Today, the Apple logo and name are two of the most iconic corporate and technological symbols. Understandably, their popularity has resulted in a great deal of speculation pertaining their source and backstory, a consequence of which several theories have emerged. To the disappointment of many, the real explanations are often much simpler than the exciting, often embellished ones. Given that the first logo made a direct reference to apples, it is speculated that, Isaac Newton, whose ideals clearly influence the company’s values, inspired the name. Another popular explanation proposes that the founders of Apple sought to pay tribute to Alan Turin, who was the brains behind several key designs upon which modern computing rests. He died in prison, where he was serving a sentence for homosexuality, by eating an Apple laced with cyanide. However, the most credible theory so far is that Steve Jobs had an orchard in Oregon and stuck for another name, he decided to name the company after McIntosh apples, which were his favorite. Steve Wozniak corroborates this version by saying that the naming process was a simple and straightforward one and they considered anything that sounded interesting (Linzmayer 6). While this last theory appears to upstage the others, there is no denying that the connection to Newton’s Apples and his idealism makes a compelling argument.
Origin of the Apple Logo
The fact that the name of the logo is also literally the name of the firm means that many of the explanations for the two are similar. The Alan Turing story has frequently been advanced in relation to the logo with claims that the bite is symbolic of his fatal bite of the poisoned Apple. There has also been speculation to the effect that it was put there to create a space for the “A” in the word “Apple” which often followed the logo. Alternatively, some suggest that it is synonymous with a “Byte” in computer terms, representing a unit of storage space. All these suggestions have however been dismissed as nothing more than, interesting and convenient coincidences. Sensational and exciting as they may sound, the designer of the Apple logo, Rob Janoff, claims these are simply urban legends. He says that the bite on the Apple was specifically meant to distinguish the logo from a similar looking fruit such as a cherry (Linzmayer 6). When the company was formed, the Apple metaphor played a big part in the initial logo. It was a drawing of Sir Isaac Newton under the tree where he discovered gravity (Linzmayer 6). Nevertheless, Steve Jobs decided it was too classical for the company’s contemporary products and asked Janoff to concentrate on the Apple. He created the bitten Apple, decorated with several colors of the rainbow in a deliberately disarranged design (Lüsted 37). This apparent lack of order is thought to have been Job’s way of encouraging open-mindedness and outside the box thinking, which are some of Apple’s core values (Lüsted 60). However, the colored design later gave way to the present monochrome one. The transformation is attributed to the fact that Apple was nearing a collapse in the 90’s, and the colored logo was proving too expensive to put on all computers. Secondly, the shift from plastic to metal necessitated the change, since the directors felt a colored design would look out of place on a metal surface.
Works Cited
Linzmayer, Owen W. Apple confidential 2.0: The definitive history of the world’s most colorful company. San Francisco: No Starch Press, 2004. Print.
Lüsted, Marcia Amidon. Apple: Company and Its Visionary Founder, Steve Jobs. Minnesota: ABDO, 2012. Print.