Think different?

The year is 1997 and Steve Jobs has returned to Apple. With Windows 95 flying off the shelves and Apple running massive losses the board resorts to bringing back the visionary, the zealot, the founder: Steve Jobs - having fired him 10 years ago.

The story of Steve Jobs and Apple is almost as romantic, if not more, than the products and brand of Apple itself. When Steve Jobs returned he found a discoordinated company in malaise strategically. Along with cancelling a huge variety of projects Apple was working on - and sacking a lot of employees in the process - Steve Jobs set to work on the brand of Apple.

Apple even in the late 90s had one major advantage over Microsoft - it built and controlled the hardware its software operated on - an advantage it retains to this day. Why is it that Apple products are not just elegant to use, but durable?

It is because in an Apple everything is designed to work together. When you buy an Iphone or a MacBook you are buying Apple hardware and Apple software. By comparison, when you buy a Samsung phone, you buy Samsung hardware and Google software (Android). When you buy a Dell, you buy Dell hardware and Microsoft software.

When you buy an Apple you buy from a company that takes responsibility for everything. And it shows in the quality of their products. And because they control the hardware and the software, they build things nobody else could. Who else could have built the Ipod's click wheel and made the software work with it? Who else could have built the touch screen and simultaneously reinvent the user interface?

Who else would have been crazy enough to try it?

Which neatly returns me to the marketing campaign Steve Jobs launched soon after his return. Think Different. I have embedded the Think Different advert below:

Who could have guessed how much Apple would change the world when this advert was first aired?

The advert is an homage to innovators. People who change things. Who see things differently. And who are crazy enough: to push the human race forward [sic]. These innovators are everywhere and sometimes they don't get the credit they deserve.

I'm writing this article on August 26, 2019. On the previous day I witnessed one of the great comebacks in sporting history - England chased down 359 in the second innings at Headingly to keep the Ashes alive.

When England went into bat for the second innings - the game as good as over. They had been bowled out for a embarrassing 67 in the first innings and the previous highest run chase by England was 332 in Melbourne in 1929.

And yet there was belief among the England players they could win. Captain Joe Root put in a knock of 77 and Joe Denly assisted with 50. But it was Ben Stokes who performed the heroics - just as he did earlier in the year at the world cup final - with one of the greatest innings of all time, scoring 135 not out and guiding England to victory with 76 runs scored on the 9th wicket.

Evidently England were not crazy to believe they could win. In part this belief was down to innovations in batting which allow cricketers to score runs in ways considered impossible 20 years ago. Perhaps the most exhilarating shot played by Ben Stokes was the reverse slog sweep for 6 when he was on 77 and England were 9 down. You can watch a highlight reel of Stokes' innings below, with the reverse slog sweep at 3:14.

The reverse slog sweep was first played by one of most inventive and polarizing cricketers to grace the game: Kevin Pietersen. When he first played the shot people could hardly believe what they had seen. Some questioned whether you should be allowed to play such a shot. Others suggested it was somehow unfair to the bowler for the batsman to reverse his stance.

In any case, a part of Stokes' innings to keep the Ashes alive came from Kevin Pietersen. A man who was sacked by English cricket. Called a c*** by England's director of cricket. And who in younger years had a yellow streak through his hair.

Kevin Pietersen: A crazy one. A rebel. A trouble maker.

You can glorify him. Or vilify him. About the only thing you can't do: is ignore him. Because he changed things. He moved cricket forwards.

The spirit of innovation that lived within Kevin Pietersen lived within Steve Jobs. The cricket that is played today owes a debt to KP just like the technology we use today owes a debt to Steve Jobs.

Since Jobs' passing the financial performance of Apple has been astounding, becoming the first company to reach a trillion dollar market capitalisation under the leadership of the former COO Tim Cook. But the malaise that blighted Apple the last time Jobs left has returned.

Instead of innovating new hardware and software Apple has started to do what a company does when it is led by a CEO without a vision: it diversifies. Hence the diversification into media content in the form of Apple TV. Or the diversification into finance in the form of the Apple Card. These are not innovations, this is just doing what other people do and putting the Apple logo on it.

So here is my note to the board of Apple: sack Tim Cook and put somebody crazy, somebody with vision, somebody who will innovate, in charge. Apple is about more than shareholder value, it is about innovating. It is about thinking differently.