Alan Sorkin is a great script writer. It will be interesting to compare the movie to the book “Becoming Steve Jobs”.
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First Trailer for 'Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine' Documentary Released
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And what are the inaccuracies?
Jobs did hire him to write the book, that can be interpreted in binary as: this is my preference lets get my personal life documented by this person, or I want the book to be objective and allow this professional to make 'justice' or be balanced to certain aspects of my life that I'm not so proud of.
Either way plus any other interpretation we make, I understand the book was written with Steve's consent and includes his requests.
It will be really foolish to think that someone like Steve so passionate about perfection and arts will choose someone he considered subpar to perform such task, so personal and important as part of his legacy.
Gates was a programmer, so he understood when he was being BS'd about how something should work, or how long it should take, or if it was possible in the time allotted. He was infamous for getting a 100 page API document, reading it overnight, and grilling the coders the next day on things he didn't like.
Jobs never programmed at all, so he used bullying to figure out the same things. He was infamous for dissing an idea, and then seeing how hard the other person defended it. If the defender was passionate and held out, Jobs would usually back down, figuring that it really must be worthwhile.
The effect that this difference in knowledge had on products was huge, and really the opposite of what most people might expect.
Not knowing how hard something might be to do, Jobs would push for extra refinements that Gates probably thought was not worth the effort. In other words, the best thing about Jobs is that he was the ultimate non-techie Computer User... in a position of power to make others change what he didn't like.
I've always said that if Apple wanted to replace Jobs, they need to find another passionate and stylish non-techie / non-manager user and give them ultimate UI/design decision power.
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Steve Jobs knew enough about most subject matters to be able to pull off products and bring them to reality. Kind of like how a film director does. Or an Art Director/Creative Director. A film director doesn't have to be the best Director of Photography to have enough working knowledge to direct a high end Director of Photography and getting what he wants.
Bill Gates was an actual coder/nerd that wanted his software in everyone's home, regardless if it was good or not. He was after the numbers. He had tunnel vision. Look at Windows 3.1 or Windows 95, it looked like a piece of crap and the latter was a crash magnet. Yes it worked on hundreds of computers, but that's what Bill wanted. He had a software company.
Steve Jobs wanted to be different this is why he always felt like he's the underdog - he was childlike until his death, but I think towards the end of his life he started to reflect on things. His heroes were Sony, IBM (which he hated), Dieter Rams. He saw his company as an appliance company, not a software company.
They're both important, but I think Steve has done a little more than Bill in terms of betterment of society through products that connect people together. I think what he did in his lifetime will be felt in the years to come.
Bill Gates is doing a lot of great humanitarian work, for the past 15-20 years. But what separates them, like I said above, is a much broader impact Steve had imagined than Bill. Yes many people's heads rolled throughout these two people's lifetime, but heads have to roll when there is big impact to be achieved.
If Apple was in the hands of Wozniak, it would have never been able to achieve what it had achieved under Jobs when he came back. He was a master class salesman - able to talk to business people and explain what good design can do. That is a difficult task and he's probably one of the only ones that we will ever encounter in this lifetime. Essentially he was like Andy Warhol - took what's out there and remixed it and made it better. His group didn't invent the touch screen - or the first MP3 player....but who remembers any other MP3 player? Zune? iRiver (I used to own this)? Etc. Or who remembers the BlackBerry etc?
It's pretty interesting how much personable he made a company and people have a personal connection with a billionaire CEO and see him as the "next guy." It's a very interesting thing psychologically of what he was able to achieve - a singular voice and unapologetic who made such a company formidable. There's probably a reason why every hipster in Silicon Valley uses him as an ultimate archetype for a CEO of his class.
To study Steve Jobs is to study Capitalism. It's just not a simple subject matter as having him be an ******* or a nice guy. These people are extremely complicated. If someone makes a documentary about Stanley Kubrick, you will never get the right picture. Extremely complicated and I think only Steve's wife kind of knows him fairly well. He probably put his guard down at home and was totally a different person at work. Some may say he had a multiple personality disorder, but it's easy to classify these people like that.
But I think Apple has lost it's touch. It used to take big chances under Steve. If a product failed they would scrap it. What they're doing now is just making things flatter and more efficient.
I remember when OSX updates were damn exciting and new hardware were a thing of awe (or that is how Steve presented them....things that we "needed").
Apple is now bigger than IBM, almost if not bigger than Google, so it's not the underdog anymore But I digress....
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Apple has changed radically on several occasions since I first clattered away on an Apple II keyboard back in days of yore...Apple used to be a computer company. Now it's a luxury commodity manufacturer that also happens to do computers and OSs. I hope Apple continues to innovate in the field of computers and doesn't completely abandon them in favor of iDevices.
Apple tried Luxury business devices after Steve was fired, but they weren't successful. But if you look at the root of what Apple was about, it was always a "luxury" company. Their first Laser printer was a luxury item. The Mac in 1984 was a luxury item. The computer was supposed to be a "device" not some piece of software that went out to OEM's and they figured out the manufacturing. It was user friendly, accessible, and anyone could use it. If you mean the very first Mac with command lines, sure. But even then Apple always designed their own hardware and software. That is what separated Apple and every other company.
I've been rewatching old videos of Steve when he was super young, it's pretty crazy how good of a public speaker he was at such a young age. Formidable, young and agile. Self taught, a little ignorant, extremely hungry.
I just feel like Apple is very boring now. Maybe it's just me.
iDevices are also computers.
Unfortunately took them way too many years to release it but haven't you seen the Mac Pro?
What do you currently use?
What are your thoughts on App development ?
I'm an old fuddy duddy with strong opinions so don't listen to me. I will probably always consider iDevices and tablets as adjuncts to, not replacements for, a "proper" desktop or laptop computer.
Right now I'm using a 2009 Mac Mini at work alongside a Dell Windows box, and at home a 2010 Mac Pro (dual booting with Windows) and a tiny, old, cheap Asus netbook running Ubuntu.
Apple continues to be a bit ambivalent abut the Mac Pro, but it was nice to see them put real effort into an update.
There's a difference between being "snubbed" and simply being forgotten and the answer in the barest form is MONEY. Steve had Power and Money and notoriety. Ritchie did not. It's that simple. Someone else could have created "C" from "B" (hell Ken could have did it, IMO). Someone else could have ported UNIX. But how many ohter people could have been Steve Jobs? You don't get to be President by being smart. You get there by being KNOWN. Steve made himself known. Ritchie was a good and quiet worker, not an investor/leader that helped create giant corporations that make hundreds of billions of dollars. Maybe it's sad (obviously Steve couldn't do that on his own), but it's the way this world is. GREED and MONEY are EVERYTHING. And if there's a God out there that hates that sort of thing as some say, then a whole lot of people on this planet are deep trouble.
As for Steve, I think he wasn't terribly charitable (he was no philanthropist) , but from what I've seen he did want to empower people so they could do amazing things themselves with the technology. I would think that is still a noble cause except for every time I see people texting and talking on their smart phones while driving, walking, etc. and putting others lives at jeopardy for meaningless conversations about nothing. Maybe more communication isn't better communication.
Nice list of computers.
Are you planning on getting any of the new models?
I'm with you regarding how apple has distanced from what it used to be a Mac computer, nowadays most of the Macs are disposable and very difficult to expand. And with latest very questionable 'low end' models not really showing us what they are heading to; I hope the sales numbers aren't there and they get rid of them soon.
My guess and hope is that with the next generation of Thunderbolt we may be able to keep at least the video cards upgradable to certain extent in the next wave of Macs.
My old Mac nostalgia goes back to the Mac Plus keyboard with the numerical pad and its unique keys springs clacking, I believe it has no replacement, that was the best keyboard to write and play.
Excellent post.
Also:
"You don't get to be President by being smart. You get there by being KNOWN."
That kind of scares me because with all the media coverage given to Donald Trump, I'm afraid that he actually WILL win the nomination for representing the Republican presidential candidacy.
I'd say the same to his face. It's no ancient Chinese secret that he was a horrible person who even denied the existence of his daughter until much later. I haven't done that, so yes, I do think I am a better man than Steve Jobs.
Of course this is only talking about his personal character, since you clearly didn't see that.
Just because you can't accept it, doesn't make it any less true. Seriously, people need to take off their blinders.
No way is Trump going to win the nomination. They have him up there just to make other GOP's look normal.
It will be Jeb vs Hillary with Hillary ultimately taking the crown.
There's even a quote in the trailer! To paraphrase, "I lost my wife, I lost my children". That's a pretty damn high price to pay to live up to one mans ego.
But the ones who survive....do the work of their lifetime. No?
I'd rather have Bernie Sanders win it all, but I'd be content with Hillary. Anyone but anyone from the republican party. All the polls show Trump being on top... that's pretty damn scary.
It's like a 30 year dynasty between the Bushes and the Clintons. Even when Obama was in office, there was still a Clinton in the office. It kind of sickens me and makes the USA look worse than Russia with Putin being in power directly and "indirectly."
Bernie Sanders really has no chance - look at his audience it's young people looking for change and young people don't always decide the vote.
They can if they actually vote. But young people aren't the only middle class, which is really the class of people that's been completely CHEATED for the past 30+ years. They've had enough.
I'm 30 and I'm in 100+K in debt so I consider myself lower class even though I have a nice career. I would vote for Bernie but he has no chance.
I'm lucky in that regard, I've got a graphic design/marketing career with only a 5k debt of Visa... mortgage I don't count as debt, rather an investment. I really do hope the media gives him more exposure. Ron Paul got completely snubbed 4 years ago, I'd have actually voted for him eventhough I have zero respect for the republican party.
Ron Paul was a nutcase in a lot of his ideas.
American politics is lame. Anyway we're sidetracking the thread to capitalism and it's whims
you can't rewrite history Jobs did many great things but business wise he $ucked over a lot people as well. You absolutely cannot rise to those levels in corporate America with a few people getting screwed over is some way.
Jobs definitely was not involved in the writing and editing process. The author made his own interpretations:
“Although Jobs cooperated with this book, he asked for no control over what was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. He put nothing offlimits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly.”
Like I said, it's not a bad biography or subpar by any means, but it focuses is on the radical and extreme traits because the author thought doing so would be both entertaining and would seem revealing to the reader. After reading other accounts by people who knew him longer, I think that the book only captured the extremely positive and extremely negative of Jobs' story, leaving the more nuanced things untouched.
Your graphic is inline with what I'm talking about. Jobs's biography focused on the squares and circles, but left the cylinder mostly untouched.
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I see. And as i interpret it, Jobs was aware of Isaacson previous works so I assume he knew it would turn out something like he did.
I haven't read any of the other books made by him, I will start sometime to do so:
http://www.amazon.com/Walter-Isaacson/e/B000APFLB8/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1438049615&sr=1-1
And as many of you know/will notice many of the books written are bios and obviously Isaacson didn't live or talked with many of those.
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