Unpopular opinion sure to upset (but that is not my intent): He made an incredible difference in the technology industry. Partially, through what the obsessive, cold, and perhaps even socially/personallly toxic aspects of his personality afforded him.
Even (most, so let's leave the extreme examples of the world like Nazism, etc out of any conversation) simple things in life are not singularly or uni-dimensionally "great" or "horrible".
I bring this up because I, years later, still see a relatively slanted discussion around his cult of personality that seems to revere him as a person and/or discuss his accomplishments without equally acknowledging the full gamut of the impact he had.
It could be argued that Jobs was a major cultural force in other ways, too, like legitimizing and encouragig a culture that incubated Holmes' Theranos. And I hardly blame Jobs for other people's actions or crimes, that's not at all what I am saying, this is, on the other hand, a part of what is a discussion of someone's impact on the world, which Jobs' has had so many incredible, positive, inspiring impacts, too to be fair.
And, that's the reason I'm leaving this comment: every year, around this time, people gather to very selectively engage in cult-like worship of someone alongside a carefully (and intentionally) curated image of the man, who just like all of us, was a human (who led a company that created some incredible things of our time) by a combination of his personal estate, Apple PR, etc.
Without a doubt, celebrating human achievement is wonderful and need not include a full accounting of one's life (one untenable extreme). The other untenable extreme, though, seems to be the norm around here: near idolatry of a man who led a company to produce a product (as innovative as they were) to the exclusion of all else.
Even (most, so let's leave the extreme examples of the world like Nazism, etc out of any conversation) simple things in life are not singularly or uni-dimensionally "great" or "horrible".
I bring this up because I, years later, still see a relatively slanted discussion around his cult of personality that seems to revere him as a person and/or discuss his accomplishments without equally acknowledging the full gamut of the impact he had.
It could be argued that Jobs was a major cultural force in other ways, too, like legitimizing and encouragig a culture that incubated Holmes' Theranos. And I hardly blame Jobs for other people's actions or crimes, that's not at all what I am saying, this is, on the other hand, a part of what is a discussion of someone's impact on the world, which Jobs' has had so many incredible, positive, inspiring impacts, too to be fair.
And, that's the reason I'm leaving this comment: every year, around this time, people gather to very selectively engage in cult-like worship of someone alongside a carefully (and intentionally) curated image of the man, who just like all of us, was a human (who led a company that created some incredible things of our time) by a combination of his personal estate, Apple PR, etc.
Without a doubt, celebrating human achievement is wonderful and need not include a full accounting of one's life (one untenable extreme). The other untenable extreme, though, seems to be the norm around here: near idolatry of a man who led a company to produce a product (as innovative as they were) to the exclusion of all else.
