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Decode: Gobble Fruit, Pac-Man Style 19.10Steve Jobs, the Perfect CEO
By Steven Levy September 27, 2011
12:00 pm
Wired October 2011
Photo: AP
It was supposed to be a temporary fix. Steve Jobs was Apple’s “iCEO,” and the iconic first letter didn’t stand for Internet. It stood for interim. In 1997, when Jobs returned to the company he cofounded, he insisted he was there only to do an overhaul. The floundering Apple was like a wrecked jalopy, he said, or an old girlfriend fallen on hard times. He’d make it shine again, then split. Apple’s board asked him to stay permanently, of course, but he demurred, explaining that he already had a company to run. “I felt I was pretty committed to Pixar and couldn’t do something else, didn’t want to,” he told me on the week of his return to Cupertino.
“And you will absolutely not be the CEO of Apple?” I asked.
“My name is not in the hat to be CEO,” he said.
It turns out there was no hat. Interim or not, Steve Jobs inhabited the chief executive role so thoroughly and masterfully that eventually people stopped asking who would take over for him. The 2000 announcement that Jobs would stay was anticlimactic. By then he was not only Apple’s CEO but someone who embodied the platonic ideal of that position.
Thus the poignant resignation letter that Jobs posted on August 24, 2011, ends an era. Though Jobs will remain at Apple as chair—and Apple says he will be an active chair—a milestone has passed. The greatest CEO in memory is no longer a CEO.
What makes the perfect chief executive? Understanding customers and what they want, even if they don’t know it yet. Mastery of market dynamics. The acumen of a poker champ. Commitment to excellence and brutal rejection of “good enough.” Accountability when things go wrong. Charisma that makes product launches as exciting as a Springsteen show. Steve Jobs had it all, in abundance. (Not necessarily included in the ideal skill set is a tendency to witheringly dismiss anything that fails to meet his “insanely great” standards. And a penchant for secrecy that makes the NSA look like the public library. But maybe those darker traits can’t be separated from such an exacting, oversize personality.)
He also had a talent no other CEO could boast of—the ability to defy the corporate equivalent of nature’s law. “If anybody’s going to make our products obsolete,” he once told me, “I want it to be us.”
The bane of Silicon Valley is the Innovator’s Dilemma, which says that once a company takes the lead in any given domain, it becomes less able to come up with radical innovations in that field. Jobs seemed to have discovered a powerful counterforce: the Innovator’s Gyre, where each dizzying breakthrough leads to another. The iMac begat a digital hub strategy with iTunes, which begat the iPod. The music player eventually served as a launchpad for the iPhone, which in turn evolved into the first massively successful tablet, the iPad. And the iPad’s innovations are now inspiring Apple’s computers, as the Macintosh gains a gestural interface.
Some chief executives view a successful run as a springboard to loftier pursuits—politics, philanthropy, the helm of an even bigger firm. For Jobs, running Apple was the pinnacle. After receiving treatment for a life-threatening cancer, all he wanted to do, besides enjoy his family, was run Apple. For the past few years, every time I or another journalist interviewed him, he would reiterate: I love this job. Even during his medical leave earlier this year, he not only kept up with Apple’s big decisions and products—reviewing key releases, negotiating with tech and media honchos—he also took star turns at two Apple launches. He did not iPhone it in but was, as always, ruler of the stage. Instead of enervating him, those moments seemed to energize him.
And now he’s no longer CEO. It’s ironic that Jobs made his decision only days after Hewlett-Packard said it might sell off its PC business. 1 I once observed to Jobs that when he and Steve Wozniak started Apple, there was no template for how two young guys should build a big corporation. Jobs corrected me. “There was a template,” he said, “HP.” Also founded by two young men, it had been a pillar of Silicon Valley’s values and standards for decades, and he saw it firsthand. “Woz and I both worked there,” he said. “There would never have been an Apple had there not been an HP.”
Now, of course, HP may be leaving the game and there is another company that is the inspiration for all young founders. 2 “When we started Apple, we took values from Hewlett-Packard as best as we understood them,” Jobs said. “We took things from other companies we admired, and to now be in that role for some new young company is wonderful. I’d like to think that in our own small way we’ve done some of that.”
Jobs knows that he and Apple do provide such inspiration, and not in a small way. Though he returned to Apple as iCEO, he became the CEO, setting a standard for leadership that was as impossibly high as the standard he set for his products. Which creates a problem for the company he gave so much to: the Successor’s Dilemma.
Senior writer Steven Levy (steven_levy@wired.com) interviewed Bradley Horowitz, lead developer of Google+ for issue 19.10.
Note 1. Correction appended [Sept. 29, 1011/19:00]: This story previously reported, incorrectly, that Hewlett-Packard has left the PC business; in fact, it has only said it is considering doing so.
Note 2. Correction appended [Sept. 29, 1011/19:00]: This story previously reported, incorrectly, that Hewlett-Packard has left the PC business; in fact, it has only said it is considering doing so.
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Andrew Eather 7 comments collapsed Collapse Expand ... does Wired have a fetish for Steve Jobs or something? Do you want to have his manbabies?
Seriously "The Perfect CEO", he made some great moves, he also made some massive blunders, stop mythologising the man.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 10 Likes F .
bewlaybrother 3 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Yeah, I think the positives have slightly outweighed the negatives in the final analysis there genius.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Andrew Eather 1 Like F .
Andrew Eather 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand It's still a far shot from "perfect". Hell even if you want to stay in the IT industry you could say Bill Gates beats Jobs out for the crown, but of course that's not a popular thing to say.
A Like Reply 2 days ago in reply to bewlaybrother 1 Like F .
Bruce Hoelscher 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand You could and you'd be wrong.
A Like Reply 1 day ago in reply to Andrew Eather 1 Like F .
3weight 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Andrew: Wired has a fetish for Steve Jobs or something
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Andrew Eather 1 Like F .
smileyyelims 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand seriously, the guy has cancer. Geez.
A Like Reply 2 days ago in reply to Andrew Eather 0 Like
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Andrew Eather 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand What does that have to do with anything? So do millions of people around the world, sucks, cancer is a horrible thing, but seriously what does it have to do with the topic at hand?
A Like Reply 1 day ago in reply to smileyyelims 0 Like
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pjcamp 13 comments collapsed Collapse Expand If Jobs is the greatest CEO in memory, then your memory is pretty short. The reason Apple was floundering was because Microsoft spanked its ass. Apple didn't begin to recover until Gates retired. You can love or hate either of them but Gates walked all over Apple, whether Steve was there or not.
This article has a disturbing, cult-like quality to it. Steve appears to be without flaw. He also appears to be dead, since this has the distinct aroma of an obit.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 9 Likes F .
VulpineMac 12 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Now who's forgotten history?
No, Microsoft didn't "spank (Apple's) ass" because DOS and Windows has never been as good as Apple's ProDos and Mac GUIs, though I won't deny they were good as far as they went.
Microsoft took advantage of a loophole IBM left open when they licensed DOS for the first IBM-PC. IBM copyrighted certain data which was intended to prevent anyone else from exactly duplicating their designs. However, by not demanding an exclusive license for DOS they left it open for Microsoft to market to anyone who wanted to build to the form factor. Since IBM was the business machine company of its day, the PC made inroads into the corporate environment carrying Microsoft with it, then with a little corporate espionage (someone stole IBM's BIOS) and reverse engineering, Compaq and dozens of other companies came out saying, "We run the same operating system and cost less than IBM." Yes, Bill Gates was a marketing genius. But he really wasn't any better than Jobs and in many ways fell short because his OSes from that point on never fully caught up to Apple's over the decades.
Apple sagged to near-bankruptcy because the CEO Jobs originally hired didn't know how to run a computer company; he ran the hardware side just fine, but lost sight of the integration that Jobs so emphatically drove and argued with Jobs so much that he eventually fired Jobs. Within 5 years the Apple board of directors was telling him to wind the company down because it had lost direction and was losing serious ground to Microsoft. Scully resigned rather than shut it down, which led the way to two others within the next five years who again didn't know how to move forwards and tried to copy the competition in every aspect but the OS--Apple stayed ahead there by about 3-5 years in capability. Amelio, however, by trying to turn Apple into an investment company that built computers, put too much of Apple's assets into medium and long-term investments rather than research and development. The one thing he did right was to purchase NeXt--which brought Steve Jobs back onto the board. Jobs himself drove the effort to fire Amelio and ended up in the top chair.
That said, Apple was practically bankrupt as far as their product line was concerned, even though they had some 5-7 Billion dollars in investments--money the company couldn't touch for years at best. Jobs needed cash fast to kick-start the company and turned to Gates--killing all existing litigation against Microsoft and requesting a loan in the form of special, non-voting stock that he priced at about $350 million. He turned that little loan into the iMac--which in the course of one year more than doubled the previous year's sales of all models which stood at about 750,000 units.
Job's efforts have driven Apple from a company with a stock value of less than $15 in 1996 to near (and for a short time over) $400 after splits of 2:1 and 3:1 in the last decade. The company not only reversed its slide but now sells ten times as many computers in a quarter as it sold in a year back in '96 but now sells more tablets than any other brand on the market and is still the #1 brand of smart phone (though Android, as a platform, sells more units overall). Apple's computers are now used in almost every environment: Corporate, government, home, charity, even military. True, they're not the most commonly used computers in these places, but their presence is visible and growing at an ever-increasing pace.
No, Microsoft didn't innovate, they took advantage of an opportunity and milked that opportunity for all it was worth. Microsoft nearly succeeded in owning the entire desktop computer market, and not always legally. But for all its efforts, Microsoft continued to lag behind the true innovator and Gates himself realized when it was time to escape with his reputation intact. Microsoft is no longer Bill Gate's place and it shows in how the company has been run over the last decade. Gates didn't groom a proper replacement for himself. He didn't find someone who could look ahead and drive the company. Gates' successor has barely managed to maintain Microsoft's lead and even that's more through its licensing to multiple manufacturers and by any real progress of its own. Jobs, however, built a team that has years of experience in their roles and understanding of how Jobs made the company work. As long as Cook and the others keep pushing in the direction Jobs pointed, Apple will remain the top technology company. Almost all the other big names are fading into obscurity as new companies fill the shoes they once did.
Gateway? Essentially gone. Compaq? Essentially gone. Dell? Very popular, yes; due to price. Still, they're losing ground due to their poor business plan of offering mass-produced, cheap products. HP? Fading. Poor decisions by a sequence of CEOs each driving the company downwards rather than forwards. Yes, Microsoft's Windows and Office are still the standard most people compare to, but Apple's OS X and systems integration is eating away at that lead.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 6 Likes F .
pjcamp 9 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Steve Jobs is the true innovator? The Mac, both OS and hardware, did little more than rip off ideas from Xerox PARC. You can't really call that innovation.
Jobs' early, ineffectual, history at Apple is also part of his CEO legacy. He drove it into the ground before he rescued it. But he did drive it into the ground. One could try to whitewash over that particular failure in the light of later events, but note that Microsoft, with an equally inexperienced CEO, did not suffer from that particular problem.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 3 Likes F .
bewlaybrother 5 comments collapsed Collapse Expand You have to be retarded to imagine this.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 2 Likes F .
pjcamp 4 comments collapsed Collapse Expand No, you just have to have lived through it. In 1979, Jobs heard of the technology being developed at PARC and traded some 100,000 shares of pre-IPO stock options for a tour. Xerox granted Jobs, Jef Raskin, and a team of engineers three days of access to the PARC facilities. There he saw the Alto running Star OS with a mouse driven desktop metaphor interface that Xerox had developed. Jobs was immediately convinced that all future computers would use a GUI and development of the Lisa interface, precursor of the Mac, began. In 1983, the mouse driven desktop metaphor Lisa appeared but sold miserably due to a stratospheric price tag and no applications to speak of. In 1984, the much cheaper mouse driven desktop metaphor Macintosh appeared.
In 1988, Apple sued Microsoft, alleging that Windows violated the "look and feel" of the Mac. Some things never change. Soon after, Xerox sued Apple for the same reason. The Xerox suit was only dismissed because the statute of limitations had expired by that point. The court did not address the issue of infringement.
Apple lost on almost all claims at both the district court level and on appeal. The appeals court ruled that "almost all the similarities spring either from the license or from
basic ideas and their obvious expression... illicit copying could occur
only if the works as a whole are virtually identical." The court outlined five ideas that it identified as basic to a GUI
desktop: windows, icon images of office items, manipulations of icons,
menus, and the opening and closing of objects.The court established that Apple could not make copyright claims based
on these ideas and could only make claims on the precise expression of
them.
The court also noted that Apple's claims failed on an originality basis due to the prior work at Xerox.
Apple won on a single claim -- they have the right to the trash can icon. That's why Windows has a recycle bin.
In 1997, Microsoft invested $150 million in non-voting Apple stock. Microsoft was floating in cash and Apple, under the astute management of Jobs and then John Scully, was tanking badly. So yes, if you have to ask your worst enemy to save you, things have come to quite a pass.
Jef Raskin once said Jobs would "make an excellent King of France." If that's the perfect CEO, well, ok then. I'm glad I work in academia.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to bewlaybrother 1 Like F .
VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Speaking of 'dealing', pj, maybe you should pay attention to what I said.
A). Steve Jobs was NOT at Apple when Apple was going downhill, so all Apple's mistakes fall on the heads of John Scully and his successors until Jobs' return, which incidentally was brought about by Apple's purchase of--guess what--NeXt. Hmmm... so NeXt was a failure, eh?
B). Within one year of Steve Jobs returning to Apple as interim CEO, Apple produced an all new model that looked completely different from any of its predecessors--a model that raised Apple's sales to double that of the previous years total sales, while reducing expenses and narrowing the company's focus to what was really needed to grow the company. Yes, he had help, but without Jobs would it have ever happened? No.
Now, speaking of those so-called Jobsian mistakes.
C). NeXt: You should do a little more research in the company; granted it wasn't a financial success in the way Microsoft or even Apple was at the time, but he was already working on a paradigm shift in desktop computing that relied on a well-established operating system that was still one of the most secure and reliable available--UNIX. You complain about his hardware choices while totally overlooking that Jobs was working on systems integration far more than hardware specs. Even now techies complain that Apple's hardware is effectively obsolete when introduced yet that same hardware somehow manages to perform as well or better than equivalently-equipped generic pcs. Why? Because the systems integration takes advantage of the stability and reliability of the hardware chosen.
D). While you are right about many of the specifics about Pixar, you might note that Lucas was about to close the Pixar studio because he couldn't see any purpose to it and Jobs bought it and kept it open. Quite honestly there would have been no "Toy Story" had it not been for Jobs knowing what he had and driving Lassiter to perform his best. Essentially he took Pixar from nothing to the top animation studio in the world in a matter of less than ten years. Disney already had its own digital studios--Oliver and Co., Beauty and the Beast and many other animated films used CGI for parts of their 'hand-drawn' movies, but Pixar showed how the whole thing could be done in CGI far better than Disney imagined. Now, Disney is relying on both the hand-drawn look and Pixar's CGI to create new, classic animation. Jobs, by the way, is 51% owner of Disney, now.
Finally, you might want to pay attention to that old saw about, "You have to spend money to make money." Yes, I do know Jobs tended to push the envelope; that's one reason why he argued so much with Scully. However, he also proved over and over again that by pushing the envelope he was driving the development of computers far beyond anything imagined for the day. Just take a look at how long corporations ran with mainframe computers with dumb terminals scattered all through the offices. Despite the obvious issues with processor time sharing and computer errors, nobody had managed to come up with anything better until IBM, some college kids and a few others asked the question, "Why can't the terminals do their own computing?" Each group found their own way to put an off-the-shelf microprocessor into a desktop-sized box with sufficient memory to run simple programs. They all used a similar assembly language based on hexadecimal commands, but they went farther by choosing to use something relatively new--high end programming languages like BASIC. However, each and every one of them also needed a way to translate code from human-readable into machine languages and later to find, load and launch applications from a magnetic source. DOS, in its many different forms was developed. The Disk Operating System was and the OS still is essentially nothing but an application launcher, and that's something most people forget when they talk about all the 'features' in today's OSes.
Now, I know I'm slipping away from that "spend money to make money" line I started with, but the fact is that with the original 8-bit Apple II, later 16-bit computers and even now with the 64-bit models, somebody had to spend money to research how to improve on preceding technologies. Jobs, first in Apple and later in NeXt tried to do exactly that. The Apple III and Lisa were grossly too expensive because they were cutting-edge technologies that nobody else understood. He went so far as to put the OS into firmware on the motherboard on the first Macs which in some ways limited capability but also demonstrated amazing (for the day) abilities in graphics handling particularly. Progressing into the Motorola 68000-series processors and maintaining that edge put the Mac into a very interesting niche of the market as they were far more capable of graphics handling than any other pc of the day. Intel itself was incensed when the first "Intel Inside" commercials were created using Motorola processor Macs.
Jobs may not have been perfect, but no man, woman or child is; they can only do the best they can or are willing to try. Jobs drove himself and his staff in ways few other leaders can manage. He surrounded himself with like-minded people in many ways. Tim Cook is an especial example when considering that in one early meeting after Jobs' return to Apple he mentioned that somebody needed to go figure out what was happening at a Chinese plant and later in the meeting singled out one attendee and asked, "Why are you still here?" That person immediately left the meeting, booked a flight to China and flew over without even bothering to change clothes or pack--for a several months stay.
Jobs was dedicated to his ideals of where computing should head and he drove his staff in the same direction. His upper management is as dedicated as he towards not only making an advanced product, but making it one anybody could use without extensive training. That is why the iPod became the top MP3 player. That is why the iPhone is still the top selling and number 2 selling smart phone. That is why the iPad is the top selling tablet and that is why Apple's computers are selling at an ever increasing rate--their growth numbers exceeding the competitions by double or more as Apple's computers eat into Windows' former monopoly.
No, Jobs isn't perfect, but he has proven that he does understand his customers better than almost every other CEO in the enterprise. I don't know of any single person who has had so much impact in desktop and mobile computing or really in any industry as he has.
A Like 2 days ago in reply to pjcamp 1 Like F .
VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Better take a look at where Steve Jobs was working between 1988 and 1996. You might discover you're wrong.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 1 Like F .
pjcamp 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Vulpinemac:
You mean 1985, acolyte, when he founded NeXT. It was a good machine but a failed company, partly due to some odd hardware decisions made by Jobs himself.
Or perhaps you mean 1986, when he bought an existing computer graphics effects operation, a software development division, from LucasFilm and, for some reason, tried to repurpose it as a high end graphics hardware vendor. Years of unprofitability ensued. Look up Pixar Image Computer some time. It was another good machine that didn't sell because it never got out of the prototype price range. It was an extravagantly expensive computer that required a second nearly as expensive computer (either a Sun or a Silicon Graphics workstation) to make it work.
One of the few purchasers of this system was Disney, who was trying to migrate their productions away from laborious hand drawn animation. Pixar was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy when John Lasseter showed some animations at SIGGRAPH to generate buzz. That led to Lasseter producing a series of TV commercials but it wasn't enough to lead to profitability. Jobs sold off the hardware division, then a year later fired half the workforce. About all that was left of the company was a few programmers working on RenderMan and CAPS, and Lasseter's TV commercial business when Disney dropped a $26 million contract for Toy Story. And that was still not enough to make the company profitable. As late as 1994, Jobs was still looking for buyers for what remained of Pixar.
(Renderman, incidentally, was a project that had started at LucasFilm before Jobs showed up.)
What successes Pixar had during this time (including Toy Story) were largely Lasseter's.
And none of this is to say that Jobs has not done some good work. It is, rather, to puncture this religious belief that he never did anything wrong, is the "perfect" CEO, free from flaws, and is now on the way toward ascending to some sort of godhood.
You can believe that if you want but its just BS.
And, by the way, the seeds of Apple's decline in the late 1980's were (in the opinion of Apple's board) in part due to the tendency of Jobs to launch extravagantly expensive forays into untested products. As we've already seen, he had to fail at that a lot of times before succeeding.
Deal with it.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 0 Like
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VulpineMac 3 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Little more, eh?
Have you ever seen PARC's original mouse? The thing cost thousands of dollars and had to undergo a major cleaning roughly every two hours of use because the mouse ball would stop working. Jobs knew it could be done a lot easier and cheaper. The first Apple mouse cost a mere $15 to make.
And take a look at that PARC OS itself. Yes, it was a great concept, but quite literally Xerox had no plans to do anything with it. Jobs took the concept and ran with it--with permission from Xerox because Jobs gave them $1million in Apple, Inc. stock--and turned it into a viable, real-world operating system. Guess who turned down the invitation to see that OS? Gates.
Jobs' history at Apple is anything BUT 'ineffectual'; where ever did you get the idea that it was? Jobs didn't drive Apple into the ground, he wasn't even AT Apple when it started going downhill. And as far as Gates is concerned, look at my comment just above.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 1 Like F .
pjcamp 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand That's a ridiculous argument. Every prototype is always stupidly expensive because it is hand made. Prototype iPhones were no different. As I recall, Apple had to refund some money to disgruntled early adopters.
And if you'll read what I wrote rather than what you think I wrote, I never argued Jobs is ineffectual. I argued that he was bad once upon a time and you really can't contest that. Apple had to approach Microsoft for an investment to avoid bankruptcy. Jobs had no training as a manager and so it shouldn't be a surprise that running a major tech company doesn't always turn out well when the manager is learning on the job.
Jesus Christ, he's not 'effing Jesus Christ, however much the faithful want to force it to be so.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 0 Like
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VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand "Ridiculous argument," eh? Let's see.
Let's start with a direct quote from you: "Jobs' early, ineffectual, history at Apple..." If that's not arguing that jobs was ineffectual, then I don't know what is.
Secondly, "Every prototype is always stupidly expensive because it is hand made. Prototype iPhones were no different. As I recall, Apple had to refund some money to disgruntled early adopters."
You seem to ignore the fact that
A). The prototype was a PARC device that was developed from an even previous device and was still buggy as sin. Apple's very first mouse cost a mere $15 dollars in parts for the prototype. And
B). As for that 'refund' you mention, it wasn't due to prototypes being sold to the consumer, but rather due to Apple's reducing the price of the iPhone itself only two months after release and then appeasing the early adopters with a refund of about $200. You're arguing two completely different concepts and trying to tie them together. Sorry, that just doesn't work.
I did read what you wrote and I pointed out word for word where you were wrong. I agree that Jobs is not "..." but when it came to running his company, nobody moved that company forward as rapidly as he did either before his firing or after his return. I will repeat and emphasize: Steve Jobs was not running Apple when it was moving downhill and was not even an employee of the company between '87 and '96. He was never "bad" except for his initial selection of John Scully as Apple's first corporate CEO. With only a little research you should be able to verify that statement for yourself.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to pjcamp 2 Likes F .
Tim Anderson, Spreadsheet solver extraordinaire. 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand To claim that Microsoft and/or Gates were not innovative is just simply intellectually dishonest. The effective implication you are making is that Apple essentially does everything right and is innovative while Microsoft lags behind and can't do anything right. In fact this comparison is silly; why should his legacy be dependent on comparing it to Gates? The fact that you even need to compare Jobs performance to Microsoft is somewhat telling regarding your irrational bias.
For example, the notion that Jobs has built this perfect team to succeed him is absolutely erroneous. There have been several articles ranging from Harvard Business School to Forbes Magazine wondering if Apple can survive without Job leadership. It doesn't matter how the succession at Microsoft - or any other company - has performed. We are looking only at Apple. My larger point here is that I think you have some Apple-tinted glasses and not really considering this objectively.
As an aside, I do not mean to imply that Steve Jobs was terrible in any sort. He was a very important figure in the development of personal computing. I think he has done fantastic work in changing how we engage with our services and devices. I just wish folks would look at his tenure objectively and rationally instead of praying to the Idol of Jobs.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 2 Likes F .
VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Sorry, I wasn't the one to initiate the use of Microsoft or Gates, pjcamp was by stating, "Apple didn't begin to recover until Gates retired." Apple began its recovery long before Gates retired and as I stated before, Apple's OS was ahead in every technology over Windows usually by a matter of five years or more. Your bias is evident by the fact that you have to defend that lack of innovation.
Innovation isn't forcing the OEMs to install your OS, innovation is making a product that the OEMs want to install. Microsoft got caught basically doing just that while even then people wanted to install the MacOS instead.
I don't argue that there have been multitudes of reports and conjecturing about how well Apple will survive without Jobs at the helm, but you seem to overlook the fact that Tim Cook, for instance, has been working for Jobs since 1997. You overlook the fact that Jonathan Ives has been working for Apple and Jobs for even longer. Apple still has the same design team. Apple still has the COO that helped drag the company up out of the mud by its boot strings. They know how Jobs worked and they are quite likely to continue that process because, quite obviously, it works.
Forbes can guess all it wants. Jobs' biggest single mistake was in hiring John Scully to be the first CEO of Apple, Inc.; Scully himself even admits it. A technology company like Apple cannot be run in the conventional manner and expect to stay ahead of the game. Jobs proved it when he created Apple and proved it again when he turned Apple around and made it the single largest technology company in the world--driving the direction of almost the entire technology industry.
I understand that you feel Bill Gates and Microsoft played a major role; they did. But they were not leaders in anything but numbers. They didn't design the hardware, IBM did. They didn't design the OS, a fellow college student did--and Gates bought it supposedly for a mere $500 after that student graduated. No, what Gates and Microsoft did was market it to somebody that asked for it. They made it available to anybody who wanted to buy into it. And with IBM's corporate access, Gates and Microsoft invaded the enterprise in a way no other startup could have managed. Without IBM's apron strings, Microsoft would have had to fight tooth and nail for every sale and the OS wars (if you care to call it that) would have been a much different battle.
Microsoft has almost never been first with any technology. Their reputation as 'copiers' was scathingly mocked at one of Apple's keynote events. They've always been behind the curve--doing enough to remain current, but not quite enough to take the lead. Now, because of their old reputation, they can't properly fix things that have been broken for 20 years. Why? Because software developers will cry foul and complain that Microsoft is being anti-competitive again. How do I know? Because it's already happened. Microsoft simply can't close some of their vulnerabilities because it is exactly those vulnerabilities that allow most of the Windows anti-virus applications to work. They tried, and were forced to re-open those holes by a judge or suffer more anti-trust punishment.
Is Apple perfect? No. I'll never claim they are. But Apple has led the game for over 30 years now, even if it hasn't always been in numbers, but rather in technology. It's not just looks; it's not just hardware; it's not just software; it's the entire, integrated package that makes Apple so good. This is what most people can't understand.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Tim Anderson 1 Like F .
Steven Randolph 6 comments collapsed Collapse Expand perfect CEO, give the consumer less in hardware specs and charge them more for the aesthetics LOL
A Like Reply 3 days ago 7 Likes F .
JayS 4 comments collapsed Collapse Expand I think you mean charge them more for quality industrial design and materials (quality). It's something that's worth paying for, like leather instead of vinyl, real wood instead of particleboard, DeLonghi instead of Mr. Coffee. At least to some people, specs aren't the final word and sometimes aren't even important.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Steven Randolph 13 Likes F .
Tony Knibb 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand You mean to shallow people, right? Who don't have a clue about what they're paying for and just want it to be shiny to impress their friends? Gotcha...
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to JayS 2 Likes F .
JayS 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand No, Tony. To people who don't think that McDonald's makes the best hamburgers, Bud is the best beer, and Transformers 3 is the best movie ever.
Appreciating design, industrial or otherwise, no more makes one shallow than buying your clothes at Walmart makes you deep.
And in terms of having a clue of what they paid for, Apple's devices (and well-made merchandise in general) have a much higher resale value than those tossed-together assemblages you prefer.
Gotcha back.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Tony Knibb 3 Likes F .
Zsolt or 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Yeah,quality...no need buy that little funny app what make your screen look as broken. It do alone, to itself.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to JayS 0 Like
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Christopher Arthur 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand And they pay it. Perfect CEO. You proved the point.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Steven Randolph 7 Likes F .
fauxshizzl 7 comments collapsed Collapse Expand "Accountability when things go wrong." Funny I recall a yellow screen issue that he would take no responsibility for saying "all LCD displays" do that. Or perhaps the Antenna issue that was denied over and over again until they finally admitted there was an issue. I guess I must just have seen these things in a different light because I don't drink the Jobs-aid he feeds to his followers.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 6 Likes F .
VulpineMac 6 comments collapsed Collapse Expand "Funny I recall a yellow screen issue that he would take no responsibility for saying "all LCD displays" do that." Yeah, what happened to that? Apple didn't do anything about it and the issue went away all by itself.
"Or perhaps the Antenna issue that was denied over and over again until they finally admitted there was an issue." What really did Apple do about that one? Gave away a few insulating bands and the "issue" vanished even though Apple made absolutely no physical changes to the phone and only slightly modified the software.
You saw things in a different light, certainly; a light where anything Apple does must be wrong, else it wouldn't be blowing away other similar products in sales on a regular basis.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to fauxshizzl 1 Like F .
fauxshizzl 5 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Telling support reps to tell customers "all LCD panels do that" isn't my idea of accountability when things go wrong. People had to fill Apples blogs with complaints for weeks (which they promptly deleted, but I am sure that is completely ok in your mind for them to do also) before they even acknowledged it, then denied it, then handed out free 15 cent bumpers that are required to make your phone capable of calling people. Sweet.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 1 Like F .
VulpineMac 4 comments collapsed Collapse Expand And who's to say he wasn't right? Are those displays still yellow, or did they clear up over time, as he claimed?
I also note that those "15 cent bumpers" aren't exactly required to make your phone capable of calling people. I have an iPhone 4 and I certainly do NOT have one of those "15 cent bumpers" on it. It works just fine without one.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to fauxshizzl 1 Like F .
fauxshizzl 3 comments collapsed Collapse Expand You must have a special iphone then, every person I know that owns one is incapable of making it through an entire call without having some form of case or bumper on it unless they "hold it right."
A Like Reply 2 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 0 Like
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VulpineMac 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Let me ask you this: If they're having such troubles with their iPhones, why aren't they trading them in for some other brand or platform? The return rates on Apple's phones are far, far below the return rates on any Android phone for instance and if as many people as you imply were really having a significant problem, those return rates should be high as well.
A Like 2 days ago in reply to fauxshizzl 1 Like F .
fauxshizzl 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Because they are "too invested in apps." That would be the most common response. They say its a great phone as long as you dont need to make a call.
A Like 1 day ago in reply to VulpineMac 0 Like
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Steve Snyder 22 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Perfect CEO? For brainwashing people into buying into a new level of planned obsolescence?
A Like Reply 1 week ago 13 Likes F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 18 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Your bitterness and jealousy are showing. Can you honestly ignore the value and innovation the man created, just to throw a cynical rock at his passing the torch? Name a single corporate head of a public company that can match Jobs creative flair, perseverance, inspirational skills, business acumen, and knowledge of his industry and I'll concede your right to toss rocks. Otherwise, some self-reflection is in order.
A Like Reply 6 days ago in reply to Steve Snyder 17 Likes F .
stead311 12 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Chuckie,
If someone has a different opinion - you can accuse them of being bitter and jealous but it doesn't make them wrong. It's an opinion. Match someone with creative flair, perseverance, inspirational business skills, acumen, knowledge..... how about Trump?
Despite your arrogance no one needs your concession to "throw rocks," it's called free speech - so get over yourself. You can lick apple's core all you want but don't discourage someones opinion if it interferes with yours - you donkey.
Start that "self-reflection" with number 1..... chuckie.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 7 Likes F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 11 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Donald Trump is not the head of a publicly traded company, or even a profitable company if industry reports are accurate. He probably has fewer than 5 direct reports and is simply in the business of self-promotion for his real estate deals. Your example fails on all points.
Yes, as a petulant, rock-throwing Internet troll, anyone is free to spew whatever they'd like. But it's still spew. My point was simply that you had no reason other than spite or vindictiveness to make your snide remark and I called you out on it. Sorry if the shoe fit too well...
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to stead311 9 Likes F .
stead311 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Sigh.... a 10 second Google search will refute everything you have said about Trump. But how about Schmidt - Google - who has done more in a shorter amount of time than jobs - how about great companies who are up and coming - Reed Hastings was amazing at being innovative. Zuckerburg... united the world and sold NOTHING. It's not so shocking how quick you are to dismiss SO many because you love to drool over Steve Jobs.
Just because YOU consider it "spew" - it doesn't mean it is. I'm sorry, but for the second time you are not the authority on what is a valid opinion or not.
How does that crow taste? Everyone has to eat a little humble pie - so grab a glass of milk.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 4 Likes F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Your ignorance is showing. Despite your assertion, searching Google does not magically turn Donald Trump into the CEO of a publicly traded company. He's still a front for a privately held real estate company. Schmidt was fired (asked to resign, parse it however you'd like) from Sun for running it into the ground. He has now been fired (demoted, excused, whatever) as Google CEO for not being able to execute there as well. So he fails the CEO test, too. Reed Hastings *is* the CEO of a publicly traded company, so you get points for getting that fact correct. But he, too, is running his company into the ground and its valuation is significantly less now than it was this time a year ago. Hardly a stellar example of a visionary, creative, successful corporate leader.
As for Zuckerburg, nope, not a CEO of a publicly traded company. And as to your assertion that he "united the world and sold nothing," I'd say you were massively off target there, too. He certainly managed to leverage the popularity of social media that The Globe.com, GeoCities, Yahoo, and MySpace pioneered. But I think the users of Weibo, Renren, and Kaixin001 would beg to differ on how effective he has been at "uniting the world."
And as for selling nothing, just because he doesn't sell anything to YOU doesn't mean Facebook sells nothing. They sell your information, your eyeballs, your mouse clicks, your time spent on Zynga games, and anything else you feed into the Facebook maw. If you think Mark Zuckerburg gets rich by selling "nothing", then you are incredibly naive about how the Internet works.
I think you should give up on this thread and return to trolling the other Wired sites. Examining the dozens of troll-bait posts you've made in other fora clearly demonstrates that you're good at it when you aren't confronted with facts or the need to appear informed or rational.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 14 Likes F .
stead311 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand You have completely disregarded my last post - which completely refuted yours. I have not gone off topic - I have only responded to your advancing posts and ridiculous series of challenges. So if you wanted to stick to the topic I am fine with that - instead you have sent me on a CEO hunt, Zuckerberg Investigation of Data Selling, Apple's history of products (most irrelevant), your constant desire to be able to approve comments that you think are valid. and so on. Go ahead reread them.
I have no problem with you thinking JOBS is okay - MY issue was with you dismissing someones opinion - and your self righteous, pompous ability to dismiss what you didn't like. But instead - you move on to the diatribe on CEO's and so on, instead of admitting that you willingly like to censor people's posts by calling it garbage because their opinions are at ends with yours. And if people can't meet your meticulous list of random facts that outline Steve Jobs - then their opinion is trolling - that is sad.
Self reflection time. - I am out of room to reply - so I will simply leave it to the hope that you will grow up and let people say what they want - without you shitting on it because they don't meet YOUR standards of "opinion."
Sorry chuckie - your bitterness is showing.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 2 Likes F .
VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand No, it did NOT refute his, it only attempted to redirect it--the sign of a very poor debater or one who has no facts to back up his assertions. I followed this entire thread and saw nothing but an attempt to belittle a real genius.
Yes, each of those others you named are leaders in their own sense, but they do not inspire. Trump is known for his business acumen. As a Real Estate mogul he's one of the best, but he is not creative and he does not inspire others to copy his methods. He had to generate a reality TV show to increase his popularity as his very ascorbic personality tends to drive innovators away. Quite honestly, would you want to be known for uttering the phrase, "You're Fired"?
Zukerburg (or whatever his name is) isn't inspirational either. Yes, he created Facebook as a social media site, but again it's nothing original--just an extension of Twitter in a sense that's aimed far more at targeted marketing of customers than it is of being a truly useful site. I won't deny some people get real use out of it--almost every one of them a marketer in one form or another--but I have found no part of Facebook interesting and only use it because I am a part of one of those marketing entities. I can count the total number of my 'friends' on my two hands, without having to resort to binary games.
True, Apple did not "invent" most of the technology they use, but in every case including the original Apple I computer, they took available technologies and redesigned it/repurposed it or otherwise re-created it to work the way it should have worked from the beginning. The Apple II was the first user-friendly desktop computer which at one point held nearly 50% of the home computer market. The iMac was the first desktop computer to abandon the floppy drive as obsolete and adopt USB as its standard communications interface. The iPod tied computer-based MP3 music capability with a hardware device where both worked as part of a single music entity, not as two different components, despite WinAmp and others being first on computers and Creative and others first on portable; neither group set up an integrated package until Apple. The iPhone did the same for smartphones--again, others were first, but RIM's Blackberry was never the easiest to use and even the Nokia was more a feature phone with apps than a true smart phone. Finally, tablet computers have been available for well over 10 years now, and because there was no integrated environment where things could be easily cross-utilized and no software support from developers, they simply did not move until Apple created the iPad--bringing it into an already-well-established environment and expanding that environment towards the desktop.
No, your arguments have been extremely opinionated without any measurable facts to back them up. You did not refute his arguments, but rather tried to divert the argument into a personal flame war. Continue as you wish, but know now that you're not helping your reputation with this argument.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 2 Likes F .
stead311 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Here is essentially what you have proposed:
Find me someone one who invented:
1. This
a) With the exceptions of this
b) At this time
c) With these specifications
d) With these random numbers
e) Whose name is Steve Jobs
You are setting a standard that outlines YOUR argument while causally dismissing everything else. You are being overwhelmingly dishonest by doing this. You had some valid points before but you have officially reached a point where you might as well put your fingers in your ears and yell "I LOVE STEVE JOBS" at the top of your lungs and perhaps yell - "NA NA NA" as well to seal the obvious observation, that you are, in fact a child.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 2 Likes F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand My original comment (which you have chosen to ignore or re-cast in your own terms) was:
"Name a single corporate head of a public company that can match Jobs creative flair, perseverance, inspirational skills, business acumen, and knowledge of his industry and I'll concede your right to toss rocks."
You have yet to do so, instead offering up numerous red herrings which I have carefully refuted at each point. Your inability to carry on a logical discourse that stays on topic and answers the questions at hand is not my problem. Each of your responses strays further afield from the topic at hand as you try to re-cast the dialog into something you can score a point with.
At the end of the day, you really should just admit that you're a bit out of your league and move along.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 8 Likes F .
stead311 4 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Since it wont let me reply below I will continue up here.
It is really quite amazing that you need to tailor the requirements of the CEO to fit jobs perfectly when the examples that I have given are not so different as to be totally not worth your consideration. Instead - you reject them based off of some nit-picked criteria. You point out the flaws of some CEO's saying Hastings is running it into the ground - while not even bringing up the fact that Apple was almost completely bankrupt - like that counts as a point against me.
You argue points about Zuckerberg that I didn't make - then claim victory. You accuse me of some points that you seem to exude yourself and despite your most sincere efforts have actually trolled greater than most anyone I have read on this forum.
Lastly, back to Jobs - he did not invent the Smartphone, Computer, Tablet or MP3 player so i am still waiting on this innovative visionary genius that you promote him to be.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 1 Like F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Oh yeah. Because "inventing" is necessarily followed as a matter of course by "making wildly successful in the marketplace." It's a pretty safe statement to say that Apple created the first mass market personal computer. Anything before it was a niche hobbyist box with minimal life in the market. Certainly no other company that was making what could be called a PC at the time is still making them today. That alone speaks volumes about Jobs' vision and perseverance as compared to others in the market.
Apple DID invent the first mass marketed touch screen mobile device. The Newton certainly qualifies as a precursor to every tablet, handheld, and smartphone out there now in my book. Feel free to name one that predates the Newton. As a hint, start looking before 1987 because that is when the first prototypes and patents were published.
MP3 players as a purely software device certainly existed for a while on a desktop computers (at least as early as '96). But feel free to tell me about the successful commercial hardware ones that predate the iPod's original release 2001. And please make sure to include all the ones with a vertically integrated infrastructure for purchasing digital music and managing it across multiple devices and computers.
I'll extend my offer again to move on to some other thread. You clearly don't know what you are talking about on this one.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 8 Likes F .
Tony Knibb 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand "It's a pretty safe statement to say that Apple created the first mass market personal computer."
IS it? Define mass market...
"Radio Shack sold over 10,000 TRS-80s Model Is in its first one and a half months of sales" in 1977
Is that mass market enough for you?
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 1 Like F .
Liam Wingard 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand you and chuckie are both fat trolls trying to top one another. get a room.
A Like 3 days ago in reply to stead311 1 Like F .
Pedro Martin Perez 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Jeff Bezos,
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 3 Likes F .
Chuck Shotton, Opinionated techie with back-up 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand That's a good example. Bezos completely opened up the "cloud" space, defined the market, and has the industry leading product. And that was AFTER making Amazon.com a huge success as an etailer.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Pedro Martin Perez 0 Like
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Rob Wyland 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Flame Score of this Thread:
Chuck vs Stead
38 vs 6
The people have spoken....
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 2 Likes F .
stead311 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand haha on an apple article from a magazine that shills apple - you mad bro?
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Rob Wyland 0 Like
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Jetpackninja 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Steve Jobs is, without a doubt, the rock star of CEOs—and it is just as nearly certain that you are his biggest groupie. Watching the messianic—and vitriolic—furor with which you defend him, it is quite clear to me that not only are you are unable to conceive of any other business leader who had made an equivalent contribution—you don’t *want* it to be true.
Considering the immense scope of human endeavor over the last century—including innovations in technology, medicine, engineering, telecommunications, manufacturing, agriculture, entertainment--some of which are considerably less glamorous than touch screen tablets--I personally don’t feel up to the task of deifying any particular executive. I hope you can understand why I view with some skepticism your fervent claims to be able to do so.
Apple’s ascendancy as a company under Steve Jobs has taken place during the refinement stage of the personal computing business. They have become the leading innovator in consumer lifestyle technology—taking computers and making them cool and usable and stylish and popular. Now, I have to admit that this doesn't impress me as much as it does you. I know from your earlier comments that you find it totally unacceptable that anyone would use different metrics than you to determine success, but I have to confess that the avid nature of your position makes me disinclined to pay your opinion much notice.
As Steve Job's Number One Fan, I suspect my comments will provoke only your ire. But as you sit in your office, or your bedroom, or wherever it is that you sit, surrounded by your softly glowing logos of little white fruit, I would ask you to briefly consider whether it is possible that you have been hypnotized, just a little, by the glitter over the substance.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Chuck Shotton 0 Like
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Christopher Arthur 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Maybe, but everything in the computer world is planned obsolescence. Moore's Law guarantees that. So you're basically making a moot point.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Steve Snyder 2 Likes F .
atimoshenko 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand And how did he do that? Which of his actions brainwashed masses of people?
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Steve Snyder 2 Likes F .
3weight 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand brainwashing? really, steve?
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Steve Snyder 0 Like
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Clint Graden 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Steven,
You are an excellent analyst and writer. Over the years, I have enjoyed the clarity and depth of your insight. This article is wonderful and I appreciate the thought you put into it. Bravo to you. And, of course, bravo to the remarkable Steve Jobs as well.
A Like Reply 1 week ago 8 Likes F .
Tim Anderson, Spreadsheet solver extraordinaire. 4 comments collapsed Collapse Expand I do not think Steve Jobs is the perfect CEO and it has nothing to do with his technical contributions or the way he changed our consumption of devices and media. Nor his exacting standards, ridiculous secrecy and so forth.
Why I don't think Jobs is the perfect CEO is simply because many people are asking this question: "Can Apple survive without Steve Job."
A perfect CEO would not make himself (or herself) so indispensable to the company so as to cause stakeholders to even ask this question. Because it is being asked, this tells me that the corporate culture that Jobs has created over the past many years is unable to function at a stellar level without his micromanagement. In my view, and I think this is rational and reasonable, a so-called "perfect CEO" would be one who carefully crafted a succession plan and implemented a corporate culture to the degree that if the CEO mysteriously disappeared, the company could seemingly go forth as if the CEO still occupied the corner office.
Again, in my view a perfect CEO would not leave stakeholders wondering how, or if, the company can survive without him.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 2 Likes F .
VulpineMac 3 comments collapsed Collapse Expand The interesting response to your question is that the people who are asking the questions are NOT the stockholders of the company, but rather generalized industry and financial analysts who have no stake in Apple other than to make money using their name in articles. (emphasis added) The obvious proof of this is the fact that Apple's stock continued to rise after his departure to over $400 and is even now proportionally higher than they would be in the current stock market had things remained static otherwise. Apple is still in the $370 range tonight (monday, 10/3) where it would more likely be in the $350 range as it was about 6 weeks ago.
So it appears that Jobs was the perfect CEO, making sure his company could continue to grow without him.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Tim Anderson 0 Like
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Tim Anderson, Spreadsheet solver extraordinaire. 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Perhaps you should have noticed I used the word "stakeholders" and not "stockholders."
Stakeholders can include stockholders as well as, for example, people invested in mutual funds vested in Apple. It can include Apple's supply chain, application partners, competitors, academics, and interestingly enough you, the customer. Effectively anybody who has an interest in how Apple performs is a stakeholder; you don't need to own stock to be affected by them.
Frankly it makes the rest of your post moot since you failed to make the distinction in terms. However, to play along it is in fact not an "obvious proof" of Jobs CEO perfection simply because the stock is at some price point right now. It is also a logical fallacy to make a contrafactual statement to assume that the stock price would be higher "had things remained static otherwise." You cannot assume to know nor prove that. Just saying it does not, in fact, make it true.
There has yet to be a product cycle since Job's departure - heck there has not even been a full quarter of financials. You have no evidence to support the claim that Jobs made "sure his company could continue to grow without him."
Perhaps Apple will be wildly successful after Steve Jobs' departure. Only time will tell. However, my point is simply that by the very fact that people need to ask this question should be interesting evidence to support the notion that Jobs was in fact not a perfect CEO.
To put it simply, if your model, ideal, perfect CEO would leave people questioning the strength of a company after their departure, then you are being woefully naive and ignorant, or just plain intellectually dishonest.
A Like Reply 2 days ago in reply to VulpineMac 0 Like
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VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Yes, I did note it and I even used the word 'stake' myself in the response. It really doesn't change or refute my response that the mere mention of Apple's name brings in visitors to websites and click-throughs on website links. They cause people to buy newspapers to read what it's all about and quite honestly get a laugh as all the negativity gets blown away by the facts that Apple simply has continued to grow despite all the anti-Apple zealotry. If you will note (and I'm sure you ignored this point) I essentially said the same thing earlier. It's the stockholders, however, who have to be satisfied. All that negative commentary can create fear, but if the company proves that nothing is effectively changing in how the company moves forward, then those fears are allayed and all the naysayers are debunked as fear-mongers.
So no, I did NOT fail to make the distinction in terms, which in turn makes your rebuttal moot in itself. Analyzing data is quite easy to do and even somebody with no skills in statistics can see that Apple's stock right now would be lower by comparison with respect to the overall market than it is because of its continued growth. It doesn't take a math genius or a stock market analyst to see trends.
I'm not a day-trader and quite honestly I pity the usual day-trader because they're so hooked on the short term that they totally miss the long-term trends. Just note that right now a single share of Apple stock that sold for $15 in 1997 is now worth over $2200, that's almost 150 times its original value when all splits are taken into consideration. That's a 15,000% growth.
What I have seen though, is that high-speed trading today has generated and extremely volatile market that reacts even to the slightest rumor and has sent us into multiple recessions over the last few decades. Regulations are in place to delay charts and numbers by as much as 20 minutes to generate some stabilizing effect, but most trading today is done by computers, not people, which can perform billions of trades in seconds and create huge swings that never stabilize.
Now, to address your final point. Why is it that people do NOT question the strength of a company when a generic CEO leaves but one driven by such a personality as Steve Jobs does, hmm? Who seems to care that HP has gone through 4 CEOs in the last 5 years? Who seems to care that General Motors has gone through 3 CEOs just since our government rescued it? People don't care because the company continues to run on momentum pretty much ignoring the person warming that top seat. Rather, the CEO that very visibly makes a difference is the one to worry about--whether or not he has the time and/or skills to groom a replacement that can continue his legacy. In the days of the tycoons, that tended to be a hereditary position. Today, it's anybody's guess.
A Like Reply 2 days ago in reply to Tim Anderson 0 Like
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patrick 3 comments collapsed Collapse Expand I think you also missed how many times Steve Jobs was personally responsible for innovation. He has over 300 patents. He started Apple. He made Pixar and left it with a strong enough team to continue growing even after he started to devote time to Apple. His innovations at Next computer gave rise to the original layout of the web. He completely changed all of these industrys: personal computers (3 times), animated movies, music distribution, mobile telecom, and tablet computers. No current or recent CEO can touch that resume
A Like Reply 3 days ago 2 Likes F .
JayS 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand He made Pixar financially viable, but little else. John Lasseter deserves that credit.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to patrick 0 Like
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datawrecker 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Yet, personal computers, music distribution, and mobile telecom are in shambles...good job with the mediocre tablet and repetitive animation movies though.
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3weight 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand oh - and just as a side-note to stead311 + chuck shotton:
way, WAY too much time on your hands, dudes. seriously.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 1 Like F .
Svend Filby 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Steve is a rock star beyond compare!!!! I have used his products in my business's over the years to make millions and have fun doing it!!! I LOVE using apple products... they are the BEST!
A Like Reply 3 days ago 1 Like F .
3weight 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand ... so... just to be clear... you're a fan of steve's... right?...
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Svend Filby 0 Like
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Bill Morlitz 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Steven,
You're not someone to fawn over Steve so reading this and remembering some of your other articles over the past few decades leads me to this observation: I've yet to read a better, short summation of why Apple and others owe so much to one individual as this essay.
A Like Reply 1 week ago 3 Likes F .
Brandt Hardin 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Jobs
is done but left his mark on every corner of wireless technology. It only
leaves us asking who won the war between the two titans of modern computer
technology? Steve Jobs vs. Bill Gates / Apple vs. Microsoft– check out my
rendering of an epic match-up of their cyborg selves on my artist's blog at http://dregstudiosart.blogspot...
A Like Reply 1 week ago 1 Like F .
Tony Knibb 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Bill Gates won, and then he retired rich and content.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Brandt Hardin 0 Like
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danwarne 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Before I post my actual comment, let me firstly say I don't want to detract from anything you've said in the above article. There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that Steve Jobs is utterly brilliant and has done more than anyone else to advance the field of computing.
However, given how the Apple PR machine built up the 'cult of Steve' so effectively -- which must have been a direction by him -- I always wonder how many _other_ brilliant people there are at Apple who get absolutely no recognition at all, because Steve always takes the credit. (I know, I know, he shares the limelight with some key lieutenants at times like Jonathan Ives and Scott Forstall, etc... but mostly, it's still the Steve show.)
A Like Reply 1 week ago 1 Like F .
nikster 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand "The Perfect CEO" - nah. I don't think so. Steve Jobs is a genius - a once in a lifetime great innovator, marketeer, businessman, visionary, all at the same time.
Calling him the perfect CEO is kind of like calling Benjamin Franklin the perfect CEO, or Albert Einstein a good physicist.
A Like Reply 1 week ago 1 Like F .
bennycocobutter 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand He will be missed - can't wait for the next Wired mag. The homepage is dope, please do him equal justice in the next issue.
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Pierre Balian 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand blah blah blah, good riddance to the smug douche. Wired really let its fanboy flag fly with the bullshit frontpage.
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chimala prakash 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand hi
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Supermonkeyme 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Hack
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Nathan Norgan 2 comments collapsed Collapse Expand Steve "God" Jobs, pray to him, bow to him. My lord and Master!
haha ffs Applism is as bad as any religion and i'd liek to think that human beings have evolved to the point that we do not need silly stories and false idols to worship.
Steve Jobs did two things, they are as follows:
Found a way to reinvent already existing technologies and claim them as brand new and different to everything else (that did the same thing already)
And
Managed to find a way to brainwash people into thinking Apple was both a good company caring about people and making good products that only considered the user.
The marketing team is the real hero of Apple, they must be the same guys that help the christian church recruit followers.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 0 Like
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VulpineMac 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand "Found a way to reinvent already existing technologies and claim them as brand new and different to everything else (that did the same thing already)"
Hmmm. If that were true, why is it that the iPod developed such demand as a Mac-only device that Apple had to port iTunes over to Windows to make it compatible? I'll agree that MP3 players were already available as separate hardware devices and computer software, but the two were never integrated until the iPod--which made mobile music much easier to listen to and enjoy.
The same kind of thing holds true for nearly every Apple product. USB was on the market and essentially ignored for over two years. Apple made it the standard connection on the iMac and removed the floppy disk. Now, USB is the standard connection and almost no pc of any brand carries a floppy disk. Apple didn't necessarily invent it, but they did lead the way in making it the standard pc modus operandi.
The iPhone? The iPad? Apple wasn't first with either concept, but just like the iMac and the iPod, by giving it integration and making them easy to use, Apple blew away the existing competition. The iPhone 4 is the top-selling smartphone; the iPhone 3G(s) is the second-top-selling smart phone. The iPad tablet is the top-selling tablet, selling more units in its first 9 months than all Windows tablets combined from the previous 10 years.
Marketing? I won't deny it played a part, but marketing can only go so far. Once a product gets a negative reputation, marketing, no matter how much you spend on it, can not overcome it. Just look at the Pontiac Fiero as an example.
As far as "Managed to find a way to brainwash people into thinking Apple was both a good company caring about people and making good products that only considered the user." Well, again marketing can only go so far. Considering the percentage of Apple users who are genuinely satisfied with their Apple products and services compared to all competitors (almost 90% vs all others 78% or less) then Apple has done more than brainwash people, they've proven their abilities despite the moaning and gnashing of teeth by their opponents.
You want Zealotry? Look at postings by anti-Apple commenters. Such ranting is far more emotional in nature and lacking in real facts than those by a true Apple user.
A Like Reply 3 days ago in reply to Nathan Norgan 0 Like
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IsraelCaballero 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Come on. Just stop the crap. Steve is no god and what people usually forget is all the people behind who really constitute the esence of what apple is. Not the CEO but the people is what makes a company go forward.
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IFUCKINGHATESTEVEJOBS 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand Steve jobs can suck my dick. "perfect CEO" my ass
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PopeOnABomb 1 comment collapsed Collapse Expand What set him apart from everyone else in Silicon Valley is that he doesn't accept bullshit as a response and he knows that the worst thing a company can do is renovate legacy products rather than innovating new products, which is the problem companies like Microsoft, RIM, and Yahoo have.
A Like Reply 3 days ago 0 Like
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