

Apple.com (2004) - esolyt
https://web.archive.org/web/20040318202234/http://www.apple.com

======
pekk
Not so different from Apple in the late 90s. And it kept struggling to find
its stride until the iPhone. Let's have some context.

1993, Apple Newton

1994, IBM Simon

1996, PalmPilot/PalmOS

1996, Apple Pippin game console

1998, iMac

1998-2000, tons of MP3 players

2000, Microsoft Pocket PC/Windows CE

2001, Microsoft's tablet PCs

2001, iPod

2001, OS X

2002, Pocket PC smartphones

2002, BlackBerry

(I included a few flops to show that this wasn't a God-given destiny but an
iterative search process...)

So as of 2004:

* PDAs are an established market but mostly limited to business. The functionality will only take off in smartphones, which are really just PDA-phones

* iPod has gobbled up the pre-existing MP3 player market in a way that prefigures iPhone, with a decent device and very good marketing

* Smartphones are just getting taken up in 2004, as an outgrowth of the PDA market. It'll be 5 years before iPhone hits a pre-existing smartphone market with a decent device, very good marketing and "app store"

* Tablet PCs are bombing, largely because nobody understands or wants the form factor yet

Near future after 2004: transition to Intel 2005-2007ish, MacBook Pro and
MacBook 2006, iPhone 2007, Android 2007, MacBook Air 2008, iPad 2010.

and consider the contribution of economic downturns/booms to the timing of
products which did well

------
icodestuff
"WWDC 2004 Register early and save"

Ah, for the days when you didn't have to register in the first minute to have
a chance of getting a ticket.

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abdophoto
You should take a look at this 15 year slideshow of Apple's homepage:
[http://thetechblock.com/15-years-apples-
homepage/](http://thetechblock.com/15-years-apples-homepage/)

~~~
larrys
I've seen that but just took another look. No doubt they should have the dates
on the pages otherwise it's hard to get the full effect.

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antonius
The change in technology and "coolness" is staggering. I remember buying the
white 20GB iPod with the scroll wheel and being the coolest kid in high
school. Looking at it now and it looks painfully outdated and ugly (IMO).

~~~
rayiner
The word you're looking for is "fashion."

~~~
pekk
Fashion is something Apple is good at.

~~~
rayiner
Its not just Apple, of course. The entire web is very fashion conscious.

~~~
pekk
That's true. Especially today - some oldies like Amazon don't have a lot of
knack for it. I meant that few companies have the same ability to predict or
set fashion that Apple does. At least, the same awareness or willingness to
make it a top priority.

~~~
GotAnyMegadeth
Or the same need to make it a top priority

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JohnTHaller
Ah, the 'truth stretching' benchmarks of the advertising for the Apple PowerPC
machines.

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skyebook
It's kind of interesting how that G5 ad on the front page has a testimonial
about freeing you from the chains of Intel and MS. Apple was was probably
right in the middle of getting 10.4 ready to run on Intel at this point

~~~
cleaver
I remember scratching my head at the numbers from Apple... The PowerPC chips
were four times faster than Intel (or some such number). Then they released on
Intel and it became twice as fast. (Of course, this might have been somewhat
accurate if PowerPC did not gain performance at the same rate over the years.
Still worth a chuckle, though.)

~~~
wsc981
Apple tended to use numbers that were based on calculations made with
AltiVec[0], a very powerful SIMD instruction set on PowerPC processors. Of
course many apps didn't benefit much from AltiVec at all.

[0]:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AltiVec](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AltiVec)

------
iambateman
Great web design basically doesn't need to change over time. Apple has kept
the same ideas: big hero image, top nav bar, a few secondary things, and
that's it for a decade.

~~~
largehotcoffee
Blinking "Hot News Headlines" bar. You know, great web design.

~~~
coldtea
It's not blinking. It just changes headlines.

You know, like what this AJAX gizmo is often used to do today.

------
Garmonidas
It's more shocking see how Samsung was 7 years ago (
[https://web.archive.org/web/20070222044411/http://www.samsun...](https://web.archive.org/web/20070222044411/http://www.samsung.com/)
) and now ( [http://www.samsung.com](http://www.samsung.com) ). Evolving from
refrigerators to smartphones!

~~~
Edmond
it may well come back to refrigerators once the "internet of things" takes
hold, except this time it would be your smartphone talking to your
refrigerator and vice-verse :)

~~~
SemanticCoder
It's still pretty much about refrigerators, washing machines and cameras. Just
the US site is different from the rest of the world. Their German site for
example clearly advertises washing machines and refrigerators on the front
page: [http://www.samsung.com/de](http://www.samsung.com/de) .

~~~
Phlarp
I see smartphones, solid state drives and TVs. Perhaps it's targeting based on
cookies?

------
k-mcgrady
The navigation bar is the most interesting part I think:

\- Store

\- iPod + iTunes

\- .Mac

\- Quicktime

.Mac and Quicktime were actually two of the most prominently featured products
on Apple.com. Wow. iPod and iTunes have stuck around but are now treated
separately probably due to the variety of content available on iTunes (apps,
books, movies, games).

I find it strange that Mac's aren't featured on the 2004 navigation bar.
Instead it's OS X.

~~~
chaz
Navbars are a great way to get a sense of the company's priorities, generally
influenced by the biggest money makers.

Amazon's navbar in 2004:
[https://web.archive.org/web/20041102060756/http://www.amazon...](https://web.archive.org/web/20041102060756/http://www.amazon.com).
Books, clothing, electronics, toys/games, music, phones. Today, it's streaming
video, streaming music, ["streamed"] ebooks, Kindles, apps ... and then
(separated by a horizontal bar) Books / Audible (still plugging digital
goods!), music/movies/games, electronics, home, etc.

~~~
iambateman
Or what they _want_ to be money makers.

~~~
chaz
Or what they don't want to be money losers. When the support link is in the
top nav, it's an indicator of a customer-focused company. Bonus points for a
toll-free number at the top. If it's buried in a tiny font at the bottom, you
might want to walk away.

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tomswartz07
Seeing the 'Education' section makes me disappointed.

Apple's recent departure from the educational market really changed how school
districts (like the one where I'm currently employed) made their purchasing
decisions.

They used to offer deep discounts for K-12 and higher ed, even featuring it on
their main page. Now they don't offer anything of the sort.

------
zafiro17
That lampshade imac was one of the coolest bits of hardware ever. I find it
more interesting than the new "trashcan" model. I had a friend with a
lampshade imac and I was very envious. It still seems more useful to me than
the new all in one macs where you basically can't service anything. The
lampshade was a good compromise.

~~~
usingpond
That's a PowerMac/Mac Pro you're thinking of, lampshade is iMac.

------
bennyg
The biggest thing that sticks out to me is the design of the tab buttons in
the nav bar. I remember looking at Photoshop tutorials and using Macromedia
Fireworks to create buttons that looked similar to this for phpBB styles.
Yikes, I'm not old. But damn I'm old.

------
cordite
That machine still feels modern to me. From the outside.

------
smackfu
Kind of funny that the "iBook Logic Board Repair Extension Program" gets a
front page link.

------
robinhoodexe
"Introducing iLife '04

\- it's like Microsoft Office for the rest of your life"

I nearly pissed myself in laughter.

~~~
dkyc
Can you explain this line to me? I somehow don't get it.

~~~
bertil
Microsoft Office was pretty much was computers were to most people, and they
came off (Bill Gates personally, ‘computer-savvy‘ managers in general and
meetings involving PowerPoint in particular) as… no really inspiring. ‘Office
life’ was an oximoron -- the title of the show “The Office” didn’t make sense.
It was dredge reports, inexplicably weird titles, erratic page numbers,
section numbers and inserted images on crack, illegible bar-charts because
color-copies where too expensive, and tweaking with margins that sent the key
information outside of your fax borders.

Apple played on that angle _a lot_. They were the computer for the cool kids
who made music, took wowing photos, edited gorgeous books, and gave snappy
presentations. Things clicked. They had the cool typeface, always, without
even pointing at it. They even knew those were not called ‘fonts’. They made
computers you actually wanted to spend time with, not be paid to be next too.

Not sure why OC is pissing: either at the office gimmicky memories, or how
Apple’s angle seems dated now. But, at the time, that was compelling.

~~~
adamio
I was a mac specialist for a few year 07-09. People were just dumbfounded and
some angry that a new Mac didn't come with MS Office. Some refused to believe
me and thought I was trying to upsell them (for no commission).

Sir if this laptop is for your daughter starting college, you'll probably want
to get MS Office or Pages. "What? No Office included?!" Well it comes with
TextEdit. "That's fine she'll use that" I'd then tell them about OpenOffice
but that would confuse most people even more

