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For those interested, AllAboutSteveJobs.com keeps a pretty good repository of Jobs moments. My personal favorite is his 1997 WWDC talk [1]. In one talk he demon

For those interested, AllAboutSteveJobs.com keeps a pretty good repository of Jobs moments. My personal favorite is his 1997 WWDC talk [1]. In one talk he demonstrates what it is to be a great leader organizationally, publicly, and as a product visionary. He also opens himself up to harsh criticism from people who were, in a lot of ways, rightfully pissed at him. He takes both tough questions and ad hominem attacks gracefully and reframes the narrative in a positive way without disparaging the questioner [2]. To me, this is in stark contrast to the staged events with canned/screened questions that most tech leaders run today. He also lays out much of the vision for products that are still being rolled out 10-20 years later. Crazy. Really recommend watching the full thing if you have time, but also linking to a little excerpt from one of the best moments. [1] (full video): https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jobs https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jo... [2] (insult excerpt): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeqPrUmVz-o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeqPrUmVz-o

mrpippy 6y ago
It's a fascinating talk. I've uploaded a much better quality version to the Internet Archive (after Apple had it taken down from YouTube): https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jobs https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jo...
- jkcorrea 6y ago
  Ahh that is much better, I'll update my link. Thanks :)
- imglorp 6y ago
  Why would they want it removed? It's free advertising.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    Apple frequently takes down older videos for the same reason I assume they don't want old iPhone 6 videos floating around alongside iPhone 11 ads.
tambourine_man 6y ago
I've seen this many times, so great. Imagine Cook taking random developer's questions at WWDC today. In that same year, the famous Gates at the big screen speech. The audience was booing. Can you imagine something even close to that today? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxOp5mBY9IY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxOp5mBY9IY
- jkcorrea 6y ago
  For what it's worth, I think Cook is a better CEO for the current era than Jobs would have been. He's not a strong public speaker, sure, but he's an operator who can execute on the vision Jobs laid out better than anyone. On a personal level he's also a much more compassionate/empathetic person which I think plays well in the current social climate. I can't imagine Jobs getting away with some of his fabled antics today. Finally, and probably due to the previous point, Cook is much more adept at playing the geopolitics game with India, China, Trump, etc.. But yes, him fielding random developer questions would be awkward at best. Which is why they shoo him off stage in favor of Craig/Sruji/some mid-level manager to talk tech every chance they get.
  - jjeaff 6y ago
    Is Cook more compassionate and empathetic? Or is he better at saying things to make him appear that way? I ask that because I don't know. He does seem empathetic in his words. But the actions of Apple (from its production processes and sub-contracted systems to its treatment of developers and even iphone customers) seem as draconian and cut throat as they have ever been.
    - DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
      When I interned at Apple, every person from the mid-level upwards (who had been at Apple long enough) had a story of either being subjected to a negative experience at the hands of Jobs or else were party to one. Like... everyone. He was notoriously asshole-ish. Cook does not have this reputation. Whether that's a persona or the real deal is impossible for us to say (I've never met him and I'm not at Apple anymore), but I think it's not very useful to think about what he's "really" like. We can only see how he presents himself, and so far his self-portrayal is significantly more positive than Jobs's, regardless of how the company is run at a larger scale. --- I also think it's impossible to compare Jobs's ethics to Cook's ethics by looking at how Apple as a company operates. The company has grown immensely in the past decade, so I think 2020-Apple can't be compared to 2010-Apple in this way. However, we can maybe look at Apple's increased commitment to certain real-world ethical concerns and stipulate a little bit. Environmentally, they're 100% powered by renewable energy, and they recently announced they want to be 100% carbon-neutral by 2030. They have also said they want to manufacture new iPhones entirely from old iPhones, which would be great. They're also a leader in consumer privacy and security, more than any other company of a similar size. Then there's the manufacturing stuff. They certainly benefit from and make use of unethical manufacturing processes, but they seem to be trying to move away from that (to the extent that a company that requires as much manufacturing as they do can). I believe their chips are manufactured in the US (?), and I think they've started trying to manufacture certain other things in the US (I think the Mac Pro? or is that done with? I haven't checked in on it recently). Of course, they've got plenty of room to grow when it comes to ethical manufacturing, but what I'm highlighting here is that they've made some effort to improve as new issues have come to light, which can't be said of all companies with their manufacturing needs. All that said, Apple as a company has plenty of room for growth in the ethical sense, but we can at least appreciate that these are issues that they address explicitly compared to the Apple of the past. As far as I'm aware, this has all been done under Cook's leadership, so perhaps it reflects on his personal values to some extent.
endlessvoid94 6y ago
You nailed it w/ your comment about how different today's most common public forums w/ leaders are run. I also enjoy how, in that Q&A session, he lays out a ton of what Apple would actually release in the subsequent decade.
codetrotter 6y ago
Clickable link for the site you mentioned: https://allaboutstevejobs.com/ https://allaboutstevejobs.com/
hajile 6y ago
I've always loved that "insult" excerpt in showing the reality distortion field in full sway. He says he's completely ignorant about the technology. Despite the tech potentially being better and him not knowing, he sidesteps his ignorance and damns the messenger with faint praise "I'm sure you could make some cool-looking demo" before moving on to platitudes about "people over tech". By the time 5 minutes has elapsed, he's mostly avoided the first question and everyone has completely forgotten the second question existed.
- klodolph 6y ago
  I don’t know what your personal experience is with OpenDoc is. I’ve used it, although I was never an OpenDoc developer. The developer isn’t really asking a question. They’re stating a challenge in the form of a question. This is something that happens here in the HN comments all the time, when people get into heated discussions. If someone asks me a question like that, I sure as hell am not going to try and give it a direct answer. The only reason the question was asked was to provoke Jobs into a particular line of discussion. Speaking of OpenDoc itself—sure, it seemed tragic when it got shut down. But it got completely steamrolled by—well, exactly what Jobs said—Java, in its various incarnations. The vision of how you combine data from different sources and different programs in 1997 onwards and put them in a single place is by writing Java apps, possibly some combination of web apps and applets. There have also been some analysis pieces out there on how Apple missed out on its potential in the 1990s because it didn’t embrace networking the way that, for example, Sun did. HyperCard, for example, could have been the web or it could have been FileMaker or it could have been PowerPoint.
  - hindsightbias 6y ago
    > HyperCard It is interesting how many analysts and opinion folks have talked about that for decades. But Bill Atkinson was smarter than everyone else in that room (probably put together) and he didn't come up with the web either. The web wasn't an end-user physical product you could wrap hardware around. Why would Jobs or Apple think of it? Sun could because they sold web servers.
ksec 6y ago
And yet 20 years later, even when people watch the video they still dont get it. God I wish this man is still alive, Apple would be so much better now.
- StillBored 6y ago
  Its vision. He knows what fits in his vision, and he knows what doesn't and can name the reasons why not and what it would take to make it work. At the same time he can on the spot explain it, and if nothing else at least the listener understands the reasons, and not just the decision. Its crazy refreshing in the midst of soundbites and technology which doesn't serve the end user. Frankly, I think he nails it all in the first couple minutes. He's the chief NAK'er. Being able to say "no" is more important than yes. Yet so many people are afraid of hurting people's feelings or don't have the political will to do it. Although at that point in his career it had already bitten him once at apple. Also, can you imagine a current apple employee publicly disparaging one of their products like Jobs did the Newton and various other things? Take the watch, he might have loved it, but I can totally hear him complaining about how it was a subpar experience to the iphone, which you have in your pocket, cue the speech recognition bit. Also the thinly veiled bits about if the clone hardware were actually better..
- michelb 6y ago
  I think Steve would have sounded like a broken record, much like Ive has been. New times require new people, and some people at Apple should REALLY be replaced by fresher ones. I doubt Steve/Ive would have let the new widget and icon customisation in iOS14 see the light of day, but it is a MASSIVE hit in a younger demographic.

mrpippy 6y ago

It's a fascinating talk. I've uploaded a much better quality version to the Internet Archive (after Apple had it taken down from YouTube): https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jobs https://archive.org/details/wwdc-1997-fireside-chat-steve-jo...

jkcorrea 6y ago
Ahh that is much better, I'll update my link. Thanks :)
imglorp 6y ago
Why would they want it removed? It's free advertising.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  Apple frequently takes down older videos for the same reason I assume they don't want old iPhone 6 videos floating around alongside iPhone 11 ads.

tambourine_man 6y ago

I've seen this many times, so great. Imagine Cook taking random developer's questions at WWDC today. In that same year, the famous Gates at the big screen speech. The audience was booing. Can you imagine something even close to that today? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxOp5mBY9IY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxOp5mBY9IY

jkcorrea 6y ago
For what it's worth, I think Cook is a better CEO for the current era than Jobs would have been. He's not a strong public speaker, sure, but he's an operator who can execute on the vision Jobs laid out better than anyone. On a personal level he's also a much more compassionate/empathetic person which I think plays well in the current social climate. I can't imagine Jobs getting away with some of his fabled antics today. Finally, and probably due to the previous point, Cook is much more adept at playing the geopolitics game with India, China, Trump, etc.. But yes, him fielding random developer questions would be awkward at best. Which is why they shoo him off stage in favor of Craig/Sruji/some mid-level manager to talk tech every chance they get.
- jjeaff 6y ago
  Is Cook more compassionate and empathetic? Or is he better at saying things to make him appear that way? I ask that because I don't know. He does seem empathetic in his words. But the actions of Apple (from its production processes and sub-contracted systems to its treatment of developers and even iphone customers) seem as draconian and cut throat as they have ever been.
  - DonaldPShimoda 6y ago
    When I interned at Apple, every person from the mid-level upwards (who had been at Apple long enough) had a story of either being subjected to a negative experience at the hands of Jobs or else were party to one. Like... everyone. He was notoriously asshole-ish. Cook does not have this reputation. Whether that's a persona or the real deal is impossible for us to say (I've never met him and I'm not at Apple anymore), but I think it's not very useful to think about what he's "really" like. We can only see how he presents himself, and so far his self-portrayal is significantly more positive than Jobs's, regardless of how the company is run at a larger scale. --- I also think it's impossible to compare Jobs's ethics to Cook's ethics by looking at how Apple as a company operates. The company has grown immensely in the past decade, so I think 2020-Apple can't be compared to 2010-Apple in this way. However, we can maybe look at Apple's increased commitment to certain real-world ethical concerns and stipulate a little bit. Environmentally, they're 100% powered by renewable energy, and they recently announced they want to be 100% carbon-neutral by 2030. They have also said they want to manufacture new iPhones entirely from old iPhones, which would be great. They're also a leader in consumer privacy and security, more than any other company of a similar size. Then there's the manufacturing stuff. They certainly benefit from and make use of unethical manufacturing processes, but they seem to be trying to move away from that (to the extent that a company that requires as much manufacturing as they do can). I believe their chips are manufactured in the US (?), and I think they've started trying to manufacture certain other things in the US (I think the Mac Pro? or is that done with? I haven't checked in on it recently). Of course, they've got plenty of room to grow when it comes to ethical manufacturing, but what I'm highlighting here is that they've made some effort to improve as new issues have come to light, which can't be said of all companies with their manufacturing needs. All that said, Apple as a company has plenty of room for growth in the ethical sense, but we can at least appreciate that these are issues that they address explicitly compared to the Apple of the past. As far as I'm aware, this has all been done under Cook's leadership, so perhaps it reflects on his personal values to some extent.

endlessvoid94 6y ago

You nailed it w/ your comment about how different today's most common public forums w/ leaders are run. I also enjoy how, in that Q&A session, he lays out a ton of what Apple would actually release in the subsequent decade.

codetrotter 6y ago

Clickable link for the site you mentioned: https://allaboutstevejobs.com/ https://allaboutstevejobs.com/

hajile 6y ago

I've always loved that "insult" excerpt in showing the reality distortion field in full sway. He says he's completely ignorant about the technology. Despite the tech potentially being better and him not knowing, he sidesteps his ignorance and damns the messenger with faint praise "I'm sure you could make some cool-looking demo" before moving on to platitudes about "people over tech". By the time 5 minutes has elapsed, he's mostly avoided the first question and everyone has completely forgotten the second question existed.

klodolph 6y ago
I don’t know what your personal experience is with OpenDoc is. I’ve used it, although I was never an OpenDoc developer. The developer isn’t really asking a question. They’re stating a challenge in the form of a question. This is something that happens here in the HN comments all the time, when people get into heated discussions. If someone asks me a question like that, I sure as hell am not going to try and give it a direct answer. The only reason the question was asked was to provoke Jobs into a particular line of discussion. Speaking of OpenDoc itself—sure, it seemed tragic when it got shut down. But it got completely steamrolled by—well, exactly what Jobs said—Java, in its various incarnations. The vision of how you combine data from different sources and different programs in 1997 onwards and put them in a single place is by writing Java apps, possibly some combination of web apps and applets. There have also been some analysis pieces out there on how Apple missed out on its potential in the 1990s because it didn’t embrace networking the way that, for example, Sun did. HyperCard, for example, could have been the web or it could have been FileMaker or it could have been PowerPoint.
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  > HyperCard It is interesting how many analysts and opinion folks have talked about that for decades. But Bill Atkinson was smarter than everyone else in that room (probably put together) and he didn't come up with the web either. The web wasn't an end-user physical product you could wrap hardware around. Why would Jobs or Apple think of it? Sun could because they sold web servers.

ksec 6y ago

And yet 20 years later, even when people watch the video they still dont get it. God I wish this man is still alive, Apple would be so much better now.

StillBored 6y ago
Its vision. He knows what fits in his vision, and he knows what doesn't and can name the reasons why not and what it would take to make it work. At the same time he can on the spot explain it, and if nothing else at least the listener understands the reasons, and not just the decision. Its crazy refreshing in the midst of soundbites and technology which doesn't serve the end user. Frankly, I think he nails it all in the first couple minutes. He's the chief NAK'er. Being able to say "no" is more important than yes. Yet so many people are afraid of hurting people's feelings or don't have the political will to do it. Although at that point in his career it had already bitten him once at apple. Also, can you imagine a current apple employee publicly disparaging one of their products like Jobs did the Newton and various other things? Take the watch, he might have loved it, but I can totally hear him complaining about how it was a subpar experience to the iphone, which you have in your pocket, cue the speech recognition bit. Also the thinly veiled bits about if the clone hardware were actually better..
michelb 6y ago
I think Steve would have sounded like a broken record, much like Ive has been. New times require new people, and some people at Apple should REALLY be replaced by fresher ones. I doubt Steve/Ive would have let the new widget and icon customisation in iOS14 see the light of day, but it is a MASSIVE hit in a younger demographic.