John Sculley forced the departure of Steve Jobs. Then Jobs founded the company that would give Apple his second life, with a logo that brings an amazing story.
To say that Steve Jobs was someone peculiar would be an understatement. He wasn’t like the rest, and that’s why he triumphed. However, throughout his life there are moments that one would call curious, to say the least. One of those moments is what we will talk about today. steve He needed a logo for the company he founded when he was fired from Apple. She paid $100,000 for it. The truth is that as an investment it leaves something to be desired.
When John Sculley forced Steve’s departure from the company he had founded, he created NeXT, a company that could have competed with Apple, but that initially did not have the success that was expected. His most famous computer was that cube for which Steve bought $650,000 molds, because otherwise the corners would not be exactly 90 degrees. In general it did not sell much, but its operating system was very good, to the point that Apple decided to buy the company to keep it, and with this Steve once again became part of the company of his life.
“The e is the mnemonic factor”
Let’s go back to the NeXT logo. 100,000 dollars. It may seem like a lot, but it is not even close to the most expensive logo in history. The one from the BBC cost 1.8 million euros, and the one from BP a staggering 210 million. If we compare what Jobs paid at the time for his with these two—and especially with the second—, It almost seems like it came out cheap. Still, it’s still a lot of money.
The designer they hired for the occasion was Paul Rand. He had previously directed Esquire and Apparel Arts, that’s nothing. It is behind logos as famous as those of Ford, IBM or ABC. He was a complete professional. Therefore, when NeXT hired him to design his logo, he provided a 100-page book in which he explains, step by step, the entire creative process that led to his final design. And it is a book that you can read online.
The truth is that it is very interesting, although many would say that it is just a way to justify $100,000 in expenses. Rand says in this book that:
“Ideally, a logo would explain or suggest the company it symbolizes, but this is rarely possible or even necessary. The IBM symbol, for example, suggests nothing about computers except what the viewer reads on it. Stripes are now associated with computers because the initials of a large computer company have stripes. The same goes for the ABC symbol, which does not suggest television. The mnemonic factors of both logos are graphic devices: stripes and circles. In this example, the e is the mnemonic factor.”
But we are talking about thinking heads. And Steve Jobs was feeling restless; he wanted a handful of solutions, not a single alternative. However, in a interviewSteve Jobs explained that:
I asked him if he could think of any options and he said, ‘No, I solve your problem and you pay me. You don’t have to use the solution. If you want options, go talk to other people.'”
It was a groundbreaking logo. At that time, that style of multiple colors, different letters, or anything was not very popular. Some say it was the precursor of Google. Maybe that’s overestimating it a bit, but it would be foolhardy to deny that it doesn’t have at least a slight air to it.
I would say that today, with the minimalism that reigns in the corporate world, it would not have succeeded. In fact, many users criticize that this It was a logo too anchored to its time, with an old aesthetic. At this point in the game, it is possible that they would have modernized it, but you can see the enormous work of iteration behind it.
I personally believe that It’s a very subjective world. to be able to determine with certainty who is right. On the one hand, we have those who think that this logo was born old and stuck in a tacky era, and on the other, those who consider it a masterpiece. It is clear that he does not lack personality.
Neither too much nor too little, I would say. Rand’s experience is undeniable, but there have been logos of his that have received a much more unanimous positive review. Is it a masterpiece? I do not know. I have no criteria to determine something like that. What do you think?
In Applesfera | Apple logo: the only reason it is a bitten apple, there are six theories and five are lies
In Applesfera | Apple TV+ and its premieres: the upcoming series, movies and documentaries that we will see in its catalog
