Steve Jobs Named 'Financial Times' Person of the Year

[kdarling]

Hang on now....Jobs is still an engineer in his own right. Not the brilliant engineer that Woz is but he can hold his own.

Jobs has never personally engineered anything, nor (according to Woz) has he ever coded a single line in his entire life.

He's also got a pretty terrible history of management.

What Jobs is good at, is finding people who are talented managers, engineers, innovators and designers... then picking out their best work, having them skim it down to the essentials, shine it up, and then let him sell it like crazy.

He is uniquely good at those things, but he depends on other people's work. People whom, with the exception of Jon Ives' designs, he seems to never give public credit to.

 

[AidenShaw]

...skim it down to the essentials, shine it up, and then let him sell it like crazy.

Yes, shiny things on the Internet fly off the shelves like hotcakes....

 

[StoneyG]

and Monty Python and the Holy Grail's Black Knight and
Benito Mussolini and The Blue Meanie and
Cowboy Curtis and Jambi the Genie.
Robocop, the Terminator, Captain Kirk, and Darth Vader
Lo Pan, Superman, every single Power Ranger.
Bill S. Preston and Theodore Logan,
Spock, The Rock, Doc Ock, and Hulk Hogan.

This made me laugh. Thanks.

And to Thunderbird: Well said good sir!

 

[LarryC]

I have at least two comments to make on this.

1. I think this whole adoration thing is getting to be a bit too much. Too many people are just too ready to drink the iKool-aid.

2. I really am sick of the overuse of "i" in the naming of products. Lets see, iMac, iBook, iTunes, iCal, iPod, iMovie, iDVD... etc. I sometimes wonder if when Steve Jobs goes to the bathroom, if he is going in there to have an "iBM."

There is nothing wrong with admiring a man who has done some good things, but it is overboard when people start trying to make him out to be an iGod, or an iSaviour. Enough is enough. It is past the time for a bunch of folks to iGrowthehellup and stop acting like a bunch of pre-pubescent iWeenies.

 

[MacAztec]

And exactly what impact has Julian Assange had on anything? Has he changed the way diplomacy is conducted? No. Has anyone been charged with a crime or forced to resign because of WikiLeaks? No. Has a ground swell of indignation risen up among the masses? No. Has anything at all been changed? Nope. Assange is a pitiful narcissist with delusions of grandeur. His organization has had no effect whatsoever on the world other than to endanger people's lives. He should be in jail, not on some magazine cover. He hates the U.S. He's a prick.

Yes, yes, and yes. While I respect that the guy is "trying" to spew out real facts on past events, he is nothing more than an internet sensation and fad. His name will be forgotten within 1 years time, and people will continue on with their life.

The internet community is so infatuated at times. Somebody pipes up, leaks some critical documents (many of which, are critical to our national security), and the internet thinks he is an overnight hero. In contrast, we have men that work their entire life doing good deeds, and they are just another Joe Shmoe.

 

[santaliqueur]

In the mean time Steve Jobs is producing a better future for ALL.

Bill Gates on the other hand is giving back most of the money he doesn't deserve after running a corrupt company.

Wait, what? Surely you jest.

I won't claim Jobs needs to donate anything. He's extraordinarily wealthy and could survive even if he donated all but 0.1% of his wealth, but should not be required to. If he wants to donate, that's great. If not, don't judge him for it.

I love Apple products more than anything, and I refuse to use Microsoft products at home. That said, Bill Gates is responsible for the most philanthropy in the entire history of humankind. Him "giving back money he doesn't deserve" is just wrong. It sounds like you need to take off your blinders and educate yourself. He's making the world a better place by using the money he earned. Yes, earned. He and Warren Buffett will be remembered forever for their generosity. Please don't fool yourself. I hate Microsoft, Steve Ballmer is an enormous buffoon, but Bill Gates is a true hero.

 

[santaliqueur]

I have at least two comments to make on this.

1. I think this whole adoration thing is getting to be a bit too much. Too many people are just too ready to drink the iKool-aid.

2. I really am sick of the overuse of "i" in the naming of products. Lets see, iMac, iBook, iTunes, iCal, iPod, iMovie, iDVD... etc. I sometimes wonder if when Steve Jobs goes to the bathroom, if he is going in there to have an "iBM."

There is nothing wrong with admiring a man who has done some good things, but it is overboard when people start trying to make him out to be an iGod, or an iSaviour. Enough is enough. It is past the time for a bunch of folks to iGrowthehellup and stop acting like a bunch of pre-pubescent iWeenies.

iAgree

I think Jobs is an amazing businessman, but I don't see where the adoration can go beyond that. He's transformed computing into something we all enjoy very much. I don't understand your "iGod" material, where do you see evidence that people are going overboard?

I also hate the iNames. So much. I wish they went away long ago, so that they could be replaced now. They feel like they are here to stay, unless something comes along to replace them. Perhaps with OS XI?

 

[greygray]

Who would give a 'negative' to this piece of good news?!

 

[StoneyG]

Wait, what? Surely you jest.

I won't claim Jobs needs to donate anything. He's extraordinarily wealthy and could survive even if he donated all but 0.1% of his wealth, but should not be required to. If he wants to donate, that's great. If not, don't judge him for it.

I love Apple products more than anything, and I refuse to use Microsoft products at home. That said, Bill Gates is responsible for the most philanthropy in the entire history of humankind. Him "giving back money he doesn't deserve" is just wrong. It sounds like you need to take off your blinders and educate yourself. He's making the world a better place by using the money he earned. Yes, earned. He and Warren Buffett will be remembered forever for their generosity. Please don't fool yourself. I hate Microsoft, Steve Ballmer is an enormous buffoon, but Bill Gates is a true hero.

True story.

 

[fobfob]

I have at least two comments to make on this.

1. I think this whole adoration thing is getting to be a bit too much. Too many people are just too ready to drink the iKool-aid.

2. I really am sick of the overuse of "i" in the naming of products. Lets see, iMac, iBook, iTunes, iCal, iPod, iMovie, iDVD... etc. I sometimes wonder if when Steve Jobs goes to the bathroom, if he is going in there to have an "iBM."

There is nothing wrong with admiring a man who has done some good things, but it is overboard when people start trying to make him out to be an iGod, or an iSaviour. Enough is enough. It is past the time for a bunch of folks to iGrowthehellup and stop acting like a bunch of pre-pubescent iWeenies.

I presume you are joking because of your overuse of the ixxx terminology you claim to hate. But I have at least two comments to make on this:

1. There is no "adoration" in business. People are recognising the impact of the man. There is no love, but there is respect at the impact that someone can have in the industries he conducts business in globally. The "awards" themselves are annoying, I mean the top xx lists at the end of each year or decade. Yeah we get it. But don't shoot the winner of these awards. After all, he's not getting anything out of it. You also need to seperate out the drinking of the ikool-aid to the discussion of the ikool-aid. Or rather, there are two flavours of kool-aid: The business related kool-aid which respect for how Jobs' is so successful, and the ikool-aid. which is the hanging on every word and shiny new iProduct kool-aid. Disclosure: I drink both but at least I know what I'm drinking!

2. Anyway I also hate the ixxx terminology because it's meaningless but I see the value in connecting the brands together. At some point Apple need to rationalise it all and come up with a naming convention that is more scalable. For exampe why is my iPad synced with "iTunes" when I don't even have any music in either? What does "iPod" mean anyway? What's a pod? At least iPad has some meaning apart from the "i" prefix. Why doesn't iLife work on an iPod? Maybe the iOS devices and OSX devices should be branded differently (ie. drop the i from one of them)?

That's got to be at least 2 comments

 

[Winni]

That picture, with the dark Apple logo in back, makes him look like a vampire.

Well, in a sense, that's what he is: As far as we know he doesn't drink blood, but he certainly drains you off your money.

As with many profiles of Jobs, the article focuses on Jobs' salesmanship and attention to detail, aspects of his personality that can drive the company to achieve remarkable design standards but also result in him being viewed as a "stern taskmaster" obsessing over the every aspect of Apple's products.

And if all this is really true, then we will see Apple falling back into nothingness on the day that Steve Jobs retires.

In the mean time Steve Jobs is producing a better future for ALL.

No, he doesn't. He is producing some nice electronic products for people who can afford them -- and that certainly is only a minority on this planet.

I won't claim Jobs needs to donate anything. He's extraordinarily wealthy and could survive even if he donated all but 0.1% of his wealth, but should not be required to. If he wants to donate, that's great. If not, don't judge him for it.

I do. Just as any great power, that money comes with responsibility. But from what we know, he doesn't care at all. So far, all he does is invent new ways to milk money from his customers. From an American perspective, that might be something good, but from a human perspective that is extraordinarily weak.

 

[Hastings101]

Our favorite greedy capitalist fat cat. The picture is a little creepy though.

 

[koobcamuk]

you gotta be joking - what the hell impact did assange have? A short lived tempest in a teapot - junior high school girls gossiping at best. He is quickly being relegated to the irrelevant bin of news / history.

Steve - otoh....

lol.

 

[CFreymarc]

If Steve Jobs is the man of the year, decade, millennium, why don't more CEOs follow his example and get paid $1 per year?

It is because most of America's CEO's are molded from their predecessors. Steve is not just a CEO but a founder of an industry that shaped society. This is a very elite lineage of American industry pioneers.

IMO, that lineage goes this way.

Steve Jobs
Dave Packard
Howard Hughes
George Eastman
Thomas Edison
Henry Ford
Henry Colt
Eliphalet Remington
John Stevens (look him up)
Eli Whitney
Ben Franklin

Who's next? My guess there is someone that will make all this budding private spaceflight into something big. He is probably in his teens right now and perhaps reading this.

 

[Steve121178]

My guess there is someone that will make all this budding private spaceflight into something big. He is probably in his teens right now and perhaps reading this.

Richard Branson is 60.

http://www.virgingalactic.com/

 

[Michaelgtrusa]

How quickly people forget the real brains behind the brand, the man with the original vision and engineering expertise.

The iconic Steve Wozniak.

If not for him, Apple would have been just another Silicon Valley Startup that Flared Up and Fizzled.

That said, I _do_ give Steve Jobs a lot of credit. He's the Master Pitchman and Brilliant Marketing Guru, that has resurrected what the prior management nearly killed off, after Jobs was forced out of the company the first time around.

The flip of it, is that he's also the really great guy (when he was younger, before he let the money go to his head) that morphed into the sometimes menacing, always dictatorial, supreme control freak that the zealots bow down to today.

Nonetheless as the posts on this forum validate, it's the almighty dollar that impresses the cult like clan that await his every word, his every move as though their life depended on it. And hey! If that works for them, then all's well in AppleLand.

Celebrate the great consumer electronics company Apple has become, we needed a replacement for Sony anyway...

...and led to the jobs going overseas.

 

[Trakker]

Wait, what? Surely you jest.

I won't claim Jobs needs to donate anything. He's extraordinarily wealthy and could survive even if he donated all but 0.1% of his wealth, but should not be required to. If he wants to donate, that's great. If not, don't judge him for it.

I love Apple products more than anything, and I refuse to use Microsoft products at home. That said, Bill Gates is responsible for the most philanthropy in the entire history of humankind. Him "giving back money he doesn't deserve" is just wrong. It sounds like you need to take off your blinders and educate yourself. He's making the world a better place by using the money he earned. Yes, earned. He and Warren Buffett will be remembered forever for their generosity. Please don't fool yourself. I hate Microsoft, Steve Ballmer is an enormous buffoon, but Bill Gates is a true hero.

55 Billion was his networth at one point - no man is worth that amount of cash.

He did not earn that amount of cash - are you telling me Jobs networth of what? 5 Billion makes him 50 Billion quids worth less worthy of appraisal than Gates? Has he not done more for the computer world than Gates?

I am very educated in the ways Microsoft spend the last two decades desecrating the computer industry with their corruption and prevented many technologies from peaking.

What Bill & Melinda is doing now is excellent, don't get me wrong but it's the least he can do after the chronic damage he has caused over time.

Don't talk about True Hero's - True Hero's are the men currently in Iraq getting blown to kingdom come without a paper towel to wipe their arses with yet they still smile - those are the True Hero's.

 

[emotion]

Some proper nonsense being uttered in this thread.

Put down the computer people and enjoy Christmas!

 

[winglet69]

1. How did a story about a well-deserved award become a comparison with a two-bit alleged rapist whose sole claim to fame is posting stolen information on the internet?

2. How badly are you missing having a life, to grasp at the straw of some ancient paternity dispute to try and discredit Jobs, who - love, hate, indifferent - has undeniably performed quite a remarkable achievement in his field?

No, coming up with the iPad isn't quite the same as finding the cure for cancer, but that isn't what the award is for either, is it?!

Sheesh.

 

[Glideslope]

Jobs has never personally engineered anything, nor (according to Woz) has he ever coded a single line in his entire life.

He's also got a pretty terrible history of management.

What Jobs is good at, is finding people who are talented managers, engineers, innovators and designers... then picking out their best work, having them skim it down to the essentials, shine it up, and then let him sell it like crazy.

He is uniquely good at those things, but he depends on other people's work. People whom, with the exception of Jon Ives' designs, he seems to never give public credit to.

This is the standard profile of a CEO. Your second paragraph contradicts your first statement. Being a great manager is what happens in your second paragraph.

Personal accolades aside, I am compensated to hire talented individuals to fill the needs of my employer. They are compensated for their contributions in many different ways. The vast majority are very satisfied, even if our CEO does not mention them by name on stage.

So, Steve actually is the quintessential CEO in every way. If an engineer needs their name in the lights or on a stage, and is not satisfied with Apple's approach they can choose to work other places (easier if they design Hardware).

I actually know a person who left Apple 3 years ago after being a VP with World Wide Service and Support for 7 years coming from Palm. They always felt appreciated, and loved their job. They simply started a family, and could not take the 24-7 life style of a VP at Apple.

So despite the statement from Woz, who I respect very much, Steve is deserving, and IMO, for very obvious reasons one of the top 5 CEO's in the world today. Period.

 

[swagi]

55 Billion was his networth at one point - no man is worth that amount of cash.

He did not earn that amount of cash - are you telling me Jobs networth of what? 5 Billion makes him 50 Billion quids worth less worthy of appraisal than Gates? Has he not done more for the computer world than Gates?

I am very educated in the ways Microsoft spend the last two decades desecrating the computer industry with their corruption and prevented many technologies from peaking.

What Bill & Melinda is doing now is excellent, don't get me wrong but it's the least he can do after the chronic damage he has caused over time.

Don't talk about True Hero's - True Hero's are the men currently in Iraq getting blown to kingdom come without a paper towel to wipe their arses with yet they still smile - those are the True Hero's.

You, sir, are in desperate need of a little love. Enjoy Christmas.

<off topic>
Giving props to some Jarheads that are blindly obeying orders instituted by Brando-esque pricks in their shiny former Republican Army palaces and don't giva a damn about the people and their feelings are not heros.

You want to be loved by Iraqis and the Arab world? Turn on your head, talk with them and learn that people are different! Learn why those people hate the US.

And learn how Bill and Melinda Gates really help, educate and show respect.
<on topic>

Respect to you old Steve-O.

Too bad I'll stop using your products due to the fact that I need the hacking community to free my devices.

Too bad I grew up from being a Mac cultist - your products still inspire me and I like them. But I certainly have stopped being a sheep blindly following what you tell me to do with my devices.

Have fun with the sheep - in a few hours you will have some more ten millions turned

 

[Mr-Stabby]

I must admit, i preferred it when Apple was the underdog. Apple being as big as it is now makes it seem more like a corporate monster than a funky technology company.

Actually for a laugh (or to make a point) I do wish IBM would put out an ad where you see loads of bald grey men wearing iPods, staring at a large screen with Steve Jobs on it. Then a woman in an IBM tank top and blue hot pants runs across the middle of them carrying an IBM mainframe, being chased by Apple Store 'geniuses'. She then flips it round several times, then chucks it at the screen

TV Gold

 

[S.B.G]

Congratulations to Steve and all of the folks at Apple.

<Off topic>
The last time I checked Steve is an American, living in the United States and has a net worth of $5 billion or so. OK he doesn't [appear] to donate any of his money to charities. So what? He doesn't have to. It seems as though some people believe that if you are wealthy or have an income of X or more you are supposed to donate some it. So being wealthy obligates one to give their money away? Is that what I am hearing? In America, so far, you get to keep what you earn, save for taxes, and Steve has every right to do that and not to be vilified for it.

Kudos to Bill and Melinda for their philanthropy, truly. They are exercising their option to do so. If they didn't want to, they wouldn't have to.

I think it would wonderful if Steve donated some of his money to charities or Christian missions (I know he's a Buddhist) or whatever good thing he can find. But since he doesn't, I am not going to demonize him for it.
</Off topic>

 

[fxtech]

Here's to the Steve-o and all he has done to move the industry forward kicking and screaming all the way. I shudder to think how backward it would be today if not for his energy.

Yes, surely without The Great Steve we'd all be living in caves eating dogs and porking the sheep, huddling in poo for warmth.

You might want to tone it down a bit. I'm sure Steve wants you to stop stalking him and sending him naked photos of yourself with your iPhone.

 

[carlemil]

I thought Jobs was named god already?

haha, true though. He's not a person he is an abstract perspective.

no one really knows who and what he is, and what he is capable of.
maybe he was conceived by a virgin mother, who gave away her child. I'm referring to the prophecy of the chosen one, the one to bring balance to the way we use computers and electronic devices.

or you know, something like that.