How Apple Changed Us: Sharing Our Biggest Apple Memories After 50 Years

With Apple turning 50 this week, it’s been fun to go down memory lane with my fellow CNET teammates, looking back on Apple’s most iconic tech and sharing Apple’s effect on our lives. 

This week’s episode of One More Thing, embedded below, will bring you back to a time when “portable computer” meant lugging a whole desktop machine on your bike. We go through memories of covering long iPhone launch day lines and the unexpected surprises at Apple’s live events. CNET’s Patrick Holland is an iPhone expert in more ways than one — as he used to work as an Apple Store employee. He shared how stores became a place for the community to gather and grieve when Steve Jobs died in 2011. 

Watch this: Sharing Our Biggest Apple Memories After 50 Years

09:23

As reporters, we get a front-row seat to the evolution of a product. Sometimes that means watching perception shift from belittled to beloved. AirPods don’t seem so strange to wear now, and the Apple Watch sure feels way more useful now than when it launched. 

While my career as a technology journalist began about 20 years ago, Apple’s impact on me began early in classroom computer labs, as it did for many others growing up in the age of the Macintosh. 

I remember booting up an Apple IIe and loading in giant floppy disks to play Oregon Trail. Now, I play Oregon Trail on Apple Arcade with my kids on my Apple TV. In 50 more years, will that experience feel as retro to them as floppy-disk drives seem now?

Earlier this week, my colleague Scott Stein explored how Apple could shape the next 50 years. It’s rare for a company to reach 100 years, but with Apple, it’s certainly possible.

For more One More Thing, subscribe to our YouTube page to catch Bridget Carey breaking down the latest Apple news and issues every Friday.