The Magic in Apple’s Devices? The Heart

During the last seismic Apple announcement, in 2010, I was at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco as Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad, a device he said was so singular it would create its own landing strip.

When the expected reveal came, there was a huge roar, and I looked around to see many of my fellow journalists clapping their hands red. I was an interloper in the land of tech announcements, but I was surprised that a group of cynical-by-nature reporters had been so completely won over in the moment.

I didn’t attend last week’s Applemageddon of multiple product announcements — new phones, a watch and a mobile payment system — but I saw more of the same when I checked the coverage. And while I may not have been clapping, I found myself rooting for Apple to unveil something extraordinary.

When the event was over, you didn’t need a watch from the future to know what time it was: Apple had done it again. By choosing the same site where Mr. Jobs announced the Macintosh computer 30 years ago, and by archly referring to “one more thing” — a Jobs tic when breaking big news — Tim Cook, the chief executive, directly embraced his legacy and sent a message that the company still had magical properties.

A lot of the subsequent coverage has been ecstatic, much of it tinged with palpable relief that a Jobs-less Apple can still set the bar in new and unexpected ways.

“Apple definitely delivered,” Tim Stevens, editor at large at CNET, told CBS News. My colleague and fellow columnist Farhad Manjoo wrote, “The biggest news was about the old Apple: It’s back, and it’s more capable than ever,“ while Matt Burns of TechCrunch said the watch seemed “spectacular.”

Apple’s ability to seize the moment and preoccupy the press is without peer. Think about it: Absent that showmanship and hype, the company announced two very good-looking, very expensive phones that catch up with consumers’ preference for larger screens, a smartwatch coming after other brands that has an unstated battery life and a payment system that will need buy-in from retailers. All these products require sharing new kinds of data at a time when some of Apple’s most prominent customers had their privacy breached in intimate and embarrassing ways.

So, what is it about Apple that makes a sea of professional curmudgeons whoop like children on Christmas? After all, it is not curing cancer or tackling world hunger. And its cult status as an underdog taking on the corporate suits seems less relevant now that it is the largest company in the world with annual revenues that surpass the gross domestic product of many sovereign nations.

Given the company’s history of maniacal secrecy and penchant for declining to comment on everything, its sway with the news media is even more remarkable. But just as the elegant packaging on Apple products is as important as what’s inside, the stage management of its events rivals what is being announced.

Nothing is left to chance. Seating charts are meticulously studied, rehearsals are endless and strategic leaks are used to temper expectations. Detailed briefing books are distributed to the public relations team and then sometimes shredded. The audience claps because everything — the lighting, the fanfare, the reveal — is meant to elicit applause. (This might be a good spot to mention that I was among the people who picked up the pom-poms after the iPad event, going on Charlie Rose’s show and elsewhere to extol its game-changing virtues.)

Paul Saffo, a technology forecaster in Silicon Valley, has watched a number of big product announcements from Apple and Mr. Jobs over the years.

“Steve’s immortal contribution to Apple is the reality distortion field, to create expectations and then convince the audience to be a willing accomplice,” he said.

My colleague Claire Cain Miller pointed out in an email that Apple had achieved its positive publicity through scarcity.

“They build up so much hype by being so secretive and controlling with the press and then they do these blockbuster events,” she said. “They practically force people to speculate and help them build hype and then cheer when they finally release the info.”

There are occasional departures from the lovefest, most notably The New York Times’s Pulitzer Prize-winning series on the iEconomy, about the blood and tears behind the manufacture of many of Apple’s products. And there is plenty of rigorous coverage in blogs and traditional media. Not everyone hugs himself when a new product is announced. Anthony De Rosa of the news start-up Circa said in an email, “I’ve been pretty unimpressed with their post-Jobs era, which lacks imagination and seems more like a company protecting their bottom line rather than going after moonshots,” he said. (While we are at it, he’s mad Apple put U2 on his phone without his permission.)

Still, Americans have a much more intimate relationship with Apple than they did with previous business behemoths like United States Steel or General Electric. After all, we hold its devices in our hands, often using them to touch images and messages from people we love. That emotional connection continues to grow.

Mr. Jobs always mandated a central adjective for a device — the iPad was “magical,” the iPhone “revolutionary” and the App Store “legendary.” The watch? “Apple Watch is the most personal device we’ve ever created,” Mr. Cook said. By literally creeping onto our skin — the watch has sensors on the back — the company is forging a deeper connection with its customers. We love Apple, even when it doesn’t love us back. I just went through a series of frustrations around my iPhone 5 and its battery, and now it has that old-phone smell. My response? I’ve read the breathless coverage and wonder when manners and budget will permit a switch to an iPhone 6.

There’s something bigger than gadget lust underway. At a time when American Greatness is under physical assault in the Middle East and economic assault by China, Apple is our answer to the world. We still do tech better than most everyone else, and most cities would love to have a gleaming Apple store to call their own.

This is a company that took on a dominant Microsoft, made a huge dent in the computing world, then nearly collapsed. Still, Mr. Jobs stormed back through sheer force of will, revived the company and created new categories of products as well as a business juggernaut. That he was kind of a jerk and his run at Apple ended prematurely in the process only makes it more cinematic. No one wants to think that his version of Yankee innovation died with him.

Apple’s core skill is not innovation but refinement. The company didn’t make the first smartphone, just the best one. Many tablets were tried, but only Apple’s opened up a category. Several smartwatches are on the market, but Apple is the one that people beyond geeks are paying attention to.

Jenna Wortham, another Times colleague deeply immersed in tech, calls Apple the Beyoncé of the digital world — even those who don’t love its products can’t help being impressed by the company’s relentlessness. In Apple, we have a company that points to the fences and then often delivers.

“Apple sells miniature jetpacks, little pieces of the future that you can hold in your hand,” Ms. Wortham said. “I was told there would be clones and driverless cars and underwater hotels in the future, and I want it all, but the closest I can get is this really slick phone. That’s what Apple offers, in a very tangible way.”

Other companies will have to continue to endure skeptical and sometimes damaging coverage. But in its careful manufacture of hype and expectation, Apple has the goods on our operating system, and pushes our buttons as often as we push theirs.