Yeah sorry I didn't explain it. I'm old enough to remember, but perhaps a lot of HN readers aren't. It's just that $15 billion may seem like a lot of money to

Yeah sorry I didn't explain it. I'm old enough to remember, but perhaps a lot of HN readers aren't. It's just that $15 billion may seem like a lot of money today to most people and even to most corporations, but for Apple and Google, it's a footnote. And yet, at one time in Steve Jobs' second tenure at Apple, just 1% of that quantum was the difference between Apple's survival and Apple's demise. Here's a better telling of the story that provides context https://www.wired.com/2009/08/dayintech-0806/ https://www.wired.com/2009/08/dayintech-0806/ and Walter Isaacson quoting how Jobs told it https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericjackson/2012/03/01/steve-jobs-used-patents-to-get-bill-gates-to-make-1997-investment-in-apple/?sh=53507be50115 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericjackson/2012/03/01/steve-jo...