I hope entrepreneurs don't start confusing accountability with narcissism because of Steve Jobs. You don't have to be a rude, difficult, bully to get things right. Not only would Steve tell people that their work sucked, but when they finally produced something he approved of, he would often act as if it was his idea. His romanticized view of the world was also impractical, from the meaningless paint job of the NeXT factory to his refusal to have his body "invaded" by surgery. What point does it serve to go through 64 nurses or worry about the design of your oxygen mask? It's absurd and accomplishes nothing.
Steve Jobs wasn't the designer of the iPhone. Other people made it while he cracked the whip. For some reason, a lot of the press is giving him credit for everything at Apple in spite of his infamous reputation for taking credit for other people's work.
Jef Raskin said these things in regards to the Macintosh project:
"What I proposed was a computer that would be easy to use, mix text and graphics, and sell for about $1,000. Steve Jobs said that it was a crazy idea, that it would never sell, and we didn't want anything like it. He tried to shoot the project down."
"After he took over, Jobs came up with the story about the Mac project being a 'pirate operation.' We weren't trying to keep the project away from Apple, as he later said; we had very good ties with the rest of Apple. We were trying to keep the project away from Jobs' meddling. For the first two years, Jobs wanted to kill the project because he didn't understand what it was really all about."
"I was very much amused by the recent Newsweek article where he [Jobs] said, 'I have a few good designs in me still.' He never had any designs. He has not designed a single product. Woz designed the Apple II. Ken Rothmuller and others designed Lisa. My team and I designed the Macintosh. Wendell Sanders designed the Apple III. What did Jobs design? Nothing."
Chapter 10 of Issacson's book spends quite a bit of time talking about Raskin vs Jobs on the Macintosh. Raskin is sourced several times for that chapter. The Macintosh would have been a very, very different product if Jobs had not taken over, and demanded a very different system than the one Raskin had envisioned.
The Issacson Analysis (backed up by Atkinson) was that Raskin had envisioned an underpowered, less expensive system that would not have had many of the features that made the original Macintosh "Insanely Great."
I like Gladwell's analysis - Jobs was a great _editor_ He didn't necessarily create very much, but he was driven to relentlessly critique until something great emerged.
It's amazing how valuable a function that can be, particularly in the presences of great engineers who can rise to the challenge.
The reason people praise Steve Jobs is not because he designed anything (though he may have had a few design suggestions) - but because his singular drive to release great products resulted in so many being created (and then, quite logically, being copied by everyone else)
The Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, iPad all came about because of Steve Jobs, and have changed the technology that we use every day. Love him, or Hate him, you can't take that away from him.
>The Issacson Analysis (backed up by Atkinson) was that Raskin had envisioned an underpowered, less expensive system that would not have had many of the features that made the original Macintosh "Insanely Great."
Or may be if Raskin was able to had it his way, we would Apple would have brought a PC to nearly every home and has as much impact to the society as MS had. We can only guess (and not even guesstimate) what would have happened if Jobs weren't there in this particular project.
> It's amazing how valuable a function that can be, particularly in the presences of great engineers who can rise to the challenge - Yes exactly. One of the major issues is that the Engineers are been given very less credit. Jobs was the editor, the face of APPL and not the creator. The current trend is to attribute all the success of Apple to just Jobs and no one else. I am not aware if they were actually great designers, developers and engineers under him or was it him alone who single handedly guided dumb sheep into greatness. Most of the Job praises after his death tend to point towards the latter, which is unfair if not wrong.
> Or may be if Raskin was able to had it his way, we would Apple would have brought a PC to nearly every home and has as much impact to the society as MS had.
If I'm not wrong, Raskin's I'd say "anti-vision" consisted of no GUI, no mouse, basically a kind of machine that even predated PC-s (capable of even less, but therefore being simpler to use). Jobs wanted more than anywhere existed and still having it simple to use.
Or may be if Raskin was able to had it his way, we would Apple would have brought a PC to nearly every home and has as much impact to the society as MS had.
Very true. Though the [lack of] success and interest in the Canon Cat, which was much closer to Raskin's vision than the shipping Macintosh ended up being, seems to belie this.
I guess I'm curious to know why so many people kept working for Jobs and Apple given that behavior? Did his "bluntness" command the respect that fueled other peoples' achievements?
There are a bunch of reasons; one of the primary ones is that it's awesome to work for a winner, and it's awesome to work on stuff that is part of the common culture (telling your mom that you can't talk about work but that she should check out the front page of the [i]Times[/i] next week is quite a rush). The downside is that you get a lot of the shouting and stomping around behavior copied from Jobs that trickles down -- after all, you get ahead by aping the Big Boss, right? Here's hoping that with Cook in charge the culture starts to mellow out a little.
You may dislike the verbosity, but it's hardly "completely unnecessary." A typical Objective-C program is inherently self-documenting. It's nice knowing what a group of arguments is used for without having to look up the method prototype.
Well, the beard, and other quirks, sort of symbolize how socially off and out-of-touch with normal people Stallman and others like him actually are. It doesn't automatically refute arguments he makes, but it does paint a picture.
Equating the iPhone to a "jail" is goofy political hyperbole. Normal people don't even view software in that context. It's just a piece of hardware and software they choose to use or not use.
Stallman represents the strain of computer nerds who want to view their hobby as the bold movement of a freedom fighter. They are out-of-touch and don't understand what normal people think and feel. They want their nerd playground to remain in place because it's a world they have control in.
It's hard for me to say how representative my non-techie friends are, but nearly all have some understanding that the App Store is tightly controlled by Apple, and not always in ways they agree with (apps being banned or not approved makes mainstream news semi-regularly). They accept it because they still like the iPhone more than the alternatives, but I wouldn't say that they are 100% happy with the way the App Store is run. Some join random "tell apple to unban [thing]" groups on Facebook periodically.
But you paraphrase me without really 'getting it' :(
Stallman represents what a lot of people would think if they really though about software freedom - it is in fact the only common sense approach. Computer software runs the world (along with JP Morgan ;) so it is very important that is adheres to these common sense, though rather hard-to-think-about ideals.
Maybe the iPhone will ultimately be inconsequential in historical terms, but it should adhere to the same principles; everything should.
The mobile world is still in its infancy, regardless of how many years ago Microsoft was working on it. No offense, but you come off as far too emotional to take seriously in a discussion. You start with some valid points about management, but then you act like they personally spit on your car.
There's a very valid point you didn't address, which is that Google is relying on its search monopoly profits to pump a free product into a new market in order to destroy existing competitors there. Regardless of how you feel about Google or Android, that is a behavior Microsoft was once criticized for when it made Internet Explorer free in order to destroy Netscape. Just something to think about.
It's important to maintain an objective perspective on all mega-corporations with monopoly power to make sure that your emotions aren't preventing you from recognizing a villain. Is Google a villain? In my opinion, they're on their way based on their behavior of the last couple of years.
Except last time I checked Android isn't bundled with existence as a human. The handsets aren't free the the public unless subsidized by contract, which is the same deal as competitors.
The only "free" part is licensing to OEMS, and they still need to pay for R&D for making physical devices. So that part has no bearing on OS-creators who also happen to manufacture their own devices like Apple and RIM.
You're being down voted because you missed the point. Google's lawyer was claiming that Microsoft was banding together with rivals to damage them, but Microsoft has revealed that they actually offered to team up with Google, and Google refused because they wanted the patents for themselves.
A lot of people are giving Google the benefit of the doubt for their motivations in bidding on the patents (hey, it's pro-Google territory around here, I get that), but the point of this article is that Google's blog post was a lie. They were trying to portray a pattern of behavior on Microsoft's part by which they team up with competitors against Google, yet it turns out Microsoft actually offered to bid with Google.
Google refused because they wanted the patents for themselves
Google refused for any of a myriad of reasons which I doubt anyone here can even begin to know, nor can we begin to know what the terms of this offer were. However, seeing as MS is in fierce competition with Google and is already on the offensive in the patent war, I would not assume the offer was particularly amicable.
They were trying to portray a pattern of behavior on Microsoft's part by which they team up with competitors against Google, yet it turns out Microsoft actually offered to bid with Google.
MS did team up with competitors against Google. Possibly after offering to team up with Google, but so what? How are the two mutually exclusive? MS is a corporation, not a character in a story. They can have a dozen different interests at once, with no particular loyalties or moral consistency.
Google fulfills the requirements of the licenses of android, that are open. So it is open. Do I like the way they do so?
Not so much, but it was necessary to do something against uglifications from the device makers, since seams that google is not willing/able to produce its own canon android hardware (and get the bigger slice of the android devices market, to make it actually canon).
Complaining about huge bids that are more than what these bogus patents are worth is pretty hypocritical if you yourself bid over $3 billion for them.
I think Google is whining because they didn't win, and they know communities like this are anti-patent and will automatically side with them if they portray it a certain way. It's hypocritical to complain about the patent system and that competitors won patents you also wanted and were bidding on.
God, I can't wait for this era of wannabe yuppies to end, yuppies reading about launching startups and talking about startups and thinking about everything in terms of startups. It's got to be the most boring tech news of all time, and I have no idea how anyone could be interested in it.
May I ask why on earth you are here? This is HN, which used to be called Startup News and is run by a noted venture capitalist who works with startups night and day.
You can join the startup crowd yourself or not, as you prefer, but if you're going to voluntarily hang out in their space please refrain from trolling them.
