S3 Apple

Apple Macintosh
Are you a Mac user? For many, home computers have become synonymous
with Windows and Bill Gates, but there has always been a loyal band of Apple
Macintosh users, whose devotion to the Apple brand and its co-founder Steven
Jobs is almost religious.
Steven Jobs and Steven Wozniak dropped out of college and got jobs in
Silicon Valley, where they founded the Apple Computer company in 1976, the
name based on Job’s favourite fruit. They designed the Apple computer in Job’s
bedroom, having raised the capital by selling their most valued possessions – an
old Volkswagen bus and a scientific calculator. The later model, the Apple
Macintosh, introduced the public to point and click graphics. It was the first home
computer to be truly user-friendly, or as the first advertising campaign put it, “the
computer for the rest of us”.
When IBM released its first PC in 1981, Jobs realized that Apple would
have to become a more grown-up company in order to complete effectively. He
brought in John Sculley, the president of Pepsi-Cola, to do the job, asking him:
“Do you want to just sell sugared water for the rest of your life, or do you want to
change the world?” Sculley and Jobs began to argue bitterly, however, and after a
power struggle, Jobs was reluctantly forced to resign.
By 1996 Apple was in trouble, due to the dominance of Windows software
and the increasing number of PC clones which could use it. Jobs, having had great
success with his animation studio Pixar, was brought back to the ailing firm for an
annual salary of $1, and the company gradually returned to profitability.
Apple’s computers cost more than most PCs, and have a more limited range
of software available for them, but their great appeal has been the attention to
design, making Apple the cool computer company. The launch of the stunning
multi-coloured iMac in 1997, followed by the sleek new iMac in 2002, marked the
end of the computer as an ugly, utilitarian machine, and brought the home
computer out of the study and into the lounge. As Steve Jobs put it, “Other
companies don’t’ care about design. We think it’s vitally important.”
Apple’s fortunes were transformed again with the development of the iPod
in 2003, which soon became a must-have gadget and brought about a boom in
Internet music sales. And of course, it was beautifully stylish.

*From: “New Headway” (upper-intermediate)

Answer the following questions.
1. How did Jobs and Wozniak design the Apple computer?
2. What characteristics of Apple’s computers can you name?
3. What is Ipod a must-have gadget?