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He completely transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet, multiple times. So he was an ass to work with... That doesn'

by gibolt 5y ago

He completely transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet, multiple times. So he was an ass to work with... That doesn't void anything else that was done, nor should it be a highlight. Worth mentioning, sure. Visionaries are usually hard to deal with (perhaps because they are fighting against the grain). Most visionaries are wrong, but that diversity is what pushes us forward.

Groxx 5y ago
To some degree yes... but to some degree you sound like you're claiming they did what they did in a vacuum. iPhone launched 2007. Android was announced in 2007 and released in 2008. Palm had large-screen phones with apps and a browser in 2002[1]. A lot of things happen around people that isn't completely due to them being them. We can't know what would have happened without Jobs, but it seems fair to say that much of the global-scale stuff would have, though perhaps not Apple itself. [1]: if not earlier. randomly skimming wikipedia finds e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treo_180 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treo_180 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palm_OS_devices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palm_OS_devices
- carlosdp 5y ago
  > We can't know what would have happened without Jobs, but it seems fair to say that much of the global-scale stuff would have, though perhaps not Apple itself. I believe there's a logical fallacy that described this thinking. I definitely don't think the smartphone revolution was inevitable, at least not on the timetable it happened on because Jobs pushed it forward. Yea, Palm had large-screen phones, and yet most people didn't care and still didn't have smartphones. That could have kept repeating for a long time more, with just Blackberry holding the market and just for "business phones," if Apple hadn't come in with its consumer gravitas. It's easy to look in hindsight and think the future was inevitable, but it often wasn't.
  - strken 5y ago
    There was a tipping point just before smartphones where J2ME apps were surging in popularity and feature phones were getting cheaper and better, where it was obvious that something was going to happen. My phone had google maps, ebooks, the web browser opera mini, and a very slow gameboy emulator running on it as J2ME apps in 2006.
    - netr0ute 5y ago
      The difference is that the iPhone ran a "full" OS without the "baby software" on every other device at the time.
      - HWR_14 5y ago
        The iPhone was most certainly not the most full OS at the time.
      - lmm 5y ago
        The opposite was true actually - the original iPhone couldn't run third-party applications at all. What it did have was a much bigger and better touchscreen that didn't need a stylus. (Even that wasn't really a technical innovation per se - rather it was the willingness to charge over twice as much as previous phones that made it possible).
        tobr 5y ago
        To be precise, the original iPhone can run third-party apps, but couldn’t from the beginning. The AppStore was introduced with iPhone OS 2 a year after the launch.
        Groxx 5y ago
        Yeah - capacitive touch tech was far from new, but it was still super expensive compared to resistive. Price made it largely not an option until around the time that Apple adopted it (which they were definitely ahead of the curve on, and they made fantastic use of it). It was pretty clear at the time that nobody was all that fond of styluses, but they were the sole pragmatic option available then. That, and many people were glad to have plastic screens - iPhones shattering because you looked at them too enthusiastically was a source of many lols and many expensive repairs / re-purchases. The early iPhones still scratched nearly as easily (keys or sand were more than sufficient), but they were nowhere near as durable overall. Decent screen durability, screen protectors, and protective cases took years to arrive - the gorilla glass of the time was far, far more fragile than it is now.
- Aunche 5y ago
  Sure, a lot of similarly functional smartphones had existed, but that didn't matter because nobody used them. Steve Job's intuition about user experience was at least several years ahead of everyone else's. Improvements are generally incremental, but the iPhone nailed so much the first time: the app icons, pinch to zoom, using the accelerometer for portrait and landscape mode, adaptive screen brightness, and the use of the proximity sensor.
- CaptainZapp 5y ago
  The first Nokia Communicator[1], arguably the first smartphone, was released in 1996 and just had its 25 year anniversary. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Arguably, Nokia is a good example of "money and connections won't save you if you persistently go astray". I liked Nokias, I even programmed for Symbian OS, but boy, that was one convoluted system. The UI was pure hell, badly documented, error-prone and had to be tailored to every device out there (of which Nokia churned out a lot), unless you wanted to risk bad artifacts. They also LOVED to introduce major compatibility breaks.
- alasdair_ 5y ago
  I had a 3G windows phone the year before the 2G iphone came out that did everything the iphone did other than visual voicemail. Still, the iphone did everything so luch better that I switched.
Jedd 5y ago
> He completely transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet, multiple times. Steve Jobs? This is going to need a fair amount of substantiation, because those are some wild claims.
- mattl 5y ago
  I assume the parent is referring to MobileMe, iPod socks and NeXTSTEP for PA RISC.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  > Steve Jobs? Steve Jobs may not have invented the personal computer, smartphone, or computer-generated animated movies, but he definitely popularized all of them
  - theonlybutlet 5y ago
    In the US yes, the rest of the world not so much. They were already popular or had other influences initially.
    - HWR_14 5y ago
      You're relying a lot on "or had other influences". None of those things were invented by him, or by the companies he worked with. They were mass-marketed by him.
      - theonlybutlet 5y ago
        Indeed but things like smartphones already had mass appeal in Europe and Asia, from the likes of Nokia in Europe and NTTDocomo in Japan.
- hncurious 5y ago
  Here you go https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs
drunkenmagician 5y ago
I'm not sure I would say 'changed the human trajectory for everyone', but I certainly think its fair to say that he was instrumental in substantially disrupting/transforming or created new markets in the technology (personal and business) space. The Apple 2 and Mac certainly disrupted personal computing in numerous ways (although perhaps the PC clone is a better example here). The Next box was a commercial failure, but a technological step forward for software. Mobile phones / tablets were clunky and did not have a great touch or internet experience before the iPhone. Apps / app stores have enabled a whole new paradigm for how users access global distributed services (and before someone says - mobile web, that experiences still is generally, subjectively a worse user experience than most apps). While there are plenty of stories about his abusive behavior (usually to his staff) especially in his younger days, there are equally plenty of positive anecdotes about him as a human. Personally I don't think I would have enjoyed working for him, but I feel it would have been an experience I would have not regretted. Like all of us, he was flawed in some areas, good in others.
theonlybutlet 5y ago
"transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet" That's some real hyperbole. We had phones and pc's already, it wouldn't of transformed our lives or changed our trajectory but yes he has been influential in shaping what that looks llike A cosmetic impact sure.
ksec 5y ago
>So he was an ass to work with I am starting to wonder if this is a tech thing. Because if you talk to people in many other industry, you will have a high chances of seeing / meeting one. And there are plenty of people who worked with him have no problem what so ever. And all of them are ones that are willing to stand up for themselves and talk back to Steve. I mean, by the age of late 30 one should realise most of the work we have today are really really shit. This may not be apparent in tech. But it is commonly the case everywhere else. Trying to push for higher quality and inertia will absolutely drive a person insane.

by gibolt 5y ago

Groxx 5y ago

To some degree yes... but to some degree you sound like you're claiming they did what they did in a vacuum. iPhone launched 2007. Android was announced in 2007 and released in 2008. Palm had large-screen phones with apps and a browser in 2002[1]. A lot of things happen around people that isn't completely due to them being them. We can't know what would have happened without Jobs, but it seems fair to say that much of the global-scale stuff would have, though perhaps not Apple itself. [1]: if not earlier. randomly skimming wikipedia finds e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treo_180 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treo_180 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palm_OS_devices https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Palm_OS_devices

carlosdp 5y ago
> We can't know what would have happened without Jobs, but it seems fair to say that much of the global-scale stuff would have, though perhaps not Apple itself. I believe there's a logical fallacy that described this thinking. I definitely don't think the smartphone revolution was inevitable, at least not on the timetable it happened on because Jobs pushed it forward. Yea, Palm had large-screen phones, and yet most people didn't care and still didn't have smartphones. That could have kept repeating for a long time more, with just Blackberry holding the market and just for "business phones," if Apple hadn't come in with its consumer gravitas. It's easy to look in hindsight and think the future was inevitable, but it often wasn't.
- strken 5y ago
  There was a tipping point just before smartphones where J2ME apps were surging in popularity and feature phones were getting cheaper and better, where it was obvious that something was going to happen. My phone had google maps, ebooks, the web browser opera mini, and a very slow gameboy emulator running on it as J2ME apps in 2006.
  - netr0ute 5y ago
    The difference is that the iPhone ran a "full" OS without the "baby software" on every other device at the time.
    - HWR_14 5y ago
      The iPhone was most certainly not the most full OS at the time.
    - lmm 5y ago
      The opposite was true actually - the original iPhone couldn't run third-party applications at all. What it did have was a much bigger and better touchscreen that didn't need a stylus. (Even that wasn't really a technical innovation per se - rather it was the willingness to charge over twice as much as previous phones that made it possible).
      - tobr 5y ago
        To be precise, the original iPhone can run third-party apps, but couldn’t from the beginning. The AppStore was introduced with iPhone OS 2 a year after the launch.
      - Groxx 5y ago
        Yeah - capacitive touch tech was far from new, but it was still super expensive compared to resistive. Price made it largely not an option until around the time that Apple adopted it (which they were definitely ahead of the curve on, and they made fantastic use of it). It was pretty clear at the time that nobody was all that fond of styluses, but they were the sole pragmatic option available then. That, and many people were glad to have plastic screens - iPhones shattering because you looked at them too enthusiastically was a source of many lols and many expensive repairs / re-purchases. The early iPhones still scratched nearly as easily (keys or sand were more than sufficient), but they were nowhere near as durable overall. Decent screen durability, screen protectors, and protective cases took years to arrive - the gorilla glass of the time was far, far more fragile than it is now.
Aunche 5y ago
Sure, a lot of similarly functional smartphones had existed, but that didn't matter because nobody used them. Steve Job's intuition about user experience was at least several years ahead of everyone else's. Improvements are generally incremental, but the iPhone nailed so much the first time: the app icons, pinch to zoom, using the accelerometer for portrait and landscape mode, adaptive screen brightness, and the use of the proximity sensor.
CaptainZapp 5y ago
The first Nokia Communicator[1], arguably the first smartphone, was released in 1996 and just had its 25 year anniversary. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  Arguably, Nokia is a good example of "money and connections won't save you if you persistently go astray". I liked Nokias, I even programmed for Symbian OS, but boy, that was one convoluted system. The UI was pure hell, badly documented, error-prone and had to be tailored to every device out there (of which Nokia churned out a lot), unless you wanted to risk bad artifacts. They also LOVED to introduce major compatibility breaks.
alasdair_ 5y ago
I had a 3G windows phone the year before the 2G iphone came out that did everything the iphone did other than visual voicemail. Still, the iphone did everything so luch better that I switched.

Jedd 5y ago

> He completely transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet, multiple times. Steve Jobs? This is going to need a fair amount of substantiation, because those are some wild claims.

mattl 5y ago
I assume the parent is referring to MobileMe, iPod socks and NeXTSTEP for PA RISC.
HWR_14 5y ago
> Steve Jobs? Steve Jobs may not have invented the personal computer, smartphone, or computer-generated animated movies, but he definitely popularized all of them
- theonlybutlet 5y ago
  In the US yes, the rest of the world not so much. They were already popular or had other influences initially.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    You're relying a lot on "or had other influences". None of those things were invented by him, or by the companies he worked with. They were mass-marketed by him.
    - theonlybutlet 5y ago
      Indeed but things like smartphones already had mass appeal in Europe and Asia, from the likes of Nokia in Europe and NTTDocomo in Japan.
hncurious 5y ago
Here you go https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs

drunkenmagician 5y ago

I'm not sure I would say 'changed the human trajectory for everyone', but I certainly think its fair to say that he was instrumental in substantially disrupting/transforming or created new markets in the technology (personal and business) space. The Apple 2 and Mac certainly disrupted personal computing in numerous ways (although perhaps the PC clone is a better example here). The Next box was a commercial failure, but a technological step forward for software. Mobile phones / tablets were clunky and did not have a great touch or internet experience before the iPhone. Apps / app stores have enabled a whole new paradigm for how users access global distributed services (and before someone says - mobile web, that experiences still is generally, subjectively a worse user experience than most apps). While there are plenty of stories about his abusive behavior (usually to his staff) especially in his younger days, there are equally plenty of positive anecdotes about him as a human. Personally I don't think I would have enjoyed working for him, but I feel it would have been an experience I would have not regretted. Like all of us, he was flawed in some areas, good in others.

theonlybutlet 5y ago

"transformed modern life and changed the human trajectory for everyone on the planet" That's some real hyperbole. We had phones and pc's already, it wouldn't of transformed our lives or changed our trajectory but yes he has been influential in shaping what that looks llike A cosmetic impact sure.

ksec 5y ago

>So he was an ass to work with I am starting to wonder if this is a tech thing. Because if you talk to people in many other industry, you will have a high chances of seeing / meeting one. And there are plenty of people who worked with him have no problem what so ever. And all of them are ones that are willing to stand up for themselves and talk back to Steve. I mean, by the age of late 30 one should realise most of the work we have today are really really shit. This may not be apparent in tech. But it is commonly the case everywhere else. Trying to push for higher quality and inertia will absolutely drive a person insane.