Apple's first logo was a portrait of Isaac Newton sitting under a tree

In 2017, tech company Apple filed for the trademark to a black-and-white image of a Granny Smith apple in Switzerland—a request that was only partially granted. Apple wanted full control over the image, but many worried that granting the trademark would open up too many opportunities for the company to own the rights to the mere shape of an apple.

Jobs introduced the now-iconic “Think Different” marketing campaign. It won numerous awards, symbolized Apple’s new era under Jobs, and showed off his understanding of branding.

During Super Bowl XVIII, Apple aired its dystopian “1984” commercial once to a mass audience, introducing the Macintosh and positioning Apple as a challenger to IBM’s dominance in personal computing.

The valuation was made possible by Steve Jobs' return to the company in 1997, who implemented a simplification strategy by cutting the majority of Apple's existing product line. His promotion of Jony Ive to SVP of industrial design would help popularize Apple through colorful products and marketing.

In honor of Apple's 50-year anniversary, Sequoia Capital recently posted a tweet on X (the social media platform formerly known as Twitter) with a photo of the original 1977 memo for Sequoia's investment in Apple.

Appointed SVP of industrial design in 1997 and chief design officer in 2015, Ive was responsible for the translucent plastic shells found on early iMacs and the iBook G3. He also oversaw the construction of Apple Park—the company's headquarters.

Before the Macintosh, computers were primarily used in offices and required users to type complex commands to perform tasks. Apple followed the device with the LaserWriter printer, bringing graphic production to at-home artists and designers.

From predicting our screen-filled future in 1983 to slashing Apple's product line in 1997, Steve Jobs believed in focus, simplicity, and the fusion of technology and art. His philosophies still influence how products are built and marketed today.

An operational Apple I, the first model of personal computer made by Apple, sold for $375K at an auction. The machine was first sold in 1976 and has a handwritten serial number by Steve Jobs himself. The auction, provided rare insight into the beginnings of the influential tech company.

The 1984 Mac control panel featured wordless icons, sliders, and desktop pattern editors, highlighting early experimentation in graphical user interface design. This software charm and personality gradually disappeared as Apple enforced visual and functional consistency over time.

In 1974, Steve Jobs traveled to India after reading a book by the famous American psychologist Ram Dass. Jobs visited the temple of one of Dass’s influences, Neem Karoli Baba. He stayed in India for seven months before returning to the US to found Apple. Jobs’s trip to India helped shape the tech leader’s vision for Apple.

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.'"

While Steve Jobs was on a hiatus from working at Apple, he founded a company called NeXT and helped lead the release of its operating system NeXTSTEP. The operating system was used to create the first app store of sorts, as well as the first web browser.

The devices Jobs introduced during his time at Apple, including the iPad and iPhone, were imitated by competitors, ultimately helping to create the numerous options consumers have today. In addition to leading Apple, Jobs also helped turn Pixar and the software startup NeXT into success stories.

Wanting Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak to focus on developing Apple computers, Mike Markkula brought in his colleague from Fairchild Semiconductor, Michael Scott. As employee number five, Scott helped professionalize the fledgling computer company and getting manufacturing off the ground.

-Apple co-founder Steve Jobs (1955-2011)

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak are well-known for cofounding Apple, but the company had a third founder who acted as an angel investor: Mike Markkula, who invested $250K in 1977.

Steve Jobs is well-known for his signature outfit: a black mock turtleneck and denim jeans. The outfit originated in Japan, where Jobs observed Sony employees all wearing matching uniforms. He proposed Apple employees do the same, but that idea was rejected. However, he still decided to create his own uniform.

During his Macworld San Francisco 2007 keynote address, Jobs claimed Apple had reinvented the phone by integrating phone capabilities with internet access and music playback from its iPod product line. The multitouch display eliminated the need for a stylus or keyboard hardware typically found on other smartphones.

Apple's cofounder debuted the first iPad in 2010, framing it as a third category of personal electronics between the laptop and the smartphone. Steve Jobs showed off how thin the device was (for the time) and explained how it was better than smartphones and laptops for browsing the web.

One of Cannes Lions’ most legendary winners, Apple’s “1984” ad was conceived by Chiat/Day and directed by Ridley Scott, fresh off his iconic film “Blade Runner.”

When Twitter launched in 2006, it featured green, slimy lettering and lacked the now-famous bird icon. The bird was adopted in 2010 and eventually became the platform's official logo—unofficially named Larry after NBA legend Larry Bird.

Apple nearly went bankrupt in 1997, when the tech company had only three months of operational cash left. Apple's board ousted cofounder Steve Jobs in 1985, but he was brought back as interim CEO to revive the company when Apple purchased Jobs' company, NeXT.

A graphical user interface that utilized windows, icons, and pull-down menus, rather than text-based commands, contributed to the device's success after its January 1984 launch. Its original sound system—capable of playing four voices—was developed after non-technical staff suggested the machine should play music.

Steve Jobs led Apple for almost a quarter century, first from 1976 through 1985 and then from 1997 through just before his death in 2011. A brief synopsis of his career underscores the impact he made during that timespan, across everything from technology to smartphones, moviemaking, retail and much more.

The launch of the MacBook Air in 2008 popularized the ultrabook category of laptops, while the iPad (2010) made large-screen mobile devices a technological norm. The iPhoneX (2017) introduced the notch, which has become a staple at the top of many smartphone displays.

Steve Wozniak's Apple I and Apple II computers launched the personal computer industry, influencing the future of consumer electronics. He was also awarded the National Medal of Technology and the Heinz Award in Technology, the Economy, and Employment because of his invention.

Apple Park features a ring-shaped main building that accommodates over 12,000 employees, situated above a two-story underground parking garage equipped with its own traffic light system. Inspired by Stanford University's foliage, Steve Jobs hired one of their arborists to oversee the planting of over 9,000 indigenous trees.

When the agency was established in 1950, the logo featured an eagle holding a shield with symbols of a pyramid, a test tube, a microscope, and a lamp from which light radiated. Subsequent logos featured variations of a ring composed of people holding hands, which would eventually be redesigned to enclose a globe bearing the "NSF" abbreviation.

Silicon Valley wasn't supposed to happen. A stretch of California orchard land somehow became the place that built the modern world: chips, PCs, the internet, the smartphone, and now AI. But the real story isn't the garage myth. It's a series of contradictions hiding in plain sight.

Born in 1774 in Massachusetts, Chapman planted apple orchards for pioneers across Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, to be sold to locals to produce hard cider. He became famous through a 'Harper's Weekly' profile in the late 1800s, cultivating the modern legend.

Steve Jobs left his mark beyond Apple with Pixar, the animated studio he acquired in 1986. In addition to pushing Pixar to focus on storytelling, Jobs led the studio to revolutionize animation via computer-generated imagery.

Apple's board fired cofounder Steve Jobs after he clashed with then-CEO John Sculley about Apple's goals and vision, as well as how to run the company. Apple later rehired Steve Jobs as interim CEO, a role he held until he died in 2011.

From 1981 to 1988, the sparkling ball was replaced by a “big apple” to promote the city’s “I Love New York” tourism campaign. This broadcast is from the apple’s first year, where one announcer proclaims, “It’s great! It’s beautiful!”

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.

First grown in Ontario, Canada, in 1795, the McIntosh became synonymous with the apple by the early 1900s. Newcomers on the market—especially the Honeycrisp in the 1990s—has nearly rendered the McIntosh irrelevant.

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.

Some even called Noyce the "Mayor of Silicon Valley." According to Steve Jobs, he was the "ultimate inventor, rebel, and entrepreneur." This Founders episode dissects an article from 1983 that explains Noyce's lasting impact.

In the early 2000s, Apple recruited multiple engineers onto rival teams tasked with combining phone, internet, and iPod capabilities. Despite significant technical hurdles, Steve Jobs favored a prototype with multitouch technology and a modified Mac operating system over a competing in-house model based on the iPod's click wheel.

Captured by National Geographic photographer Charles O'Rear in 1996, the photograph was uploaded to the stock image site Westlight in 1998, before being purchased by Microsoft. As of 2023, the hillside in the image is now home to rows of grapevines.