Updated on: March 7, 2026 / CBS News
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CBS Sunday Morning correspondent David Pogue’s book Apple: The First 50 Years (Simon & Schuster, published March 10) examines how the company Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs founded remade culture in its first half-century—and then remade itself. Read an excerpt below.
Steve Jobs had been away from Apple for 11 years. When he returned on July 6, 1997, Apple had cycled through three CEOs in four years and was in dire shape: morale at zero, talented people leaving, divisions and fiefdoms proliferating—even lawyers from different Apple divisions suing each other. The company lacked a CEO, a coherent strategy, and, Jobs believed, a soul.
Jobs plunged in, unpaid and relentless. He fired most of the board, simplified the company’s structure, and cut Apple’s 70 Mac models to four—two laptops and two desktops—so the A-team could focus on each product. The changes provoked turmoil, but Jobs insisted focus was necessary.
He also found Apple running a dozen conflicting ad campaigns. He wanted a single campaign to celebrate creativity, independence, and the spirit of Apple. L.A. agency Chiat/Day produced an idea that stood out: black-and-white photos of revolutionary figures and events, with the striped Apple logo the only color and the words “Think Different.” Creative director Rob Siltanen, inspired by the monologues of Dead Poets Society, penned a TV script opening “To the crazy ones. Here’s to the misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers,” closing with, “The people who are crazy enough to believe they can change the world… are the ones who actually do.”
Jobs initially rejected the script, calling it “advertising-agency s***.” Siltanen quit, but 17 days before the ad was to air, Jobs reversed course and approved the “crazy ones” concept. Securing image rights was difficult—many subjects or estates had never allowed their images in ads—but Jobs used personal calls and persuasion: he contacted the families of JFK and Jim Henson and flew to meet Yoko Ono about a John Lennon clip. Participants received money and Apple products for charity.
For narration the agency auditioned many voices; Jobs weighed narrating it himself but chose actor Richard Dreyfuss to avoid making the campaign about him. The ad debuted on September 28, 1997, during ABC’s broadcast of Toy Story. Sixty seconds of piano-backed black-and-white clips—Einstein, Bob Dylan, Martin Luther King Jr., Buckminster Fuller, Thomas Edison, Picasso, and others—never mentioned computers or showed Apple products. Many viewers didn’t recognize every figure, which prompted conversation and repeat viewings. The message: Apple had a soul, and the company’s creative core endured despite prior missteps.
“Think Different” became a major success: awards, an Emmy, endless parodies, and renewed pride inside Apple. The campaign cost Apple about $100 million and ran in various forms over five years.
At the January 1998 Macworld Expo, barely a year into his return, Jobs—bearded and more confident—delivered a keynote whose “one more thing” wasn’t a product at all but a return to profit.
From “Apple: The First 50 Years” by David Pogue. Copyright © 2026 by David Pogue. Excerpted with permission by Simon & Schuster, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.