The Birth of Cool

I've been a Mac user off and on again for over 10 years. But in the past three I've made the decision to never turn back to a PC again. I love my Apple computer(s) and all of their glorious portable devices. Some days I look in our office and chuckle at what appears to be a Steve Jobs-worthy shrine. We have 4 iPods (don't ask) in addition to our pimped out individual Mac workstations. And we hope to add more members to the family of products soon.

And since Sunday was my birthday (yay!) I found it cool to see that Apple was also 'born' in June as well. Here is a technology company driven by excellence in design and usability - and succeeding at profitability. With the upcoming launch of the iPhone (a must for my fellow gadget lovers), Apple Inc. - now 30 years old - shows no sign of slowing down.

TechCrunch offers their take:

The Apple Mac may not hold a position of dominant market share today but amongst the influencers of Web 2.0 there is no other choice. The iPod is all dominant; even Apple could not have predicted the market dominance that iPod holds today. On June 29 the Apple iPhone will take the Apple brand to the mobile phone market, and even if it doesn’t meet market hype, its impact prior to launch is already causing competitors such as Samsung to respond.

In my opinion, Apple single handedly saved the computer industry from 'grey box' thinking. There is no reason why a product cannot look sleek and function flawlessly. The iMac and the iPod (in all of their respective iterations) have shown consumers and competitors alike that great function does not always require the elimination of good form. Happy birthday, Apple.