Today marks a decade since the death of Steve Jobs, and Apple’s own website has reminded us of him with an emotional video of all his legacy and history and a special dedication from his family. We could talk for whole afternoons about everything Jobs has done, but there is a way of remembering it that is more fitting for all of you reading this: his best moments at Apple events.
From the original Macintosh to iPhone 4
And it is that Steve Jobs has been many things, but of course he has also been a fantastic presenter of the products and services of his company. Let’s look at some examples.
The key Apple presentations that will remain in history are not few, and I would start with the original Macintosh. A very confident Steve would remove a floppy disk from the pocket of his jacket and leave the audience speechless with a computer capable of moving graphics and speaking for itself.
Another great key presentation was the first iMac. In just a few minutes Apple left the boring beige world of computers behind to enter the colorful and translucent. The phrase that remains for posterity: “the back of the iMac is prettier than the front of many computers.”
Wi-Fi connectivity is very common today, but a few decades ago it was a revolution. Apple introduced it in its first iBook, where he used a live web page while using a hulahoop to demonstrate that there was no cable providing signal.
The original iPod should also have a place on this list. Jobs explained to us how the music market worked and what players were used at this time, and moments later, bursting the entire market by presenting the first iPod. A thousand songs in a small device that fits in our pocket. He broke all the schemes.
The same pattern was revealed in the presentation of the first iPod Nano. A proud Jobs returned to the essence of the 1,000 songs in our pockets, but with an incredibly small size for the time that it could fit in that small pocket of the pants that no one knew its usefulness. Until then. The moment when the public reacts to seeing iPod nano for the first time is mythical.
A keynote that I always like to remember from time to time was the one from the presentation of the first 30-inch Cinema Display. Imagine seeing a screen of that size presented in a world used to 15-, 17- or 20-inch CRT monitors. People gasped. “A huge day in the history of the great.”
Another great moment left for posterity is the arrival of Intel chips to Macs. I perfectly remember watching that event and deciding to buy a Mac right then and there. Don’t miss Jobs enjoying himself as he reveals to the public that they had been watching all morning demos on a Mac with an Intel chip, or revealing that Mac OS X led a “double life” being compiled on Intel environments since 2000.
The term “performance per watt” is also heard at this event for the first time. In 2005 Apple was no longer interested in raw power, but in efficiency. They began to work on an efficiency necessary for future iPhones.
In a world where thin notebooks were 3 cm thick, one day Steve Jobs took the stage and introduced the first MacBook Air taking it out of an office envelope. Now that original MacBook Air seems crude and thick to us, but in its day it was quite a revolution. Special mention to the public surprise when Jobs reveals the size of the laptop’s motherboard.
And what about the Mac mini? His presentation was one of the funniest I can remember, with the audience laughing and a Steve Jobs who could finally say that Apple was going to sell a cheap Mac. No one believed how small it was until Jobs held it in one hand.
And what about the presentation of the original iPhone, truth? The Apple event par excellence, in which Jobs literally said “today we are going to make history.” And yes, Apple made history. Every second of the entire iPhone presentation will be studied for generations.
And from the iPhone we go to iPad. For the first time, Jobs presented a product sitting in an armchair, in order to demonstrate the scenario in which an iPad could be used. In 2010 the whole world was filled with doubts about this. Today it only goes without saying that I use my iPad Pro as a laptop.
Chronologically, the last moment of Steve Jobs was presenting the Iphone 4 that had leaked into the rumors. “Stop me if you’ve already seen this,” he said between laughter from the audience.
Beyond product introductions, Steve has also starred in some anecdotal moments in his introductions. There was one in which the slide controller broke, and while the problem was being fixed, the Apple CEO shared an anecdote about how it caused interference on the neighbor’s TV:
And finally there was another in which Steve had to ask the public (with some nervousness) to turn off their devices in order to have a good Wi-Fi signal:
All these moments are well engraved in the minds of the most veteran of Apple. Steve Jobs was a visionary who revolutionized several markets, but he was also a great presenter. Ten years later, those presentations are still surprising.