Wie schon bei Mercury News gibt es jetzt auch bei Macworld eine Liste mit den Top Stories der letzten 10 Jahre aus der Welt der Technologie.
Neben den Schritten gegen Microsoft’s versuchter Monopolherstellung im Bereich Internet Browser, Google und Facebook kommt Apple gleich zweimal vor:

Apple launches the iPod, and gets back on track

Several years after his return to Apple, after being banished in the 1980s when company growth stalled, co-founder Steve Jobs realized that though the mainstream market for digital devices was booming, music players were not very well designed. The iPod, launched in October 2001, was Apple’s game-changing entree into the consumer mass market. It was an immediate hit, and a year and a half later, Apple completed the content part of the picture with the launch of the iTunes Store, which opened up the floodgates for legal music on the ‘Net.

The concept of convergence among consumer electronics, communications, and computer technology took root in the ’90s, but it wasn’t until this decade that the consumer market, with Apple leading the way, became the holy grail for even traditional IT vendors. By 2003, mainstream PC makers like Dell offered LCD televisions and Hewlett-Packard announced digital cameras. But the iPod was, and remains, a clear category leader and became a symbol of the consummation of the marriage between IT and the consumer market.

The iPhone: Apple redefines a market, again

Yes, Apple products warrant two entries in the decade’s top 10 tech stories. That’s because while some companies reinvent themselves. Apple, under the guidance of the mercurial Jobs, reinvents markets.

After redefining IT in the 1970s with the Apple II and then pushing the envelope in personal computing with the Mac in the 1980s, Apple stalled when its business model ended up giving the company a loyal—but tiny—user base. The company started to ride high again after launching the iPod, and in 2006 breathed new life into the Mac by moving to Intel-architecture chips.

Before the iPhone, there were many multifunction phones. But amid a June 2007 launch that had people lined up at stores from Tokyo to San Francisco, Apple proved its design mojo still worked. The iPhone combination of cool design, phone functions, Internet connectivity and multimedia features raised the bar for any manufacturer of connected handheld devices.

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