Der i-Kosmos

Apple Inc., the Californian computer company, has been marked by unparalleled success over the past three and a half decades. Like no other company, it has succeeded in shifting the focus of use from utility to coveted possessions when it comes to computers and electronic entertainment devices such as the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. In addition, each of the products in the i-family have changed their product genres technologically and ergonomically to such an extent that not only have all competitors adopted these new 'user guidances', but hundreds of complementary products have been created around these products as well, from a wide range of accessories to docking stations, i. e., veritable radios with external speakers for the iPods and iPhones that allow users to experience the stored music without headphones. The iPhone has compelled all manufacturers of mobile phones to add smart phones with touch sensitive screens, the touch phones, to their programs. And the iPad will fundamentally transform the handling of video and news as well. Since the introduction of the iPhone, more than 200 000 special application programs, the so-called apps, have been made available for these i-devices. In their product genres, these devices have each caused a paradigm shift: they are both leading and cult products, and they represent a development that has leveraged the mobile Internet and delocalized the act of surfing from the home to almost anywhere. The book comments upon this process of 'disruptive technologies', which has taken place only very rarely in the history of technology and design. They leaf through the preconditions and position these innovative devices in product-historical, social, and psychological contexts. Spiegel magazine correctly wrote: 'The i-cult. How Apple seduces the world.' But beyond any seduction, the 'iCosmos' represents a changed handling of information, media, and entertainment. The internationally known architecture and design historian Volker Fischer was deputy director of the Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt am Main for over ten years. Since 1995 he has built up a new design department in the Museum for Applied Arts in Frankfurt; in addition to his museum work he teaches history of architecture and design at the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Offenbach. Volker Fischer is already represented in Edition Axel Menges by books on Stefan Wewerka, Richard Meier, the Commerzbank in Frankfurt by Norman Foster and Hall 3 of Messe Frankfurt am Main by Nicholas Grimshaw.