Get over Steve Jobs!

Bbucko

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I have purchased two Apple products in my life. The first was a used word processor purchased in 1987 and was where I made my first tentative attempts at creative writing. The second was an iPod for a skeezy grifter who essentially demanded I buy it for him for Xmas.

I've never been one of the iCultists, and have no intention of becoming one now. If I were to buy a smartphone (something I'm contemplating before the end of the year), it'll be an Android, not an iPhone.

That having been said, there's something genuinely disturbing about grave-pissing. I've seen two different examples today posted on popular blogs denouncing Steve Jobs with smears that are, in reality, just holding a mirror up to the global economy and sneering at the image. Count me out, thanks.
 

fluoro

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Philanthropy?

Fair and comparative pricing?

Jobs was well known for being very private, so we can only speculate on his philanthropy.

Pricing is pretty simple - if you think it's overpriced, don't buy it. Apple consistently has the highest customer satisfaction rating among computer manufacturers and smartphone manufacturers, so the people who chose to buy seem to be happy that they did. No reason to be disgruntled about that.

He was a smart, hard working man…not a god. Since its founding in 1977, Apple has employed over 75,000 people worldwide. He's done more for the world than I have.
 

Intrigue

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Like it or not he changed the industry and possibly the world with his company. Im a windows guy and I say that with no shame. Gates/Wozniak/Jobs. Imo they are/were silicon valley.
 

VernalTiger

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As to pricing... Apple's pricing was fair and competitive... for quality merchandise.
Jobs proved that folks WILL pay for a product experience that SATISFIES them.


I think Apple's products are priced fair for the value received... and, apparently, so does everyone else who buys them.

Your experience is different to mine. I live in Australia. And before you start getting flashbacks to Crocodile Dundee, we are a rich and successful country, and in many ways we are doing better than the USA economically.

iTunes was released in 2001, and when started international music sales, it set prices for music - 99c for a single track. Unless you lived in Australia, where you paid $1.69 for the exact same packet of bytes. In April that year, the Australian dollar was worth 47 US cents. Australia's economy improved in leaps and bounds over the next ten years, but our iTunes purchase price remained the same. In October last year, we reached parity with the US dollar. This year our dollar was worth MORE than the USD for an extended period, only dropping because of instability in the US and European markets, but we still pay more than US consumers.

iPad 2 - US $499 ($510 AUD)
iPad 2 - AU $579 ($565 USD)
Prices taken from apple.com and apple.com/au
This is what I meant by fair and competitive pricing.

I'm not "against" Steve Jobs or Apple. I am against slavering idolatry, that's all.
 
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D_Hairy Truman

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I hope this is not what is meant by America need Jobs? A complement to a great innovator and leader.
RIP Steve.

i use a macbook so even a computer illiterate like me can get on the internet. i know bad idea. during college i did have to take a computer class and was on a pc window based. a family member introduced me to macs. in the 10 years i have used imacs or macbooks everything has been very simple and user friendly plus no viruses. steve jobs was the same type of guy who used to scream oxiclean on tv. wow he is dead too and got time on the internet. yes apple may not have invented a lot of their products, but made them more user friendly because of steve jobs and if you were willing to pay the money for their product they were successful. so to continue the quote above in the last 10 years steve jobs has died along with bob hope and johnny cash. so does that mean america has no jobs, hope or cash?
 
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Frnkd213

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i use a macbook so even a computer illiterate like me can get on the internet. i know bad idea. during college i did have to take a computer class and was on a pc window based. a family member introduced me to macs. in the 10 years i have used imacs or macbooks everything has been very simple and user friendly plus no viruses. steve jobs was the same type of guy who used to scream oxiclean on tv. wow he is dead too and got time on the internet. yes apple may not have invented a lot of their products, but made them more user friendly because of steve jobs and if you were willing to pay the money for their product they were successful. so to continue the quote above in the last 10 years steve jobs has died along with bob hope and johnny cash. so does that mean america has no jobs, hope or cash?

The definition of our American dream, a good job, lots of hope, and plenty of cash!!
 

midlifebear

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I suffered through using terminals wired to BIG dedicated machines such as WANGs and PD-1011s. We had giant stacks of flimsy disks that could barely hold a 200 word document, stuff was still maintained on rolls of IBM tape. I, along with thousands, learned the first iterations of BASIC as undergrads. I learned IBM's COBOL for AIX so I could waste hours trying to access and compile info from different enterprise data bases. Enterprise, a word some of you might recognize as technobabble for getting "middle ware" to "interfacer" with old information in even older data bases. And there was the sudden need in the Neolithic era to quickly become proficient in FORTRAN to crunch numbers. I thought FORTRAN would soon die (1980), but no. It still lives and data written in FORTRAN 30 years ago is easily retrieved and remains valuable as long as you understand C and how to write interface software for FORTRAN and C compilers. Ah, yes, compiling. If you're a programmer you know how much fun that is. Two or three days working overtime to create language bridges that can also be rendered in C++ object modules only to discover one command lacks a [ or a ] or / and the whole thing is fucked, then someone who makes more money than you, but can't program their way out of a paper bag, has a one-to-one meeting with you to remind you for the umpteenth time to carefully write "in well-formed code." A phrase that usually means the person using that phrase hasn't a fucking clue what he or she is talking about. It's just an excuse to pass on all the responsibility of missing a deadline on YOU. People who make larger salaries, by definition, do no make mistakes. No, not THEM.

But I digress.

While everyone was learning and relearning DOS (ewe for ick!) and all we had were command lines to invoke and control chunks of software, we all had to pick up JAVA on the side and figure out how to write mini programs that did mini things -- like turn on and off your house lights with a device attached to your key chain. Yeah. THAT was fun.

Then Steve Jobs, usually regarded as someone working for the good side of the force, was ousted by his own company so an ex exec from Coca Cola could run Apple. Apple barely survived. Coca Cola execs know shit from Shine-Ola when it comes to writing programs with fun guided user interfaces (GUIs) that are intuitive and teach as you learn. That dark period of Apple's history was when Microsoft caught up with the GUIs you PC lovers use today. Macs always had them. Apple had copied them from research at XEROX in Menlo Park decades earlier. But XEROX made photo copiers.

I still know programmers from my era who complain they can't run DOS session as they once did. With enough time my Golden Lab could have mastered DOS. And they also complain the rear engine air-cooled VW Bug is dead. Poor things.

When Steve Jobs was asked to return to head up Apple it was a good day. Apple has a well-deserved reputation for working with outside software companies (ADOBE) to enhance and create quality software with few bugs. And those bugs that occurred were more "wish list" commands and options to do things cross platform than software that didn't work. In contrast, Microsoft has a reputation for shipping mediocre quality software that "will be fixed in the next release." By the time the "next release" became available, Moor's Law had overtaken Microsoft's best intentions and we waited for the "next, next release." (Anybody remember Windows 3.0 or 3.1?)

Apple made one of it's early compatibility requirements that it would run Microsoft software. Granted, you have to install a shell operating system within which Microsoft Office, et al, must work. But it works. Microsoft never thought there was a need to return the favor.

Everything made by Apple is far from perfect, but it is infinitely better designed, intuitive, and generally just way more cool. This cannot be said as a general rule for products not made by apple. I was constrained to use PCs for most of the 80s, 90s, and 2000s. But a few years ago when my trusty Dell laptop died I was free to buy whatever I wanted to replace it. My first MacBook Pro showed up three days later. I now have two plus an iPad (II), and soon I'll get a new iPhone. My life will be complete when I get a new iStick and iRock.

You get what you pay for and there's no question Apple makes quality stuff. It just isn't for everyone. Most folks who buy Apple products and are disappointed/angry just don't have the attitude for an Apple product. Blackberries are very efficient. I like them. However they REALLY excel as address books and text messaging. I'm happier with the iPhone -- shiny colors and all that. But I'm so glad I don't need to write command lines to prove that 2+2=4 that words fail me.

Mind you, FOTRAN, COBOL, C++, BASIC (in various flavors), PASCAL. and a whole bunch of other programming languages are still in use and will be for the next 90 years. Some of these languages are actually used to make Apple compatible software (but the majority are rendered in some flavor of UNIX).

Steve Job's genius was envisioning how to make the world communicate using good design and panache. Given enough time he would have most likely pushed the creation of communication tools that don't have any moving parts. But he checked out early and whether you hate him (certainly, you didn't know him well enough to hate him) or loved him (he had a small circle who truly loved him) -- it doesn't matter. He was a visionary and we aren't. :smile::smile::smile::smile:

ADDITION: And one sweet thing, one truly sweet, great thing about the ancient Mac 512s was a letter written to Steve Jobs from Arthur C. Clark who thanked Steve and Woz for producing a product that allowed Mr. Clark to make the font size big enough that he could once again read a computer screen and continue to write without the use of his glasses. This is something that I often do, zoom in two or three levels when I haven't got my bifocals. But now every computer does that. At least I know an iPhone does. Do Androids and Blackberries?
 
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Ed69

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Do Androids and Blackberries?midlifebear
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yes
 

Deno

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Philanthropy?

Fair and comparative pricing?

not to get into a rant fest but fair and pricing on the backs of hundreds of thousands of chinese workers who are nearly worked to the brink of insanity. Housed in factories where there is no escape to any other type of life. Don't produce and your fired with no home to live in and no money save because you spent it all in the compound your housed in. Remember like 8 suicides at the factory because people were supervised to the extreme. quota quota quota. And we have our iphone and ipads and ipods who cares. 300 thousand workes housed in a facility/compound sounds more like a prison to me.
 

fluoro

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not to get into a rant fest but fair and pricing on the backs of hundreds of thousands of chinese workers who are nearly worked to the brink of insanity. Housed in factories where there is no escape to any other type of life. Don't produce and your fired with no home to live in and no money save because you spent it all in the compound your housed in. Remember like 8 suicides at the factory because people were supervised to the extreme. quota quota quota. And we have our iphone and ipads and ipods who cares. 300 thousand workes housed in a facility/compound sounds more like a prison to me.

Obviously, you have to extrapolate your rant to include most electronics and other goods we find in our stores today. I don't disagree with your sentiment, but it seems disingenuous to focus it all on Apple. If we are truly concerned about the plight of Chinese workers (amongst many others) we should be looking at a huge segment of our economy. Go into a Costco or Walmart and look at how much of that stuff is produced in China. American companies contract with Chinese companies (like Foxconn for Apple) to manufacture goods and have little control over what happens in China. Apple, Microsoft, HP, Nike, and on and on…same problem. If you decide to build your computer yourself, you'll have to buy components that were produced in these same conditions. It's truly a conundrum.

FOXCONN : Channel Business
 

bigbull29

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I think that this is very sad when people say "He did more good in the world than you ever did" ("you" being used in a general sense). A person's worth is grossly elevated because of a great contribution to technology? The reality is, is that Steve Jobs' life was no more precious than that of homeless man's.

Those who sacrifice their lives to work with the poorest of the poor in the world get my utmost respect, not a computer genius with selfish motives (not just for money and fame, but it was fun for fun's sake for him).
 
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hairynyc

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Philanthropy?

An article from 2008

Last year the founder of the Stanford Social Innovation Review called Apple one of "America's Least Philanthropic Companies." Jobs had terminated all of Apple's long-standing corporate philanthropy programs within weeks after returning to Apple in 1997, citing the need to cut costs until profitability rebounded. But the programs have never been restored.

Unlike Bill Gates - the tech world's other towering figure - Jobs has not shown much inclination to hand over the reins of his company to create a different kind of personal legacy. While his wife is deeply involved in an array of charitable projects, Jobs' only serious foray into personal philanthropy was short-lived. In January 1987, after launching Next, he also, without fanfare or public notice, incorporated the Steven P. Jobs Foundation. "He was very interested in food and health issues and vegetarianism," recalls Mark Vermilion, the community affairs executive Jobs hired to run it. Vermilion persuaded Jobs to focus on "social entrepreneurship" instead. But the Jobs foundation never did much of anything, besides hiring famed graphic designer Paul Rand to design its logo. (Explains Vermilion: "He wanted a logo worthy of his expectations.") Jobs shut down the foundation after less than 15 months.
 

D_Johnson Withernads

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Okay, I agree with the video & its facts. If they really are - I haven't followed up to check them.

The guy was still a genius. Can't vouch for that statement personally to qualify it, but you don't guide companies the way he did at Apple and Pixar unless you are extraordinary yourself.

I wish you did end up using what you started with, but my Sinclair's not up to it these days...

Both Microsoft & Apple have been & hopefully will continue to be extraordinary. They happened to focus on different things previously & the majority of their respective users think they still do. I don't hear IBM fans bemoaning Microsoft much (& hence Apple).

Out of all posts on this thread I think midlifebear said it best. (But VW's never die dude.)

It's a sad day for user technology for sure. It's a far sadder day for family, friends & colleagues of Steve Jobs & I don't think "grave pissing" which is done anywhere is appropriate.

Being unappreciative of Jobs' infuence is not appreciating the changes in computing & media technology for the previous quarter of a century. Whatever you run is your business, but he's affected all of us who are writing here today.

It doesn't matter if it's your desktop, laptop, tablet, smartphone, or movie that you take your kids to (that you secretly really want to watch too, as it'll be funny). Mr Jobs likely had a more positive effect on your life than negative.

As for his philanthropy, let's just give him the benefit of the doubt at this time, at least in the absence of much word to the contrary. Pleasing your shareholders by not giving money away from the company that you work for is not the same as what he's often accused of. Not everyone chooses to be as publically generous as Bill Gates. (I wish I could be!)

And, no, I do not own a single Apple product.

RIP to one of the original nerds.
 

travis1985

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It does seem like whenever a famous person dies, people act like they knew them and they're in mourning. They just feel like they're part of something that's in the news, but it does get pretty irritating watching people act like their lives will be any different because a celebrity died.