The price of the Apple brand remains consistently above $180 billion, and no one else has yet reached it. And the company’s logo, an apple bitten on the right, remains one of the most recognizable in all developed countries.
Many naively believe that the symbol of the manufacturer of the most popular smartphones in the world contains a hint of the original sin of Adam and Eve. According to the Bible, they took a bite from the apple of the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil in Eden, the Garden of Eden, and for this they were expelled from there.
Others see the Apple logo as a nod to physicist Isaac Newton. According to legend, he discovered the law of universal gravitation when an apple fell on his head. The company sign that she had at the very beginning of her journey also speaks to this. However, this does not explain the missing piece on the right.
There is another theory, which the company has not yet officially confirmed or refuted. She says that Apple logo became a tribute to Alan Turing, which Steve Jobs respected to the core.
The Apple logo was created in honor of scientist Alan Turing
Few people know about Steve Jobs's love for Alan Turing's contribution to science, but the English scientist was indeed a real idol of the ever-living soul of Apple.
Most likely, you have not even heard this name, but this brilliant scientist in the scientific community is considered the father of not only mathematics, but also artificial intelligence.
In 1954 Turing committed suicide by biting an apple, which he himself pumped with cyanide - this official version reasons for his death.
Some believe that the mathematician was actually poisoned, but this does not seem plausible, because at that time the scientist was not considered great because of his unconventional sexual orientation.
It was Alan's unconventional inclinations that became the reason for the mystery that hangs over the Apple logo. Steve Jobs honored the scientist's memory with a symbolically bitten apple, which he even painted in the rainbow colors of global tolerance, but could not reveal his tribute to the world for business reasons.
Jobs understood perfectly well that he did not want to create a local company that would work only for the United States and a couple of nearby countries. He planned to lead a global manufacturer and enter other promising markets that may not be as tolerant as the American one.
For example, China is still considered one of the most desirable markets in the world, and in this country non-traditional sexual relationships are against. Russia, eastern Europe and other countries with their own views on life in this matter also cannot be written off.
It was precisely because of the fear that Apple would be misunderstood that in 1998 the company changed the logo to a less provocative one, and in 1999 it came to the current neutral version, which still remains without a piece.
Jobs' idol is coolly portrayed in the movie "The Imitation Game"
Alan was born in India in 1912. Like all geniuses, he was an unconventional child. Since childhood, he had only mathematics in his head, but his parents tried to develop him comprehensively, so they moved to the UK and sent him to a liberal arts school.
At 13, Turing baffled teachers by solving in his head the most difficult tasks mathematics, which he was not even taught. At school he was considered almost the worst student, and in his description after graduation, the director sarcastically emphasized:
“He will definitely become a real problem in the community.”
At 23, Alan had already defended his doctoral dissertation in mathematics, and later developed the theory of logical computing machines, which would become a mandatory part of curriculum cybernetics.
The further fate of the mathematician is dramatically shown in the film “The Imitation Game,” which won the main award at the Toronto Film Festival in 2014.
Played the main role Benedict Cumberbatch, whom you definitely know from his extraordinary image of Holmes in the TV series “Sherlock” and his superhero role in “Doctor Strange.”
The film turned out to be quite plausible from a historical point of view, and you can still watch it if only because of the sweet smile of Keira Knightley, who played Joan Clark.
The film tells about several lines of Turing's life, which begin in 1939. This year, together with other specialists, he was brought in to decipher messages from the Enigma machine, which the Nazis used to coordinate the actions of the navy and air force.
Then Alan was overcome with real excitement. At midnight, the code word needed to decipher it changed, so he had only a day to solve the problem.
A year later, the mathematician drew attention to the weather information that was in the messages, and she helped create a tool for deciphering them.
In 1943, Turing and his team also cracked a more complex version of Enigma and gained access to the full flow of German information, which helped bring victory in the war closer by a couple of years and save millions of lives. For this he was awarded an order.
In 1951 Alan took part in the creation of one of the first computers in the world. This is probably what Steve Jobs compared himself to in 1976 when the Apple I hit the market.
Alan wasn't accepted so he killed himself
Turing was an advocate for gay people for many years. At that time in Great Britain many scientists and representatives high society countries also shared it.
In most cases, society simply turned a blind eye to this. In order not to fall under the cruel ax of justice, then you just had to not tell everyone about your preferences and hide your orientation.
In 1952, Alan's apartment was robbed by one of his lover's friends. Then, during the investigation of the crime, the mathematician’s orientation was not only revealed, he openly admitted his sexuality.
However, there was enough evidence even without this. During the investigation, police seized Turing's correspondence with a huge number of lovers over the past few years.
Of course, everyone quickly forgot about the robber, and Great Britain watched the trial of Alan and did not believe that the brilliant scientist who changed the course of the bloody war in favor of the Allies could be convicted only for his personal views.
But the judge was adamant. He suggested to Turing two punishments to choose from: chemical castration or 2 years in prison. Alan chose the former and was given a special injection that would make him impotent for the rest of his life.
Turing was immediately fired from government service and banned from teaching at the university. The scientist instantly lost both his good name and his means of livelihood.
Two years later, due to the lack of hormones on the mathematician’s body, female breasts were already visible, he had a terrible complex, almost never left the house, and eventually committed suicide by biting off an apple pumped with potassium cyanide. His body was found on June 8, 1954.
Jobs paid tribute to Turing 30 years before society
Alan Turing's good name was restored decades later. Working on and actually creating your first computer quickly rewritten on Professor Norbert Wiener, and the unconventional mathematician was relegated to the background and consigned to oblivion.
Many believe that Steve Jobs also paid tribute to the scientist when he approved the Apple logo in 1977.
The British government admitted its mistake in 2009. The country's minister, Gordon Brown, recognized Turing as the most vocal victim of homophobia in history and asked for his forgiveness posthumously. Jobs may have preceded him by 30 years.
How it really happened is unknown. There is a single clue that both disproves the theory and makes it important. Stephen Fry, a famous British actor, comedian and LGBT rights activist, once personally asked Steve Jobs if all this was true?
He replied: “No, but it would be better if it were true!”
Logo Apple, in the form of the well-known bitten apple, has a rather fascinating history. But just three decades ago, no one knew about him. Now let's talk about this story.
In 1976, two young men decided to register their company under the name “Apple Computers”. And the names of these young people were Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs, then the guys themselves could not even imagine that after going through all the tests, they would be able to become the owners of the most popular company on the planet. In those distant times, they simply sat in their garage and did what they loved. Their first creation was a computer based on the Mos Technology 6502 processor. It was then that the first rudiments of the logo appeared.
True, at that time, the logo was an unattractive drawing of the physicist and mathematician Newton, who was sitting under a tree with an apple dangling above him. Steve Jobs almost immediately realized that with such a logo “you can’t cook porridge”, and ordered its design from Regis McKenna. One of the studio's designers, Rob Yanov, responded to Jobs' request and created the well-known apple. 
Although they say that due to the closed source code there are no viruses for Mac OS and iOS, viruses still make their way onto Apple laptops. And if suddenly you need to remove a banner from your desktop, we recommend turning to professionals rather than doing it on your own. 
The designer's idea was not to simply depict an apple, but to give the logo a deep meaning. But no matter how hard he tried, it just didn’t work out, and then, completely desperate, the designer sat down in a chair and took a bite of an apple. And then he came up with the idea of creating a logo in the form of a bitten apple in black and white colors. But Steve Jobs insisted on a color image. As a result, Apple became a company with a brilliant logo. The apple remained colored until 1988, after which it became black and white.
Everyone knows the Apple logo in the shape of an apple. The choice of apple is obvious - “Apple” in translation from English means “apple”. But few people know why this apple is bitten. Who bit him? For what purpose? Does this make any sense?
First of all, let's figure out why “Apple” was used for the company name, and therefore for the logo. As writes, this was played out in the very first Apple logo, which was created in 1976. Then one of the co-founders of the company - his name was Ronald Wayne - made a drawing, which became the first logo.
Apple's first logo
The logo Wayne created has nothing in common with the current one. It was a miniature depicting Isaac Newton, an English scientist, on whose head an apple fell while he was relaxing in the garden, after which an epiphany came to him. This idea was the basis for choosing the name and logo of the company.
The logo, although educational, had little to do with the requirements that are usually placed on logos. It was unrecognizable and poorly suited for printing or for applying to company products. Therefore, Wayne's logo lasted about a year, after which Steve Jobs turned to graphic designer Rob Yanov with a request to create a modern, recognizable logo.
Second Apple logo
As Yanov later said, the idea for the logo appeared unexpectedly. Rob bought apples, put them in a bowl and began to draw, discarding unnecessary details. The result was an apple similar to a tomato or cherry. All that remained was to make one more stroke so that the apple would be clearly recognized as an apple.
This is how the “bite” appeared. The idea came from a play on the words byte/bite: on the one hand, a technology company that works with information (bytes), on the other, an apple that can be bitten, while a tomato can only be cut.
However, the second logo was different from the current one: it was made in multicolor. This has given rise to many versions, the most common of which is that Apple supports sexual minorities.
But it is not so. Apple does support the LGBT community, but the colorful logo was created a year before a similar rainbow symbol was introduced as a symbol for sexual minorities. At the time of the birth of the Apple logo, this sign was not recognizable, so it has nothing to do with LGBT people.
Then why was the apple multi-colored?
The idea was very simple. At that time, color monitors had just entered the market, and Apple's color logo was intended to reflect the fact that the company produces computers with color monitors. The Mac display at the time could display six various colors, which were indicated on the logo. All the primary colors were placed randomly, but the green on top was Jobs's wish that an apple could have a leaf on top, which is always green. The logo existed in this form for 22 years.
Apple's third logo
The third logo has no color scheme. And designer Jonathan Ive came up with the idea to do this.
This happened in 1998. At the time, Apple was experiencing enormous financial difficulties. But Steve Jobs figured out how to save the situation. He relied on elegance and simplicity. This was the order for the new logo: to make elegance and simplicity recognizable.
The famous bitten apple is a simple and laconic icon that symbolically crowns the complex structure of the giant Apple corporation, the name of which is familiar to everyone. It is quite natural that it gives rise to a lot of interpretations and acquires meanings. They see in it both the biblical apple of discord and Turing’s apple, after biting into which the scientist died. Any interpretations have the right to life, but what is interesting, first of all, are the meanings that the creators purposefully intended.
Such a simple sign as an apple really provides many reasons for creating additional meanings, but the starting point should be considered the very first Apple logo, which was created by artist Ron Wayne. It was a monochrome miniature depicting Isaac Newton sitting under a tree with an apple above him. According to legend, the scientist was prompted to create the foundations of the theory of gravity, becoming one of the symbols of insight.
The logo was accepted, but Steve Jobs immediately realized that a modern company needed a more modern logo. Therefore, it was decided to discard all unnecessary things and make the sign as simple as possible. A year later, it was created by designer Rob Yanov - it was already a bitten apple painted in all the colors of the rainbow.
Why did the apple become bitten?
Since the shape of the logo was simple, it could be confused with other fruits, or even not immediately understand what image was applied to the company’s products. A bite made the sign more unambiguous, and also really created an attractive hint of the forbidden fruit, which is known to be sweet. But still, a practical approach is paramount in this case.
There is also an unconfirmed version that the apple became bitten, since the sign of the whole was already occupied.
Sometimes an apple is just an apple
A huge army of fans and opponents of Apple have created many legends about the history of its origin and the meanings inherent in the logo. The most common one says that the logo, painted in all the colors of the rainbow, has something to do with the LGBT community. Apple, although it supports the rights of sexual minorities, did not include such a meaning in the logo. The multi-colored logo simply noted that the company produces multi-colored monitors.
The company logo remained in color until 1998.
Moreover, the logo itself appeared long before the LGBT community began to use the rainbow as a symbol.
Video on the topic
Sources:
- Walter Isaacson, "Steve Jobs", 2011
Tip 2: Why does the Apple logo show a bitten apple?
Apple's logo is simple. So simple that it has given rise to a lot of guesses, versions and entire legends about its semantic basis. It’s time to write a detective novel about this. And this is just further confirmation of the common truth that everything ingenious is simple. Jobs, with his company's logo, came out on top here too.
On April 1, 1976, Steve Jobs founded Apple. Today, 41 years later, it is difficult to find a person who has not heard of her. The company that gave the world the mouse, trackpad and graphical user interface has not yet fully revealed the secret of the origin of its logo - a bitten apple.
Helped make the brand what it is today. The modern user knows what the company's logo looks like, and some even remember the rainbow-colored apple decorating the gray Macintosh. But when it comes to why Apple has a bitten apple as their logo, many are forced to admit that they do not know the correct answer to this question.
What does the apple have to do with it?
It seems that even now no one fully understands why the company was named Apple. Hardly anyone associates computers with apples. The history of the appearance of such an unusual brand symbol is overgrown with myths and legends. Because Steve Jobs was working on an apple farm in the summer of 1975? Or was it all about his love for the Beatles (their recording studio was called Apple Records)? Or he just liked McIntosh apples.
Where did the history of the logo begin?
Few people know, but in 1976 Apple had a different logo. It showed Newton resting under an apple tree. Such a brand name did not look stylish at all and was not suitable for use in small sizes. If you look at the instructions for the Apple I (the company’s very first computer), you can see exactly this complex logo.
So why does Apple have a bitten apple as their logo? The answer to the question goes back to 1976, when the brand was first born. Anyone who is even slightly interested in modern technology knows that Apple was founded by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. In fact, the company had three, and not two, as is commonly believed, founders - Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and the lesser known Ron Wayne. The latter gave up his stake in the company less than two weeks after its creation. Now Ron admits that even then he saw a successful future for the young company, but does not regret his choice. And if he had the opportunity to change his mind, he would have done the same.
The reason for refusing a 10% stake in a promising company lies in Ron's negative past experiences and his reluctance to take risks. At the very beginning of Apple's journey, it received an order for 50 computers. In order to collect them, it was necessary to take out a loan of $15,000. Wayne had heard that the customer company had a history of difficulty paying suppliers. Being no longer young (43 years old), Ron did not want to take risks by getting involved in transactions with the possibility of losing all his property. Unlike both Steves, he had own house and a car.
It was Ron Wayne who, at the beginning of the founding of the company, drew the first logo - an image of the brilliant Isaac Newton reading a book under an apple tree.
The appearance of the famous logo
The logo appeared shortly before the release of the Apple II. The history of its origin began in April 1977. Steve Jobs turned to Rob Yanov, a middle-aged designer at Regis McKenna Advertising. Back then, many people predicted failure for the company if they kept the same logo. He was too intellectual and not suitable for depicting him in small sizes. According to the author of the book "Little Kingdom": private story Apple Computer" by Michael Morritz, Steve Jobs actually believed that the logo could be one of the reasons for the poor sales of the Apple I. Interested, Rob spent several days looking at apples bought from a nearby store from different angles. As a result, the designer came to the conclusion that simplicity is the key to success, and drew a logo in the form of a monochrome bitten apple.
rainbow apple
Jobs liked the idea, but he insisted that the logo be in color, despite all the manager’s attempts advertising company dissuade him from being too high expenses to the printing house. By the way, all the attacks of the company’s ill-wishers, who claim that Yanov borrowed the idea of a colored logo from the well-known rainbow flag, have no basis - the symbol of sexual minorities began to be used by the community only in 1979. However, there is an opinion that the similarity of the flags was the reason for changing the color of the logo in 1998. The bitten apple became what it was originally intended to be - monochrome.
“There was also a practical reason for the multi-colored stripes in the first logo: the Apple II was the first personal computer that could display color images on a monitor,” Yanov explained.
The most expensive logo
Steve Jobs was responsible for most of the work when creating the logo. The challenge was to print it in multiple colors next to each other. The four multi-stage color printing technologies known at the time left the risk that layers could be misaligned and overlap each other. Yanov suggested dividing the layers with thin black lines. This would solve the problem and make printing cheaper. However, Steve Jobs firmly decided that the logo should be without stripes. For this reason, Apple's Michael M. Scott called it "the most damn expensive logo ever created."
It is noteworthy that Rob Yanov did not receive a penny for his legendary work. “They didn’t even send postcards,” he said in an interview. Steve Jobs managed to establish an excellent relationship with the chief marketer of Silicon Valley, and he allowed the growing company to use the services of his subordinates for free.
Bitten Apple
According to Lensmeyer, Rob Janow started with a silhouette of a black apple on a white background, but felt something was missing. A play on words Apple had previously used in advertising for the Apple I, Yanov was told to bite the apple (“bite” in English translated as “bite” and pronounced like a computer “byte”).
“The bitten apple means that the logo also no longer resembles a tomato, cherry or any other fruit,” Yanov said.
Bill Kelly, also of Regis McKenna Advertising, remembers a different story. He says that a bitten apple is a symbol of temptation and the acquisition of knowledge (a reference to the biblical tree of knowledge). A hint of how modern technologies helping humanity learn and develop faster, but at the same time making it more and more dependent on them.
inspired by Apple?
In 1954, computer scientist and brilliant mathematician Alan Turing died after biting into a cyanide-laced apple. For a long time it was assumed to be a suicide, possibly due to the chemical castration that the British government imposed on him after admitting to having a sexual relationship with a man. Although it is now assumed that Turing's suicide was not deliberate. He was often careless with his experiments and could easily have accidentally inhaled cyanide or placed an apple in a puddle of cyanide.
Whatever happened, the bitten apple was found at Turing's bedside. Two decades later, two guys began making computers in their garage. They knew about Turing's contributions to programming and computer science and decided to honor him. And the world received an iconic logo.
According to logo designer Rob Yanov, this beautiful story is not true. "It's just a wonderful urban legend," he said in 2009. Other theories - a reference to the first woman, Eve biting the forbidden fruit, or Newton's discovery of gravity - are also wrong.
However, when actor Stephen Fry once asked his good friend Steve Jobs on whether the famous logo was related to Turing's apple, Jobs replied: "God, we wish it were."
What does Apple's bitten apple mean?
The true reason for the birth of such an unusual brand name remains a mystery even to Apple employees. On the other hand, such an abundance of legends around this adds a special mystery to the history of the logo, allowing each user to interpret it in their own way.
According to Apple employee Jean-Louis Gasier, this is where its brilliance lies: “Our logo reflects both passion and disorder, reason and hope. We couldn't have asked for anything better." Today no one dares to deny that a memorable and at first glance simple icon has played vital role in brand development.