would come to define Apple for years and change not just the smartphone industry but the world at large. 10 examples of the iPhone's impact include its all-screen touch interface and the way it led to the rise of app culture.

How TikTok ate the internet

TikTok is now deeply integrated into American culture, thanks to the app’s powerful algorithm and focus on entertainment which have influenced popular trends and social media content consumption in the US. This immersive piece highlights TikTok’s role in helping shape everything from music to fashion and even politics in the US—while its connection to China has also drawn scrutiny and raised national security concerns.

Watch a video about how cellphones conquered the world

A fight with a telecom giant. A stunt call on a New York sidewalk. A forgotten memo that rewired the world. Host Sony Kassam sits down with Marty Cooper, the father of the cellphone, and Arlene Harris, the first lady of wireless, to explore the innovation, politics, and high-stakes battles that pried connectivity out of corporate control, unlocked the airwaves, and built the always-on world we live in today, for better or for worse.

Music today is often intended to circulate on social media

Artists are increasingly using TikTok and other short form video platforms as a space to promote their music. One scholar notes this emphasis, and connect it to Taylor Swift's early use of social media to promote her own work and brand.

The 2022 best picture winner, 'CODA,' was an Apple+ original

Streaming has changed more than how we watch movies—it's changed the way we recognize them during awards season. When movie theaters shut down during the early days of the pandemic, studios had no choice but to release their films on streaming. Once the shift occurred, there was no going back.

In 1984, Apple ran an award-winning Super Bowl commercial

Directed by Ridley Scott and a winner at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, the clip features a heroine flinging a sledgehammer at a Big Brother-style figure delivering a speech. As the screen shatters, a voiceover proclaims that Apple's release of the Macintosh will ensure, "1984 won't be like '1984.'"

'Because of phones, we always have the ability to jump out of ourselves. But unless you learn how to be in your head, you’ll never learn how to create.'

- Songwriter and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda (1980-present)

Are emojis real communication? And other questions for the experts

Emojis took off around 2009, after Apple's operating system for its defining iPhone became available in Japan. By 2012, a standardized set of emojis was released, and now seven in ten users feel a message without one of the 3,664 official emojis is lacking.

How Apple's GarageBand changed music

Apple's preinstalled, easy-to-use software GarageBand was first released in 2004. Since then, it's changed the way artists write and record music. The program's accessibility and ease of use have allowed beginner artists to experiment and find their voice, while major artists like Rihanna, Grimes, and Bjork have used the program to record hit singles and perform live. This article from the Red Bull Music Academy explains how the basic interface reshaped an industry.

Space travel sparked inventions we now use every day

Technologies developed for space exploration produced lasting spinoff innovations—from camera phones to memory foam—displaying how the space race reshaped everyday life here on Earth

The iPad drawings of a Pop Art legend

David Hockney gained popularity in the 1960s as a major figure in British Pop Art, but since then he's continued innovating, particularly through his use of an unlikely medium: the Apple iPad. This video essay explains why Hockney began drawing on the iPad in the late 2000s and analyzes his major iPad works, including the Yosemite Suite.

The rebrand to X was to make Twitter an all-in-one social media app

Elon Musk renamed the platform as part of his plan to create an app that goes beyond posts and tweets. The rebrand included a new name, logo, and vision for a platform that offers messaging, video, banking, shopping, and more.

Apple's latest invention

Apple may be working on a robotic smart lamp. Internally called ELEGNT, it's designed to respond to music, display emotion through movement, and even serve up reminders. A new research paper details how it could work—though Apple hasn't officially confirmed a release.

How soap operas are being reimagined for the smartphone

Apps like ReelShort, FlickReels, and DramaBox purport to offer "micro dramas," but they strongly resemble soap operas, with serial melodramas about romance and murder. This NPR piece unpacks the trend, highlighting why this new format appeals to demographics that never connected with daytime soaps.

The selfie camera exists thanks to Einstein's discovery of the photoelectric effect

Smartphone cameras utilize sensors such as CMOS or CCD to capture light by converting it into electrical signals through the photoelectric effect. Einstein explained this effect by demonstrating that light behaves as both particles and waves simultaneously, a discovery that earned him the Nobel Prize in physics.

How 'A Hard Day's Night' innovated popular culture

The Beatles' first film, "A Hard Day's Night," was groundbreaking, using innovative directorial techniques, the aesthetics of French New Wave, and slapstick class-based humor to effectively establish the model for the music video decades before the debut of MTV. This essay from a music educator breaks down how the film was received in 1964 and why it still resonates with new fans today.

'Foodie' culture arose in the early 2000s

Food writer Jaya Saxena attributes the mainstreaming of the term to early-aughts TV shows, including “Top Chef” and “No Reservations,” as well as the dawn of social apps like Yelp, which turned everyday diners into critics.

Burning Man’s countercultural messages have influenced Silicon Valley’s work culture

Burning Man is famous for attracting tech leaders like the CEOs of Tesla, Meta, and Google. Some experts believe the festival's ethos and principles of participation, communal effort and radical inclusion have given rise to Silicon Valley's communal work culture.

Tim Cook refused to give the FBI a backdoor into iPhones during a terrorism case

The Apple CEO's refusal to comply with the government's request was viewed as controversial, despite support from privacy advocates. The FBI would later back down, claiming to have gained access to the device without disclosing additional details.

Andy Warhol's presence continues to persist in pop culture

Warhol produced iconic album art for The Rolling Stones and The Velvet Underground. He also inspired rappers Jay-Z and Tyler, the Creator. Warhol’s immense influence on art and pop culture elevated him to celebrity status, and his identity and style continue to be referenced in sometimes unexpected corners of cultural consciousness.

Fantasy sports have turned fans into 'second screen' consumers

The rise of smartphones made fantasy sports more accessible and contributed to a phenomenon called “second screen consumption,” where sports fans are not only watching a live broadcast but are simultaneously watching the statistics from that game play out in their fantasy matchup.

The 'Miracle on the Hudson' showed heroism in the air and changed social media forever

On Jan. 15, 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 lost both engines after hitting birds and was safely landed in the Hudson River. The event was a turning point for Twitter, as a photo and a tweet quickly spread—marking Twitter's rise as a real-time news source.

9 billion voice notes are sent every day

The recorded voice note has come to replace a regular phone call conversation for some. Observers suggest the monological nature of the voice note corrodes the benefits of real-life interactions.

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

At its peak in 2001, the Toyota Prius made up 77% of the US hybrid vehicle market

Celebrities and early adopters popularized the model, making it a cultural symbol for eco-conscious driving and fuel efficiency. The rise of fully electric vehicles, like Tesla's Model 3, caused the Prius to lose the spotlight.

A smartphone contains over a dozen rare earth elements

One of the most important elements is indium, which makes up an electrically-conductive mesh beneath the display that provides touchscreen functionality. Alloys containing REEs are used in the magnets needed for the microphone and speaker.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

The Mona Lisa's celebrity status and repeated restorations have obscured what made the painting so revolutionary for its time

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

Some researchers have labeled nomophobia, the fear of being without your phone, as 'the phobia of the 21st century.'

Hear 50 years of iconic hip-hop samples, the genre's foundational looped tracks

Memecoins are a type of cryptocurrency—a form of digital currency with a wide variety of uses—created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes.

Tattoos remain visible on your skin thanks to immune cells called macrophages

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

Dorothy's famous entrance into Oz in 'The Wizard of Oz' relied on analog tricks, including a body double and sepia-toned paint, as much as it did on technology

The power and influence of the American presidency have expanded significantly over time—far beyond what the founders envisioned.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

Visualize how CRISPR-Cas9—a type of immune system used by single-celled organisms to attack invasive viruses—targets and makes precise changes to a gene's DNA.

The most expensive ad of all time was for Chanel No. 5 perfume and cost roughly $33M to produce in 2004—about $57M in today's dollars.

Sony set the standard for cylinder-shaped batteries when it repurposed manufacturing equipment used to make rolls of magnetic recording tape.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

In preparation for this weekend's Eurovision finale, which is something like the World Cup of pop music, here's a young Céline Dion performing (for Switzerland?) at the 1988 competition.

Graffiti dates back to at least ancient Pompeii, where citizens scrawled messages to one another on public walls

After 25 people used virtual reality headsets to practice flying with virtual wings—flapping their arms—their visual cortex responded to the wings almost as if they were real arms, treating them as body parts.

Fireworks make a loud booming sound after exploding due to air expanding faster than the speed of sound.

An initial public offering or 'IPO' is the process of a private company becoming public by putting shares of the company on the stock market for purchase.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones in communities in West Africa have hampered Ebola responses.

The American Society of Civil Engineers' infrastructure report card gave the US a C in 2025, its highest grade since the project launched in 1998.