There is something about Apple that draws genius. I still have some small amount of faith that someone will rise to the ranks and maybe we need to give Cook a fair shake... but I can't think of any other leader in any industry with as much vision and sheer force of will than Jobs. He was truly unique in having ego enough to force his will and being genius enough to be right most of the time.
Its unfortunate that we see such rare genius only every twenty years or so at least in American corporations. Then again I guess they're game changers because they are so revolutionary.
Either way, Jobs couldn't have left Apple in a better position. The dominant force in both market share, mind share, and cash reserves. Enough IP to last them a good decade and a management team that can execute. I still have faith in Apple and maybe the changes he made to the corporate culture is permanent enough to last them at least until my lifetime.
A small part of me thinks though, the next big revolutionary company won't be from California. It'll be from Shanghai or Mumbai.
Looks like the mods combined the Steve Jobs thread posted in the Canon and Nikon forums by someone else, into this thread that I started in the Forums & Misc forum.
Bifurcator wrote:
But that was Xerox and not Jobs nor Apple. Xerox's "Pink" is what Jobs ripped and used in the Apple for the UI - first in Lisa and then later in Macintosh. Even the idea of a mouse was Xerox's.
Xerox Pink? Are you talking about IBM/Apple's Taligent, which came much later, and which was replaced with NeXT/Mac OS X? The Xerox project was probably the Alto, but as with so many things, ideas are like sphincters, everyone has one. Genius comes in bringing it to market in the right form. Xerox could never have done that, they were a copier company with a think tank bolted on.
Cook won't be Jobs. He is competent, and I am sure he will be a great CEO, but I don't know where to brilliant ideas will come from now. Jonathan Ive will surely make the products great-looking, but I don't think he has the original ideas. The whole company has a creative culture, so maybe the ideas will come from below. I don't know who can successful choose the best ones.
Well if you think about Jobs' best ideas, they came in his second act and they were obvious ideas. An MP3 player, a good all in one computer, thin well made computers, a phone, a tablet, etc. All nothing new, what was brilliant was the execution and meticulous attention to every single detail.
Bifurcator wrote:
But that was Xerox and not Jobs nor Apple. Xerox's "Pink" is what Jobs ripped and used in the Apple for the UI - first in Lisa and then later in Macintosh. Even the idea of a mouse was Xerox's.
carstenw wrote:
Xerox Pink? Are you talking about IBM/Apple's Taligent, which came much later, and which was replaced with NeXT/Mac OS X? The Xerox project was probably the Alto, but as with so many things, ideas are like sphincters, everyone has one. Genius comes in bringing it to market in the right form. Xerox could never have done that, they were a copier company with a think tank bolted on.
You need to read up on your history! The first computer product to ever sport a GUI was Xerox's own "Alto" running an OS code named "Pink". That was 1972 or 73! It wasn't till 79 that Jobs went to Xerox and copied all the ideas from that the OS for Lisa. In fact he couldn't even do it. Jobs got totally stumped and failed completely! He had to head-hunt 15 or 20 of the Xerox's own engineers to get Lisa up and working by the beginning 1983 - released mid-year 83. Jobs invented nothing to do with the Lisa or Mac OS! There's a lot of dirty little details, cash injections, globalist's plannings, and etc. but this isn't a thread about CS and IT history. It's about remembering the mascot, Vision Leader, and CEO of Apple.
That was my life in those days. I pretty much know everything about everything and all the players from those times. It was a most magnificent soap opera to experience living in that part of the USA as I did.
gdanmitchell wrote:
Just for one day, can you possibly give it a break? Talk about inappropriate and insensitive...
I did not read their whole comment, so I'm not sure of the context.
Without using words like religion or cult, it could "sort of" be a compliment if worded and intended correctly. Judging from your response to them, and you being one of the more level headed people kn these forums, I'm thinking they meant it maliciously.
As a whole, I think apple users have a brand loyalty that is up there with for example Honda. That is something that is extraordinary and speaks volumes to the level of commitment from the people at the companies. Myself as an example, I own pcs but own several apple products. Even in my frustrations, I still look at apple products. I see that television commercial with the young boy kn the iPad. It makes me think of my son, and the future he has.
You bet your bottom dollar, he will have an iPad when he's older and can learn from it.
The long/short of what I'm saying is that, the apple loyalty is something that is very powerful, and something I think that just says how people felt about their products/brand.
Read my reply again, Bif. My question is about the name "pink". This was (definitely) the codename of the Taligent object-oriented operating system which was co-developed by IBM and a Jobs-less Apple, and was developed to replace Mac OS. Eventually, Jobs returned, brought lots of NeXT technology with him, which turned into Mac OS X, and Taligent was scrapped:
I know about XEROX PARC and the Alto, but do not recall ever hearing a name for the OS of the box. As far as I know, everyone who saw the Alto thought it was neat, but nothing was ever done with it, really. Apple and XEROX entered into an agreement which allowed Steve Jobs to see the Alto, and he immediately saw the potential, and the Macintosh was born:
"Jobs was so struck by the power inherent to the PARC that he offered Xerox the opportunity to invest a million dollars in Apple computer if the company would agree to let him and his Lisa team study Alto. Xerox felt that it had nothing to lose. After all, they couldn't sell it."
"It has often been suggested that Apple's development of the Lisa GUI primarily centered around copying the Alto GUI. This shortchanges the hard work and brilliance of the Lisa team. Apple did not receive a blueprint from Xerox. What they got was much more profound: inspiration. Xerox had nothing to complain about. They had this wonderful creation that they couldn't sell. A 1760% increase on a one million dollar investment for two peeks at the PARC Alto was about the best the company could have hoped to achieve."
Note that Jobs put the Lisa team on copying the important ideas from the Alto, but soon after he was forced to leave that team, moved to the Macintosh team, and eventually overtook the Lisa with a vengeance. I think you need to read up on your history
The photo chosen by Apple for Jobs tribute in their front page, was taken with a 4x5 film camera by Albert Watson (http://www.albertwatson.net/):
"Albert Watson, who photographed Jobs just once for a portfolio of people in power that Fortune commissioned him to shoot in 2008, had a different experience from other photographers. “The one thing I insisted on was that we have a three hour window of set up time,” Watson says. “We were prepared…we set up to make [every shoot] as greased lightning fast as possible for the [subject].’ Watson says he had also read “a massive amount of stuff” about Jobs to help him conceptualize the shoot, and so he would be able to converse with Jobs intelligently.
When Jobs walked in, Watson says that his power, charisma and genius were palpable. “It was like when Clint Eastwood walks in to the room.”
Jobs didn’t look immediately at Watson, but looked instead at the set-up and then focused on Watson’s 4×5 camera “like it was something dinosauric,” Watson recalls, “and he said, ‘Wow, you’re shooting film.”
“I said, ‘I don’t feel like digital is quite here yet.’ And he said, ‘I agree,’ then he turned and looked at me and said, ‘But we’ll get there.’”
Jobs gave Watson about an hour–much longer than he ever gave most photographers for a portrait session. “I had wanted to do the shot in a minimalistic way because I knew that was going to suit him very well. He said, ‘What do you want me to do?’ I said I would like 95 percent, almost 100 percent of eye contact with the camera, and I said, ‘Think about the next project you have on the table,’ and I asked him also to think about instances where people have challenged him.
“If you look at that shot, you can see the intensity. It was my intention that by looking at him, that you knew this guy was smart,” Watson says, adding, “I heard later that it was his favorite photograph of all time.”
Apple cleared its home page today to post that photograph as a tribute to Jobs."
denoir wrote:
What I admired most with Steve Jobs is that he belonged to that nearly extinct spices - the great industrialist. Large corporations today are for the most part controlled by boards of directors that care for nothing but quarterly earnings and whose interest in the company is temporary and limited. The CEOs they hire are just employees caring no more about their company than any other rank and file employee.
Steve Jobs provided a vision and a driving force to Apple. The company was an integral part of his life and his passion for it is reflected in the products of the company. ...Show more →
I think you have captured what made him, and Apple under his leadership, "different" quite well. Not having ever had much of any interest in anything Apple or Jobs has done I had mostly been ignoring the extended obituary which itself is still trapped in the "reality distortion field". Obviously there was something different here and I think you characterized it succinctly.
That's too bad as Steve Job's Apple has in the past 10 years been an influential driving force in the tech industry. During that period anything that they did became the gold standard that was imitated by the competitors. Without Steve's vision and leadership I can't see Apple continuing doing that and I can't see anyone else today picking up where he left off. Had he lived for a decade or two more the tech industry would have been different from what we're going to see. And I'm convinced that it would have been better.
I'll differ a bit here. Not the "tech industry" but instead the "consumer electronic devices industry" would be more accurate. Apple's scope is actually quite limited in the larger technology industry and they've been absent and late to the game on a number of the most important changes in the industry as a whole. Where they have focused in the consumer market I think the impact is what you state, and probably specifically because of their focus.
So it's a great loss for all, including people that have never touched and never planned to touch an Apple product.
That presumes you like where Jobs/Apple steered the consumer devices. I'm at best indifferent, but more likely opposed to most everything in the direction Apple took in the past decade. So for me, no loss at all. I am, however, distinctly an oddball and I think what you say here is probably spot on for the vast majority of the market.
RIP Steve.... posted from my macbook pro, while listening to a podcast on my iPhone and looking forward to buying the 4S for me and my wife. I used to HATE Apple stuff when I was in college but in grad school my idea of what a good computer changed and both me and my wife became Apple users. My sincere hope for the future is that the team that Steve has put in place will continue on his path of innovation and integrative thinking. At this moment however my thoughts go out to his wife and kids.
abam wrote:
our inability to treat some forms of pancreatic cancer bothers me.
Actually, I though it was MOST forms of pancreatic cancer. I thought he was "lucky" to have a form that was in fact treatable. I've read that most times it's a death sentence of months and if you make it past a year or so you are doing great.
FortyOneSixty wrote:
So it's sad the guy is dead and all but...I just wish people would stop talking about it on every single forum on the internet (even on a Battlefield 3 forum I checked earlier...).
No kidding. On a Nikon sub-forum? People are so infatuated with his products, it is quite scary. The guy lied to a court saying he was sterile to prevent being identified as the father of his biological daughter. Extremely weak in the philanthropy department for someone with such vast wealth. Renowned for treating many of his employees like garbage. If only people were as touched by people who have helped pave the way to curing disease or helping mankind rather than someone who knows how to make an aesthetically pleasing product..
It is sad and all, but perhaps take it to the off topic, general gear, or software forum.
My two cents worth: Apple is overpriced, overhyped, product. Steve Job's attitude was you can have anything you want, as long as you take what I tell you that you can have. I will tell you what you want. Sorta like Henry Ford telling people they can have a Model "T" in any color as long as it is black.
That being said, Jobs, while not the engineer, designer, or software engineer, had a vision of where he wanted to go, and skillfully guided those above in getting to what he wanted. He was visionary, when the world did not want to be visionary. He was eccentric when the world did not want to be eccentric. He was right in many ways when the rest of the world was completely wrong.
He had a knack of coming out with something that EVERYONE else slapped themselves and said: "I wish I had done that!" HE forced Microsoft to adapt, adopt, and pulled computers kicking and screaming into the information age. Jobs had the ability to look ahead, and design a product that people wanted, and that would change the way information was received: iPod, iPad, iPhone, etc. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
