12 ms·

Think different about Jobs

159 points by andyking 15y ago

forgottenpaswrd 15y ago
Napoleon and Alexander the Great killed a lot of people. Colombus wanted to profit owning a big part of what he "discovered"(including the people). Most of the founding fathers of America had slaves on their properties and also killed people. America's pioneers killed native Indians, stole everything they owned and eradicated Buffaloes, dried rivers, cut ancient forest, contaminated the water for profit. The best generals on the WWs killed people, cheated on their wifes, drank a lot, let their people to beat and rape their enemies... And here we are discussing that some guy was not perfect. Of course not, learn and focus what you can about the positive and try to incorporate in in your life, if you can.
furtivefelon 15y ago
If people think that the reason for Job's success is because of his attitude is indeed lacking in intelligence. It is more correct to say that Job succeed in spite of his attitude. This trait is perhaps the easiest to emulate, therefore it will be sad if people emulate Job's worst trait and think that it will make them successful.
- zobzu 15y ago
  actually its both "thanks" to his attitude and other traits (intelligence, etc. putting it all in the same bag) if you aren't an asshole, at least a little bit, it's difficult to manage a company successfully. you'd be seen as weak and/or other sharks would eat you anyway.
  - cageface 15y ago
    Ed Catmull is anything but an asshole and he's run Pixar brilliantly. It's also possible to get people do what you want just because they respect the hell out of you.
    - jonhendry 15y ago
      And he's worked for Jobs for over 20 years.
      - cageface 15y ago
        I worked for Ed for ten of those. Jobs was very hands off at Pixar. I think he realized that Ed had things under control.
        jonhendry 15y ago
        True, but if anyone at Pixar was going to experience the worst of Jobs over the years, it would probably be Ed, because he would be one of the few interacting with Jobs.
        cageface 15y ago
        Probably, which makes it that much more impressive (IMO) that he never tried to emulate Steve's less admirable qualities.
bfrs 15y ago
---------------------------------------- From Malcolm Gladwell's "The real genius of Steve Jobs" [1]: Jobs, we learn, was a bully. "He had the uncanny capacity to know exactly what your weak point is, know what will make you feel small, to make you cringe". Jobs gets his girlfriend pregnant, and then denies that the child is his. He parks in handicapped spaces. He screams at subordinates. He cries like a small child when he does not get his way. He sits in a restaurant and sends his food back three times. He arrives at his hotel suite in New York for press interviews and decides, at 10 pm ... the flowers are all wrong: he wanted calla lilies. When his public-relations assistant returns, at midnight, with the right flowers, he tells her that her suit is "disgusting". Machines and robots were painted and repainted as he compulsively revised his color scheme, Isaacson writes, of the factory Jobs built, after founding NeXT, in the late nineteen-eighties. He insisted that the machinery on the 165-foot assembly line be configured to move the circuit boards from right to left as they got built, so that the process would look better to visitors who watched from the viewing gallery. ...when Jobs returns, in the late nineteen-nineties, and our natural expectation is that Jobs will emerge wiser and gentler from his tumultuous journey. He never does. In the hospital at the end of his life, he runs through sixty-seven nurses before he finds three he likes... ...Even within Apple, Jobs was known for taking credit for other's ideas. Jonathan Ive, the designer behind the iMac, the iPod, and the iPhone, tells Isaacson, "He will go through a process of looking at my ideas and say, 'That's no good. That's not very good. I like that one.' And later I will be sitting in the audience and he will be talking about it as if it was his idea." ---------------------------------------- If Jobs was really such an A-level asshole, I think he was goddamned lucky to have Steve Woz as his co-founder. From what I know about Woz, in addition to being a first rate engineer, he is also a very good guy. Maybe if Woz was even half (milli-Jobs?) the asshole that Jobs seems to be, he would have kicked him out before Apple went public (à la Saverin in The Social Network) and Jobs would have been just another tantrum throwing hippie hanging around some starbucks in Berkeley or wherever it is angry hippies like to hang about these days. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/14/111114fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=all http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/14/111114fa_fact_...
- jshen 15y ago
  " he would have kicked him out before Apple went public (à la Saverin in The Social Network) and Jobs would have been just another tantrum throwing hippie hanging around some starbucks in Berkeley or wherever it is angry hippies like to hang about these days." And woz would have been just another engineer working for some company.
moxiemk1 15y ago
>> But what worries me is the amount of stupid businessmen who’ll be copying Jobs’s behaviour. (I say “businessmen” on purpose, since I’ve yet to encounter a businesswoman, on any level, who treats people in an unpleasant way). Recognizing that I say this from a white, cis-gendered, born to highly intelligent (if not at all successful) parents perspective, I don't think that comments like that are appropriate. First, it continues to perpetuate the mindset that women and men should be approached due to their gender, not their being. Second, to counter the anecdote, I have met such people. Using only male-gendered pronouns and nouns would (as regrettable as this is) probably have gone unnoticed by me. That sentence put my conception of the author squarely into the most nefarious category of misogynists: those who try to better their own image while still perpetuating the problem.
- spacefungus 15y ago
  This is completely irrational and irrelevant. A misogynist is someone who hates women and/or girls. He's saying he's never encountered a bad business woman, which is not hatred at all under any circumstance. He's a man writing about a man, so the gender of pronouns shouldn't mystify or bother you. And "those seeking to better their own image while perpetuating a problem" isn't any form or category of misogynist. See the definition at the beginning of this comment for reference. And he did not say "negative businesswomen do not exist". He said he's never personally encountered any.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    While in normal discourse "misogynist" means "someone who hates women and/or girls", in formal academic feminism a misogynist is someone who disagrees with the feminist dogma. It's not difficult to spot third-wave feminists: usually by the time someone uses jargon like "cis-gendered" (which is Women's Studies for "doesn't suffer from gender identity disorder") you're well above 90% odds that you're dealing with some type of left-wing identity politics wonk. Interestingly, "misogynist" itself is a high-probability marker as well. It would be interesting to run a Bayesian classifier and find out what the observed probabilities actually are....
- puredemo 15y ago
Tichy 15y ago
I've read only parts of the books, but I get the impression I only get part of the story. It describes his unpleasantness, but at the same time it describes how lots of people were enchanted by him. The book doesn't explain how that is possible. So I take it with a huge grain of salt.
- jonhendry 15y ago
  The 'hero/asshole roller coaster' is a widely accepted description of what it could be like working for Jobs. On the other hand, there are plenty of people who worked for him for decades, and people who worked for him, left, and then returned. I suspect part of it was learning how to deal with Jobs and his tantrums, part of it was being talented enough to spend more time as a 'hero' than an 'asshole', part of it was feeling that Jobs was trying to achieve something significant and thus the expected effort was worthwhile, and part of it was finding ways to stay out of Jobs' sight when necessary.
schraeds 15y ago
You kind of have to be an asshole to get things done. The best coaches and mentors in my life caused me displeasure in their relentless efforts to push me further than I thought I could go.
- jarcoal 15y ago
  Exactly right. Companies do not get ahead by having mellow pushovers at the top. People having been talking a lot about how he stole all of the design credit from Ives. This might be the case, but I'm willing to bet you that Ives would be the first to admit that Jobs helped him unlock his true potential.
  - atdt 15y ago
    Taking credit for other people's creative work is a shit thing to do. Whatever benefits Ive may have drawn from the relationship aren't relevant. Daddy doesn't get to beat the kids just because daddy puts food on the table.
    - jonhendry 15y ago
      I'm inclined to take Ives' complaint with a grain of salt. After all, as the face of Apple design, Ives might be getting some amount of credit for designs that his underlings have made. He might not be seeking it, but that's how it's working out. Ives is pretty much the only designer at Apple who gets any credit at all, at least in the media. And that's been the case for years now. He hasn't exactly been laboring in obscurity while Jobs sucked up all the credit and adulation.
      - philwelch 15y ago
        Apple has always been circumspect about identifying any of their employees below the Senior VP level because they don't want any of them poached. And even their senior VPs get poached.
    - matwood 15y ago
      Taking credit for other people's creative work is a shit thing to do. If SJ pushed Ives to iterate through 100s of designs, tweaked each one and then iterated again whose creative work would it be? If SJ sat down and explained what he wanted in excruciating detail (given the stories of his attention to detail this is what I would expect), and through trial and error Ives arrived at what SJ wanted whose creative work would it be? I think there is clearly no single creator in either case. Ives gets a lot of credit for being a great designer and being the one who helped SJ realize his computing vision. Given SJs OCD about details I don't think it was ever a case where he was playing golf, took an Ives design and just pushed it out as his own.
gbog 15y ago
> (Incidentally, my Kindle crashed three times while reading this book.) I don't know which Kindle the author is talking about, but it seems weird to me, I never heard of a Kindle crash and I have 4/5 around, not counting colleagues'. And, maybe it is off-topic, but maybe it is not. Why would the author add this parenthesis if it was not a necessary adjunction to his point? Maybe it was a way to underline how non-Apple products have the bad habit of crashing randomly just for the purpose of annoying their owners? It is the same with "I’ve yet to encounter a businesswoman, on any level, who treats people in an unpleasant way". This is a way to say, "I am a very gentle guy, I don't want to discriminate against women, love me please", but this apparently innocent statement is 1) pure and simple sexism 2) plain wrong. Then the main point, Job being a "detestable human being", well, it seems obvious. Let's just hope no too many people idealize him for too long a time.
- polyfractal 15y ago
  The closest I've ever come to a "Kindle Crash" was a multi-second delay on page turn, which has only happened once. I've been using mine every day on my commute for the last year. No idea what the author was referring too. Maybe the new Kindle Fire?
  - jonhendry 15y ago
    I've owned a kindle 2, a kindle DX, a kindle 3, and a black kindle DX. I've had a few crashes. Spontaneous reboots, actually. The most recent ones I think happened when I was looking at a PDF, so presumably something about the PDF did it. Nothing major.
  - larsberg 15y ago
    Agreed. I use Calibre to download all of my news subscriptions to it and between that and a several books per week, I've never seen my kindle 3 crash in the many months that I've been using it. As opposed to my iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and iPad2, all of which I've taken down rather horribly with just the normal apps (typically frozen, sometimes insta-reboot), not even counting things that bad programs _I_ wrote were doing.
  - 15y ago
ryan-allen 15y ago
While you can point at how he conducted himself at Apple and scream "Monster!", what isn't mentioned in this post but is dealt with at length in his biography is how he conducted himself at Pixar. He was much more low-key about the 'products' at Pixar, he mostly was an enabler and negotiator for them. In Pixar's early days he invested an awful lot of his then-fortune into keeping it alive, and it was his cunning negotiation skills that kept Pixar from being swallowed by the then flailing Disney. If you contrast his behaviour at Pixar and at Disney, I think it illustrates that he didn't consider the work at Pixar to be 'his art'. There were other people at Pixar who were leading the 'art' there and it was all in hand. At Apple on the other hand, it's completely clear that Jobs' considered the products to be 'his art' and his conviction was such that he literally was going to drag everyone, kicking and screaming, to realise his vision. And that he did, in a world of horrible consumer electronics he would not abide, he set out and truly lead the creation of some very awesome and uncompromising products. It was his Art. Imagine if Andy Warhol or Piccasso or any other famous artist relied on the expertise of many individuals to realise their creations. Do you think they'd be considering that all you want is your 9-5 job and your 401k and 4 weeks holiday a year. Nope, they'd be behaving in exactly the same way: aggressive and fervent conviction. Work ceases to become merely a job and you're no longer working, you're crusading. In a world of unambitious and mediocre individuals, you have to move mountains to do great work that requires multi-disciplined collaboration. You're going to upset people along the way but that just comes with the territory. I don't think it's fair to blame him for his behaviour. The world needs more people like him: true leaders who will stand up for their convictions, no matter what the cost.
- ditojim 15y ago
  even if the cost is other people? your last statement is a dangerous stance.
  - Game_Ender 15y ago
    It's a greater good kind of thing. Eisenhower, Patton, Roosevelt won WW2, but were directly responsible for the death of hundreds of thousands. In most case people no their chances when they decide to work under these kinds of people.
mikerg87 15y ago
Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, they're all sausage factories. You really don't want to look too close at how all this stuff is made.
- puredemo 15y ago
  How is Google a sausage factory? Just curious..
  - rdl 15y ago
    The internal politics are pretty bad, from what Google employees have reported. For an organization originally without politics, in the mid-2000s there was a whole mess of PMs and managers.
petercooper 15y ago
the biography has actually made me think twice about buying anything Apple-branded again. This seems as asinine as refusing to buy a Volkswagen because VW was founded by Nazis.
- spacefungus 15y ago
  Nope, it's not asinine at all. The problems this guy has with Apple are things still going on now. Your comparison is equivalent with "one time long ago cotton was picked by slaves so I won't wear cotton". That is irrational as its not happening right now. But the horrible apple conditions are alive and well.
  - petercooper 15y ago
    The problems this guy has with Apple are things still going on now. Every problem the author notes in this article is specifically with Steve Jobs' behavior, not Apple's. I'm commenting on what was in the submitted article. However, you reiterated my point beautifully with your cotton anecdote. I'm not sure why you needed to repeat the sentiment but, yes, it's similarly irrational.
spacefungus 15y ago
I'm a fan of Steve Jobs for his vision and ability to see things we all blatantly are unaware of. He changed technology, but also advertising, movies, music, etc. But I'm glad to see someone holding him accountable for his life and the consequences of his actions. The iPhone rocks, but the Foxconn factory it was made in is so fucking hard to work in that they have suicide nets on the roof; almost a dozen have killed themselves to escape the 14+ hour days. The MacBook is beautiful, the iMacs are amazing, the software (before Lion) had a simplicity and aesthetic that were unmatched. But to ignore the fact that many people were screwed over by Steve, that many people were payed a few cents an hour to make his products, and that he was a cold, arrogant man is just ignorant. Thomas Edison was a shrewd, competitive, harsh man. Does this mean we should ignore his contributions to science? Absolutely not. Nikola Tesla , Leonardo Da Vinci, Howard Hughes, etc. etc. all had negative qualities like every other human. They contributed a lot to the world, though. So some of the comments that are accusing this post of being over-dramatic or don't want any criticisms of Lord Jobs are foolish. He did a lot of good and a hell of a lot of bad. Acknowledging and accepting both, and then learning from both, is fair and rational. Facts are facts.
- ricardobeat 15y ago
  Get rid of your television, shoes, computer, mobile phone and clothes then. They are all made in china (or indonesia/taiwan/etc) in probably worse conditions. What do you even know about their manufacturing? "I'm glad to see someone holding him accountable for […] the consequences of his actions" is what I'd call over-dramatic.
  - spacefungus 15y ago
    I don't know much about their manufacturing, which is why I do what I can to buy from people I know and buy from within the United States. As I replied to Nirvana, I'm recognizing the fact that Jobs, like everyone, was not perfect and had negative qualities. I'm also recognizing his involvement in a supply chain I don't feel 100% happy about. I still buy his products but I'm aware of the negative stuff, too. I'm just trying to be informed and fair about him. And by talking about a part, that does not mean I'm unaware of or ignoring the whole. If I talk about the evils Dr. Mengele that doesn't mean I've forgotten about the rest of the Nazi party. We're just talking about specifics in relation to this article (Steve Jobs and Apple).
pbreit 15y ago
This article has a gaping whole: most/all of the people mentioned would not feel that they were mis-treated by Jobs. Quite the opposite, in fact: most people who worked closely with Jobs consider it the highlight of their lives.
- LaGrange 15y ago
  This is, sadly, something that happens often to victims of sociopaths. The sociopaths came, he did bad things to them (that is, directly, mentioned), then left them in the cold, feeling sad, and still, he was "the highlight of their lives". At least that's what I see in so many stories in that book.
- spacefungus 15y ago
  I think he's more commenting on Jobs' behavior and how he doesn't like it. I mean, lots of people at Enron talked about it being the thrill of their lives. But as observers we can recognize that their behavior sucks and not like it. (reference -> "Enron: Smartest Men in the Room")
  - pbreit 15y ago
    I would not equate breaking the law and causing lots of people to go broke with hurting peoples' feelings.
michaelpinto 15y ago
I've read quite a few biographies and what i hate about Walter Isaacson is that everything becomes an oversimplified Time magazine article, which makes every character into a flat cartoon caricature. My guess is that Jobs could be a jerk, but then if you were a multimillionaire in your early 20s how could you not be a jerk? Also the tech industry is filled with tons of very bright people who are social cripples. The harsh reality is that to build something like a Macintosh you might have to be quite nasty to pull off the scale of cat herding that may be required. I also hate to admit this: But I half suspect Jobs picked out Isaacson because he'd draw a cartoon sketch instead of doing a serious biography. I'm still not done reading the book yet, but I almost feel that I know less about Jobs than before I started reading the damn thing. And the other thing that drives up the wall is that you get the feeling that Isaacson doesn't have a clue about technology -- so you half wonder how much he missed. And I suspect Jobs wanted it that way -- instead of burning his papers he just picked a lightweight. By the way if any of you want to read an amazing biographer look at the work of Robert Caro who is a real writer. His first book "the Power Broker" is an amazing study Robert Moses who is a very flawed hero who really made NYC what it was (for both better and worse). He's also written several books on LBJ who also starts out as a progressive and does both amazing and terrible things in his life. I wish someone like that had done this bio...
- LaGrange 15y ago
  It paints Steve Jobs as a jerk far before he became a millionaire. Also, the harsh reality is that neither of us knows if your assumption about the state of the harsh reality is valid.
purephase 15y ago
First off, I say all this as a fan of both Isaacson and Jobs. I am convinced that this book is Jobs' attempt to counter worries that Apple is in trouble without him at the helm. Given that he was a perfectionist, that he would both commission, support and supposedly proof a work that paints him in the light that it does, there must be a motive to the caricature it paints. Think about it. Everyone is worried about the staying power of Apple without him at the helm. He is the quintessential micro-manager, so the concerns are valid. He was also a very private person that, despite some oft-reported claims, held a demi-god like status in the company and with a lot of people around the globe. The book repeatedly (oh god, the repetition) remarks on his intent on "creating a legacy", "making a dent in the universe", "working only with the best" which speaks directly to Apple's future without him. Isaacson even doles out micro-biographies on Cook and Ive. Two entire chapters! It then completely obliterates his demi-god status by painting him as a petulant child, terrible father (early on), liar and narcissist. I cannot imagine anyone reading the book and idolizing Jobs afterwards. It makes him very, very human which is an ideal image to paint if you are/were worried about Apple's future. I am more interested in the biography on Jobs that will be written in 10-20 years from now.
- philwelch 15y ago
  I wouldn't say I "idolize" Jobs after reading the biography, but I still consider him a hero. His arrogance and narcissism is justified in the end; an inflated self-image is unbecoming in someone mediocre, but Jobs really was a special and important person. Still, Jobs never seemed outright grandiose, as he often acknowledged his own flaws and appreciated people who stood up for him. His other flaws, while he could certainly do without some of them, do seem to tie into his greatest strengths. And his heroic qualities greatly outweigh everything else. He was never physically violent, never even seemed to cheat on his wife, and aside from the Breakout incident, never outright screwed anyone out of money. There's a line between mean and immoral, and Steve stayed on the better side of that line a lot more than a lot of other people who get idolized with far less question. I'm not even talking about people who are unfairly idolized, like Edison or Mother Theresa or the Dalai Lama. I'm talking about people like JFK or Martin Luther King or Winston Churchill, genuinely heroic figures who cheated on their wives or killed innocent people.
brisance 15y ago
Anyone else read Sam Smith's "The Jordan Rules"? Jordan is without doubt one of the greatest, if not the greatest, basketball player the world has seen. He is also known to be egotistical, as many competitive athletes/alpha males are (it's probably the testosterone). Like Steve Jobs, Jordan would not suffer fools gladly, would "bully" team-mates, had laser-focus etc. Had a good wingman in the form of Pippen (Tim Cook). Yet one cannot fault him for his many accomplishments. He rose to the occasion time and again (how many times have we seen him take the buzzer-beater?), and had an admirable work ethic. As the saying goes "haters gonna hate". The fact is that Jordan, Steve Jobs, and many other people changed their respective industries and beyond. Jordan not only changed professional sports, but also sports management and sports equipment marketing. Steve Jobs' achievements probably need no introduction.
- loso 15y ago
  Have you seen the perception of Jordan lately? I was and probably still am one of the biggest Jordan fans ever but he's a dick and as a fan I have to admit it. His former teammates do not have many nice things to say about him and the people he played against even less so. Right now there are a bunch of young NBA players, who grew up watching Jordan's accomplishments, considering boycotting Jordan brand sneakers because of him being an asshole during the lockout negotiations. Even take a look at how poorly his hall of fame speech was regarded by the general public and his peers. The chip on his shoulder helped him be a winner on the court but not so much off of it. Yes, your egotistical ways might lead you to win in your field but don't expect the people you ran over to all of the sudden see the light and respect you as a person. You can respect a persons accomplishments while also despising who they are as a human being.
  - brisance 15y ago
    There is no way to please everyone all the time. I saw the HoF induction speech. Did it come across as self-centered... yes, I thought it did. But that's his privilege, he earned it. About a person's qualities as a human being: I feel there isn't much need to pass judgment on others, whether they are celebrities or not. Each of us are also humans and are also prone to our own lapses of judgment, integrity etc. That's what we are. Otherwise we'd all be saints and life would be predictable and boring. :) There was a time in the 90s where there was all this talk about being a "role model" and Barkley famously got into trouble for it. It's touching on exactly the same issues. And I agree with Barkley: that parents should be the ones bringing up their offspring, not the media,entertainers, sports/tech heroes et al. Coming back on topic: I respect Jobs for the things he'd done, to "push the human race forward". He was a giant, and my opinion is that the world became a better place for it. You're free to disagree (refer to RMS's stance), but that doesn't mean my own opinion is any less valid, and I'm sticking with it. :)
sjs 15y ago
I hope he also avoids products and media made my anyone who has not been an absolute saint their entire life. It's perfectly acceptable to dislike Jobs, no question about that whatsoever. It's also acceptable to stop buying Apple stuff for any reason. But if you're going to put a proverbial line in the sand on moral grounds then you had better stick to your guns and apply that to everything or you just end up looking ... silly. (Nice attempt at a clever title, but it misses the intended meaning of "think different" which is not "think differently" but more along the lines of "think bigger", as in "think of something different".)
- andrewcooke 15y ago
  you really think that "anyone who has not been an absolute saint their entire life" is a equivalent to "Devoid of any kind of feelings towards anyone else, he shouts, screams, cries and sulks his way through his petulant life"? because i don't. i think there's quite a difference. everyone can be an arsehole sometimes, sure. but that doesn't excuse those that are consistently unpleasant. there's a clear difference. so you can distance yourself from the latter without having any problems with the former.
  - sipefree 15y ago
    > Devoid of any kind of feelings towards anyone else, he shouts, screams, cries and sulks his way through his petulant life Sounds like full-on Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Various people who knew Steve have also said that he must have had this. As far as I can see, it's probably true. I don't think it's right to attribute malice to the man if it's the case. Neither is it right to insist that someone be prevented from being successful in business because they have something wrong with their brain.
    - jonhendry 15y ago
      "Sounds like full-on Narcissistic Personality Disorder." And/Or some OCD and some kind of autistic spectrum disorder, combined with early success which probably encouraged or reinforced some things that a regular person would have to learn to avoid doing.
ethank 15y ago
Wouldn't it be nice if the people behind the things we loved were as pure and perfect as our love for the products they created? It doesn't happen. I ended up great friends with someone who created a body of work I hold dear. He isn't perfect. His faults make the relationship between who he is as a person, as an artist and the body of work he's created complex. But that fissure between the creator and the created is what makes the work that much better. Jobs seemed to be similar. The art of creation is a messy thing indeed.
- codelust 15y ago
  It is not limited to just creation, we seem to be giving up easily the ability to grasp that not everything is black or white. There was much to admire and like about the man, there was much that was flawed about him. But, for most, it is either fully angelic or 100% the devil's cohort that they work overtime to fit him into.
Olih 15y ago
Did u know the man personally? NO. But you're happy to denounce him, based on others comments. Do u honestly feel qualified to denounce a man you've never met? Never worked for? Who has contributed more than u ever will, to the world & to individuals quality of life? I'll point u to another quote from the book, where Steve asks a blog editor who is likewise trying to attack him: what have you ever made? I'll leave it at that, friend
- andrewfelix 15y ago
  Steve Jobs aside, that's a pretty weak argument. I never knew Idi Amin or Moa Tse Tung personally (I'm not comparing them to Steve Jobs), and while they made some contributions, it's no reason not to make criticisms of them.
richcollins 15y ago
I doubt many will try to emulate his sociopathic behavior unless they themselves are sociopaths. Hopefully all entreprenuers will try to emulate his focus on product and his refusal to accept anything other than the best work that the company can do.
rdl 15y ago
The main thing I learned from the book (having read a lot about Jobs in the past), is that he actually seems like a good father, especially to his son Reed, toward the end; after being horrible to Lisa early on.
joelmichael 15y ago
You either hold yourself and others accountable to a high standard, or you rationalize their failings to avoid the sin of judgment. I'm with the former camp.
- philwelch 15y ago
  The question is, how harshly do you judge Steve Jobs for not being nice, and how harshly do you judge mediocre but nice people for not reshaping a half dozen different industries in a single lifetime?
nirvana 15y ago
Isaacson's book is a hatchet job, with many errors, and some downright dishonest statements. It is a shame that Jobs cooperated with that hack. In numerous passages, Isaacson will quote Jobs saying something perfectly truthful[1], and then follow it up with a claim that Jobs is lying. Most of the time, he doesn't provide any evidence that Jobs is lying, just the assertion, because, as Isaacson is careful to tell us many times in the book, Jobs is famous for his "reality distortion field". I guess this means that Isaacson doesn't have to back up his assertions, and of course Steve Jobs isn't around to defend himself. One example of this is Jobs talking about how NeXT's software gave the Mac new life. Isaacson says this is a lie, and then goes on to quote Bill Gates who says none of the NeXT code made it into OS X. Now, this is an obvious and bald faced lie on Gates' part, but Isaacson doesn't know any better. He's decided that Jobs is a liar, and therefore , whenever someone says anything that disagrees, it must be evidence that Jobs was lying. Reality is, OS X is NeXTSTEP with the Mac UI put on top of it, and at this point another 10 years of evolution. Gates was lying for whatever reasons Gates lies (and gates really is pathological in this regard). Another example is how he treats the statements of Alvy Ray Smith. One of the really nice things about the PBS show on Jobs a few weeks ago was getting to see Alvy. He's clearly disgruntled. And this makes sense, given the extreme difficulties Pixar had in the early years before they were able to start doing features. As a result, as the company kept needing money, and since they couldn't' get outside Capital, they kept using Jobs' capital, and other founders would get diluted as Jobs would buy more and more shares by putting more and more money into it to keep it afloat. In Isaacson's book, however, this isn't really explained, and it comes off as if Jobs was ripping off the others. Isaacson takes Alvy at face value.... but doesn't seem to ask Catmull or others about it. This makes Isaacson a sucker for anyone who has any "dirt" on Jobs, and he clearly didn't ask Steve about many of these claims (or if he did, he didn't put Steve's response in the book.) The book is an excellent piece of propaganda. It pretends to glorify someone who it is obvious the public recognizes as a major positive impact on society, while subtly and at every turn, engaging in character assassination. For the past 30 years, I've seen constant repetition of lies about Apple. I'm not really surprised to see Isaacson do a hatchet job-- as every other book about Jobs has been one as well. His is a little more classy, but a hatchet job none the less. If you think you've got nothing to learn form Steve Jobs, or that he was a bad guy, well, that reflects a lot more on you than on him. It's sad that, now that he's died, it seems the haters-- all of whom seem to be completely ignorant about the history of Apple and constantly repeating the same mindless party line-- feel that they are free to keep posting these bullshit stories and voting them up. Its time to stop. I know you kids think its cool to bash Steve Jobs because "android android derp derp derp!" but this is Hacker News. This is the site for technology enthusiasts who want to do Startups. If you don't respect Steve Jobs for taking a garage startup all the way to being larger than Exxon Mobile in 30 years, by doing a small number of products exceedingly well, I don't think you should be hanging out here. [1] I've had Apple products for 25+ years. I've been following the company for that long and have met a fair number of their executives over the years and a lot of Apple employees. I'm extremely well versed in all things Apple, to the point that I caught many innocent errors in the book. There are things I don't know about, of course, such as current plans, and things Jobs said that were private. But when I say "something perfectly truthful", I mean, the statement is something I know to be a fact from an independant source (not Steve Jobs) and it is at least a fair statement of the facts (leaving room for some of the statements being opinions. On at least one occasion, Isaacson calls an opinion a lie.)
csallen 15y ago
Human communication is a funny thing. We possess fragile egos and staggering amounts of pride. Consequently, we take great offense if even the simplest of statements are misworded (regardless of intention). Consider the difference between, "Give me the salt", and "Hey, would you mind passing me the salt? Thanks." We constantly pollute our speech by adding phrases whose only purpose is to prevent offense. And anyone who doesn't is an asshole. An arrogant jerk. You've heard the advice, common in books on communication or leadership, that the best way to persuade another is to avoid harming his ego. Allow that person to save face at whatever cost. Lie if you have to. Suggest that your idea is really his idea, and that it's brilliant. Is this type of manipulation (and let's be honest -- this is manipulation) really so much better than blunt honesty? It's more effective, to be sure. If you don't already command the respect of a deity, you have to play this game. But for a Gates or a Jobs, is bluntness really such a travesty? Is it really the end of the world because Steve Jobs told you that your shitty design was shitty?
- jonhendry 15y ago
  "Is it really the end of the world because Steve Jobs told you that your shitty design was shitty?" Especially if you then went on to make a truly great design.
alexwolfe 15y ago
I think the real take away should be that we are all flawed as human beings. No matter what we do, how much we achieve, how great we become, we are still human and very imperfect. There are certainly some detestable people on this earth, I wouldn't put Steve Jobs in that category even if I didn't agree with his treatment of others. There are much worse people out there, he simply had many faults. I think its good you don't want to be like Steve Jobs, be yourself. If you hold yourself to a high standard of morality, even better. But don't judge someone completely based off this book, its hard to know what someone felt or thought unless you walked in there shoes. Also, never buying another Apple product is a little short sighted. Jobs, while a great visionary, is hardly everything Apple. There are many many talented, hard working, brilliantly creative people that helped Apple become what it is today. I think it is human nature to want to point to a leader, a genius, "the man". The reality is that these products were created from the collective genius of many, not one person. Anyways, my two cents.
podperson 15y ago
I think there's a difference between being pleasant and being good and the writer of the linked article appears not to. A lot of good people aren't especially pleasant (Richard Stallman, much as I disagree with many things he says, might serve as a nice example). Jobs certainly seems to have been unpleasant in many ways, especially when he was young. As far as I can tell, Jobs is guilty of three major sins in the book: 1) He screwed Woz on the Breakout deal. (Well-documented.) He did not screw Woz on the Apple IPO, however, and made him a very rich man. 2) He behaved abominably to his daughter Lisa's mother, but tried to make up for it later. Lisa's mother comes across as a dissolute user (e.g. she cons Lisa into signing over a house Jobs had given her to live in but bought in Lisa's name, and then sells it to go traveling with her guru). We don't know if Jobs had reasons for what he did, but Lisa chose to live with him. 3) He screwed Kottke out of equity in Apple during the IPO, deciding that his contribution was insufficient. This seems pretty unfair based on what we learn (which isn't much) in the book. That's it, as far as I can recall. There's probably a few minor things, but those are the ones that stuck with me. Aside from that there's a lot of screaming, shouting, and whining, but it's basically pretty much a story of an incredibly dedicated guy trying to make great products and not really caring about money. (How is Jobs supposed to have used Ives? By making him rich and giving him a huge amount of power?) If you wrote the life story of pretty much any businessman, I think you'd be unlikely to find fewer immoral acts. He also did some really mean things to some of his friends early on, but -- at least in most cases -- he owns up to them and tried to make amends. This is not like, say, Bill Gates who pretty much screwed everyone he did business with at some point and rationalizes it all away. But hey, he's curing malaria now so all is forgiven. (Bill Gates also comes across as an asshole, not to mention unhygienic and smelly, in various biographies.)
grandalf 15y ago
I don't care what Steve Jobs' personality is like... or Larry or Sergey's, or Hans Reiser's or Linus Torvalds'. If a product is well-engineered I can respect the narrow aspect of the engineer's brilliance, which is enough. The rest is silly to waste time on. Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.
nice1 15y ago
The author of this article understands precious little about business. The weird comment about female businessmen being nice is rather telling too.
Bratwurst 15y ago
The book just didn't have the Mona Simpson speech moments, or the Pineapple Pizza moments in Steve's life: http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Pineapple_Pizza.txt&characters=Steve%20Jobs&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&s...
jamescridland 15y ago
I said "think twice", not "refuse"...
billpatrianakos 15y ago
I'm impressed with this post for a few reasons. Usually we see people either wanting to tarnish Jobs' image because they're just not in his "camp" or because they're RMS lovers or some such nonsense. Then there are those who go out of their way to justify and excuse all of Jobs' shortcomings. I'm a Jobs fanboy but I appreciated this so much. I'm not too far into the book but I do see the OP's point about Jobs acting like a spoiled brat at times and really being a misanthrope. That said, I see a lot of redeeming qualities in him as well. The great thing a out this post was that I felt it approached the topic from a really fair and grounded perspective. I would agree that others shouldn't try to emulate Jobs because his behavior just isn't acceptable in a lot of cases. Jobs could get away with it because he was Jobs. He was just one of those people who were one of a kind. There can only be one Jobs and to emulate him would most likely doom your prospects for success. There are qualities and anecdotes that can inspire us, teach us, and that can be safely emulated in our own style but speaking to what the OP is talking about I'd agree that what he talks about are not the things to be emulating. I'm just really impressed. It's rare to see such a grounded perspective when talking about someone like Steve Jobs. That name can really stir up a debate and cause some heated discussions and, to repeat myself, this post comes at it from a great, grounded perspective.
c3d 15y ago
There's one thing about Jobs I didn't see mentioned here or in the target web site. Jobs did things out of love: love for his customer, love for his products. As a result, Apple was one of the few companies that self-improved with each flaw in its products. Self-improvement is hard, and it takes a lot of discipline. Jobs' screaming and shouting may have not been the best way to achieve the goal, but it worked. And until we have proof by counter-example, it may be the most efficient way to achieve the greater good. Think about your own teachers or coaches. For me, the ones I remember most are not the one who always told me "good job". It's the teachers who fought my flaws, pushed my limits. In many cases, that involved tedious exercises, boring discipline, "coldness" or shouting. I have yet to see a good sports coach who is always smiling on the field and drives the team with "good job" during the match. To me, Jobs is the best illustration of "There's a difference between knowing the way and walking the way." Jobs knew the way, and made others walk it.

159 points by andyking 15y ago

Napoleon and Alexander the Great killed a lot of people. Colombus wanted to profit owning a big part of what he "discovered"(including the people). Most of the founding fathers of America had slaves on their properties and also killed people. America's pioneers killed native Indians, stole everything they owned and eradicated Buffaloes, dried rivers, cut ancient forest, contaminated the water for profit. The best generals on the WWs killed people, cheated on their wifes, drank a lot, let their people to beat and rape their enemies... And here we are discussing that some guy was not perfect. Of course not, learn and focus what you can about the positive and try to incorporate in in your life, if you can.

furtivefelon 15y ago

If people think that the reason for Job's success is because of his attitude is indeed lacking in intelligence. It is more correct to say that Job succeed in spite of his attitude. This trait is perhaps the easiest to emulate, therefore it will be sad if people emulate Job's worst trait and think that it will make them successful.

zobzu 15y ago
actually its both "thanks" to his attitude and other traits (intelligence, etc. putting it all in the same bag) if you aren't an asshole, at least a little bit, it's difficult to manage a company successfully. you'd be seen as weak and/or other sharks would eat you anyway.
- cageface 15y ago
  Ed Catmull is anything but an asshole and he's run Pixar brilliantly. It's also possible to get people do what you want just because they respect the hell out of you.
  - jonhendry 15y ago
    And he's worked for Jobs for over 20 years.
    - cageface 15y ago
      I worked for Ed for ten of those. Jobs was very hands off at Pixar. I think he realized that Ed had things under control.
      - jonhendry 15y ago
        True, but if anyone at Pixar was going to experience the worst of Jobs over the years, it would probably be Ed, because he would be one of the few interacting with Jobs.
        cageface 15y ago
        Probably, which makes it that much more impressive (IMO) that he never tried to emulate Steve's less admirable qualities.

bfrs 15y ago

---------------------------------------- From Malcolm Gladwell's "The real genius of Steve Jobs" [1]: Jobs, we learn, was a bully. "He had the uncanny capacity to know exactly what your weak point is, know what will make you feel small, to make you cringe". Jobs gets his girlfriend pregnant, and then denies that the child is his. He parks in handicapped spaces. He screams at subordinates. He cries like a small child when he does not get his way. He sits in a restaurant and sends his food back three times. He arrives at his hotel suite in New York for press interviews and decides, at 10 pm ... the flowers are all wrong: he wanted calla lilies. When his public-relations assistant returns, at midnight, with the right flowers, he tells her that her suit is "disgusting". Machines and robots were painted and repainted as he compulsively revised his color scheme, Isaacson writes, of the factory Jobs built, after founding NeXT, in the late nineteen-eighties. He insisted that the machinery on the 165-foot assembly line be configured to move the circuit boards from right to left as they got built, so that the process would look better to visitors who watched from the viewing gallery. ...when Jobs returns, in the late nineteen-nineties, and our natural expectation is that Jobs will emerge wiser and gentler from his tumultuous journey. He never does. In the hospital at the end of his life, he runs through sixty-seven nurses before he finds three he likes... ...Even within Apple, Jobs was known for taking credit for other's ideas. Jonathan Ive, the designer behind the iMac, the iPod, and the iPhone, tells Isaacson, "He will go through a process of looking at my ideas and say, 'That's no good. That's not very good. I like that one.' And later I will be sitting in the audience and he will be talking about it as if it was his idea." ---------------------------------------- If Jobs was really such an A-level asshole, I think he was goddamned lucky to have Steve Woz as his co-founder. From what I know about Woz, in addition to being a first rate engineer, he is also a very good guy. Maybe if Woz was even half (milli-Jobs?) the asshole that Jobs seems to be, he would have kicked him out before Apple went public (à la Saverin in The Social Network) and Jobs would have been just another tantrum throwing hippie hanging around some starbucks in Berkeley or wherever it is angry hippies like to hang about these days. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/14/111114fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=all http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/14/111114fa_fact_...

jshen 15y ago
" he would have kicked him out before Apple went public (à la Saverin in The Social Network) and Jobs would have been just another tantrum throwing hippie hanging around some starbucks in Berkeley or wherever it is angry hippies like to hang about these days." And woz would have been just another engineer working for some company.

moxiemk1 15y ago

>> But what worries me is the amount of stupid businessmen who’ll be copying Jobs’s behaviour. (I say “businessmen” on purpose, since I’ve yet to encounter a businesswoman, on any level, who treats people in an unpleasant way). Recognizing that I say this from a white, cis-gendered, born to highly intelligent (if not at all successful) parents perspective, I don't think that comments like that are appropriate. First, it continues to perpetuate the mindset that women and men should be approached due to their gender, not their being. Second, to counter the anecdote, I have met such people. Using only male-gendered pronouns and nouns would (as regrettable as this is) probably have gone unnoticed by me. That sentence put my conception of the author squarely into the most nefarious category of misogynists: those who try to better their own image while still perpetuating the problem.

spacefungus 15y ago
This is completely irrational and irrelevant. A misogynist is someone who hates women and/or girls. He's saying he's never encountered a bad business woman, which is not hatred at all under any circumstance. He's a man writing about a man, so the gender of pronouns shouldn't mystify or bother you. And "those seeking to better their own image while perpetuating a problem" isn't any form or category of misogynist. See the definition at the beginning of this comment for reference. And he did not say "negative businesswomen do not exist". He said he's never personally encountered any.
- philwelch 15y ago
  While in normal discourse "misogynist" means "someone who hates women and/or girls", in formal academic feminism a misogynist is someone who disagrees with the feminist dogma. It's not difficult to spot third-wave feminists: usually by the time someone uses jargon like "cis-gendered" (which is Women's Studies for "doesn't suffer from gender identity disorder") you're well above 90% odds that you're dealing with some type of left-wing identity politics wonk. Interestingly, "misogynist" itself is a high-probability marker as well. It would be interesting to run a Bayesian classifier and find out what the observed probabilities actually are....
puredemo 15y ago

Tichy 15y ago

I've read only parts of the books, but I get the impression I only get part of the story. It describes his unpleasantness, but at the same time it describes how lots of people were enchanted by him. The book doesn't explain how that is possible. So I take it with a huge grain of salt.

jonhendry 15y ago
The 'hero/asshole roller coaster' is a widely accepted description of what it could be like working for Jobs. On the other hand, there are plenty of people who worked for him for decades, and people who worked for him, left, and then returned. I suspect part of it was learning how to deal with Jobs and his tantrums, part of it was being talented enough to spend more time as a 'hero' than an 'asshole', part of it was feeling that Jobs was trying to achieve something significant and thus the expected effort was worthwhile, and part of it was finding ways to stay out of Jobs' sight when necessary.

schraeds 15y ago

You kind of have to be an asshole to get things done. The best coaches and mentors in my life caused me displeasure in their relentless efforts to push me further than I thought I could go.

jarcoal 15y ago
Exactly right. Companies do not get ahead by having mellow pushovers at the top. People having been talking a lot about how he stole all of the design credit from Ives. This might be the case, but I'm willing to bet you that Ives would be the first to admit that Jobs helped him unlock his true potential.
- atdt 15y ago
  Taking credit for other people's creative work is a shit thing to do. Whatever benefits Ive may have drawn from the relationship aren't relevant. Daddy doesn't get to beat the kids just because daddy puts food on the table.
  - jonhendry 15y ago
    I'm inclined to take Ives' complaint with a grain of salt. After all, as the face of Apple design, Ives might be getting some amount of credit for designs that his underlings have made. He might not be seeking it, but that's how it's working out. Ives is pretty much the only designer at Apple who gets any credit at all, at least in the media. And that's been the case for years now. He hasn't exactly been laboring in obscurity while Jobs sucked up all the credit and adulation.
    - philwelch 15y ago
      Apple has always been circumspect about identifying any of their employees below the Senior VP level because they don't want any of them poached. And even their senior VPs get poached.
  - matwood 15y ago
    Taking credit for other people's creative work is a shit thing to do. If SJ pushed Ives to iterate through 100s of designs, tweaked each one and then iterated again whose creative work would it be? If SJ sat down and explained what he wanted in excruciating detail (given the stories of his attention to detail this is what I would expect), and through trial and error Ives arrived at what SJ wanted whose creative work would it be? I think there is clearly no single creator in either case. Ives gets a lot of credit for being a great designer and being the one who helped SJ realize his computing vision. Given SJs OCD about details I don't think it was ever a case where he was playing golf, took an Ives design and just pushed it out as his own.

gbog 15y ago

> (Incidentally, my Kindle crashed three times while reading this book.) I don't know which Kindle the author is talking about, but it seems weird to me, I never heard of a Kindle crash and I have 4/5 around, not counting colleagues'. And, maybe it is off-topic, but maybe it is not. Why would the author add this parenthesis if it was not a necessary adjunction to his point? Maybe it was a way to underline how non-Apple products have the bad habit of crashing randomly just for the purpose of annoying their owners? It is the same with "I’ve yet to encounter a businesswoman, on any level, who treats people in an unpleasant way". This is a way to say, "I am a very gentle guy, I don't want to discriminate against women, love me please", but this apparently innocent statement is 1) pure and simple sexism 2) plain wrong. Then the main point, Job being a "detestable human being", well, it seems obvious. Let's just hope no too many people idealize him for too long a time.

polyfractal 15y ago
The closest I've ever come to a "Kindle Crash" was a multi-second delay on page turn, which has only happened once. I've been using mine every day on my commute for the last year. No idea what the author was referring too. Maybe the new Kindle Fire?
- jonhendry 15y ago
  I've owned a kindle 2, a kindle DX, a kindle 3, and a black kindle DX. I've had a few crashes. Spontaneous reboots, actually. The most recent ones I think happened when I was looking at a PDF, so presumably something about the PDF did it. Nothing major.
- larsberg 15y ago
  Agreed. I use Calibre to download all of my news subscriptions to it and between that and a several books per week, I've never seen my kindle 3 crash in the many months that I've been using it. As opposed to my iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and iPad2, all of which I've taken down rather horribly with just the normal apps (typically frozen, sometimes insta-reboot), not even counting things that bad programs _I_ wrote were doing.
- 15y ago

ryan-allen 15y ago

While you can point at how he conducted himself at Apple and scream "Monster!", what isn't mentioned in this post but is dealt with at length in his biography is how he conducted himself at Pixar. He was much more low-key about the 'products' at Pixar, he mostly was an enabler and negotiator for them. In Pixar's early days he invested an awful lot of his then-fortune into keeping it alive, and it was his cunning negotiation skills that kept Pixar from being swallowed by the then flailing Disney. If you contrast his behaviour at Pixar and at Disney, I think it illustrates that he didn't consider the work at Pixar to be 'his art'. There were other people at Pixar who were leading the 'art' there and it was all in hand. At Apple on the other hand, it's completely clear that Jobs' considered the products to be 'his art' and his conviction was such that he literally was going to drag everyone, kicking and screaming, to realise his vision. And that he did, in a world of horrible consumer electronics he would not abide, he set out and truly lead the creation of some very awesome and uncompromising products. It was his Art. Imagine if Andy Warhol or Piccasso or any other famous artist relied on the expertise of many individuals to realise their creations. Do you think they'd be considering that all you want is your 9-5 job and your 401k and 4 weeks holiday a year. Nope, they'd be behaving in exactly the same way: aggressive and fervent conviction. Work ceases to become merely a job and you're no longer working, you're crusading. In a world of unambitious and mediocre individuals, you have to move mountains to do great work that requires multi-disciplined collaboration. You're going to upset people along the way but that just comes with the territory. I don't think it's fair to blame him for his behaviour. The world needs more people like him: true leaders who will stand up for their convictions, no matter what the cost.

ditojim 15y ago
even if the cost is other people? your last statement is a dangerous stance.
- Game_Ender 15y ago
  It's a greater good kind of thing. Eisenhower, Patton, Roosevelt won WW2, but were directly responsible for the death of hundreds of thousands. In most case people no their chances when they decide to work under these kinds of people.

mikerg87 15y ago

Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, they're all sausage factories. You really don't want to look too close at how all this stuff is made.

puredemo 15y ago
How is Google a sausage factory? Just curious..
- rdl 15y ago
  The internal politics are pretty bad, from what Google employees have reported. For an organization originally without politics, in the mid-2000s there was a whole mess of PMs and managers.

petercooper 15y ago

the biography has actually made me think twice about buying anything Apple-branded again. This seems as asinine as refusing to buy a Volkswagen because VW was founded by Nazis.

spacefungus 15y ago
Nope, it's not asinine at all. The problems this guy has with Apple are things still going on now. Your comparison is equivalent with "one time long ago cotton was picked by slaves so I won't wear cotton". That is irrational as its not happening right now. But the horrible apple conditions are alive and well.
- petercooper 15y ago
  The problems this guy has with Apple are things still going on now. Every problem the author notes in this article is specifically with Steve Jobs' behavior, not Apple's. I'm commenting on what was in the submitted article. However, you reiterated my point beautifully with your cotton anecdote. I'm not sure why you needed to repeat the sentiment but, yes, it's similarly irrational.

spacefungus 15y ago

I'm a fan of Steve Jobs for his vision and ability to see things we all blatantly are unaware of. He changed technology, but also advertising, movies, music, etc. But I'm glad to see someone holding him accountable for his life and the consequences of his actions. The iPhone rocks, but the Foxconn factory it was made in is so fucking hard to work in that they have suicide nets on the roof; almost a dozen have killed themselves to escape the 14+ hour days. The MacBook is beautiful, the iMacs are amazing, the software (before Lion) had a simplicity and aesthetic that were unmatched. But to ignore the fact that many people were screwed over by Steve, that many people were payed a few cents an hour to make his products, and that he was a cold, arrogant man is just ignorant. Thomas Edison was a shrewd, competitive, harsh man. Does this mean we should ignore his contributions to science? Absolutely not. Nikola Tesla , Leonardo Da Vinci, Howard Hughes, etc. etc. all had negative qualities like every other human. They contributed a lot to the world, though. So some of the comments that are accusing this post of being over-dramatic or don't want any criticisms of Lord Jobs are foolish. He did a lot of good and a hell of a lot of bad. Acknowledging and accepting both, and then learning from both, is fair and rational. Facts are facts.

ricardobeat 15y ago
Get rid of your television, shoes, computer, mobile phone and clothes then. They are all made in china (or indonesia/taiwan/etc) in probably worse conditions. What do you even know about their manufacturing? "I'm glad to see someone holding him accountable for […] the consequences of his actions" is what I'd call over-dramatic.
- spacefungus 15y ago
  I don't know much about their manufacturing, which is why I do what I can to buy from people I know and buy from within the United States. As I replied to Nirvana, I'm recognizing the fact that Jobs, like everyone, was not perfect and had negative qualities. I'm also recognizing his involvement in a supply chain I don't feel 100% happy about. I still buy his products but I'm aware of the negative stuff, too. I'm just trying to be informed and fair about him. And by talking about a part, that does not mean I'm unaware of or ignoring the whole. If I talk about the evils Dr. Mengele that doesn't mean I've forgotten about the rest of the Nazi party. We're just talking about specifics in relation to this article (Steve Jobs and Apple).

pbreit 15y ago

This article has a gaping whole: most/all of the people mentioned would not feel that they were mis-treated by Jobs. Quite the opposite, in fact: most people who worked closely with Jobs consider it the highlight of their lives.

LaGrange 15y ago
This is, sadly, something that happens often to victims of sociopaths. The sociopaths came, he did bad things to them (that is, directly, mentioned), then left them in the cold, feeling sad, and still, he was "the highlight of their lives". At least that's what I see in so many stories in that book.
spacefungus 15y ago
I think he's more commenting on Jobs' behavior and how he doesn't like it. I mean, lots of people at Enron talked about it being the thrill of their lives. But as observers we can recognize that their behavior sucks and not like it. (reference -> "Enron: Smartest Men in the Room")
- pbreit 15y ago
  I would not equate breaking the law and causing lots of people to go broke with hurting peoples' feelings.

michaelpinto 15y ago

I've read quite a few biographies and what i hate about Walter Isaacson is that everything becomes an oversimplified Time magazine article, which makes every character into a flat cartoon caricature. My guess is that Jobs could be a jerk, but then if you were a multimillionaire in your early 20s how could you not be a jerk? Also the tech industry is filled with tons of very bright people who are social cripples. The harsh reality is that to build something like a Macintosh you might have to be quite nasty to pull off the scale of cat herding that may be required. I also hate to admit this: But I half suspect Jobs picked out Isaacson because he'd draw a cartoon sketch instead of doing a serious biography. I'm still not done reading the book yet, but I almost feel that I know less about Jobs than before I started reading the damn thing. And the other thing that drives up the wall is that you get the feeling that Isaacson doesn't have a clue about technology -- so you half wonder how much he missed. And I suspect Jobs wanted it that way -- instead of burning his papers he just picked a lightweight. By the way if any of you want to read an amazing biographer look at the work of Robert Caro who is a real writer. His first book "the Power Broker" is an amazing study Robert Moses who is a very flawed hero who really made NYC what it was (for both better and worse). He's also written several books on LBJ who also starts out as a progressive and does both amazing and terrible things in his life. I wish someone like that had done this bio...

LaGrange 15y ago
It paints Steve Jobs as a jerk far before he became a millionaire. Also, the harsh reality is that neither of us knows if your assumption about the state of the harsh reality is valid.

purephase 15y ago

First off, I say all this as a fan of both Isaacson and Jobs. I am convinced that this book is Jobs' attempt to counter worries that Apple is in trouble without him at the helm. Given that he was a perfectionist, that he would both commission, support and supposedly proof a work that paints him in the light that it does, there must be a motive to the caricature it paints. Think about it. Everyone is worried about the staying power of Apple without him at the helm. He is the quintessential micro-manager, so the concerns are valid. He was also a very private person that, despite some oft-reported claims, held a demi-god like status in the company and with a lot of people around the globe. The book repeatedly (oh god, the repetition) remarks on his intent on "creating a legacy", "making a dent in the universe", "working only with the best" which speaks directly to Apple's future without him. Isaacson even doles out micro-biographies on Cook and Ive. Two entire chapters! It then completely obliterates his demi-god status by painting him as a petulant child, terrible father (early on), liar and narcissist. I cannot imagine anyone reading the book and idolizing Jobs afterwards. It makes him very, very human which is an ideal image to paint if you are/were worried about Apple's future. I am more interested in the biography on Jobs that will be written in 10-20 years from now.

philwelch 15y ago
I wouldn't say I "idolize" Jobs after reading the biography, but I still consider him a hero. His arrogance and narcissism is justified in the end; an inflated self-image is unbecoming in someone mediocre, but Jobs really was a special and important person. Still, Jobs never seemed outright grandiose, as he often acknowledged his own flaws and appreciated people who stood up for him. His other flaws, while he could certainly do without some of them, do seem to tie into his greatest strengths. And his heroic qualities greatly outweigh everything else. He was never physically violent, never even seemed to cheat on his wife, and aside from the Breakout incident, never outright screwed anyone out of money. There's a line between mean and immoral, and Steve stayed on the better side of that line a lot more than a lot of other people who get idolized with far less question. I'm not even talking about people who are unfairly idolized, like Edison or Mother Theresa or the Dalai Lama. I'm talking about people like JFK or Martin Luther King or Winston Churchill, genuinely heroic figures who cheated on their wives or killed innocent people.

brisance 15y ago

Anyone else read Sam Smith's "The Jordan Rules"? Jordan is without doubt one of the greatest, if not the greatest, basketball player the world has seen. He is also known to be egotistical, as many competitive athletes/alpha males are (it's probably the testosterone). Like Steve Jobs, Jordan would not suffer fools gladly, would "bully" team-mates, had laser-focus etc. Had a good wingman in the form of Pippen (Tim Cook). Yet one cannot fault him for his many accomplishments. He rose to the occasion time and again (how many times have we seen him take the buzzer-beater?), and had an admirable work ethic. As the saying goes "haters gonna hate". The fact is that Jordan, Steve Jobs, and many other people changed their respective industries and beyond. Jordan not only changed professional sports, but also sports management and sports equipment marketing. Steve Jobs' achievements probably need no introduction.

loso 15y ago
Have you seen the perception of Jordan lately? I was and probably still am one of the biggest Jordan fans ever but he's a dick and as a fan I have to admit it. His former teammates do not have many nice things to say about him and the people he played against even less so. Right now there are a bunch of young NBA players, who grew up watching Jordan's accomplishments, considering boycotting Jordan brand sneakers because of him being an asshole during the lockout negotiations. Even take a look at how poorly his hall of fame speech was regarded by the general public and his peers. The chip on his shoulder helped him be a winner on the court but not so much off of it. Yes, your egotistical ways might lead you to win in your field but don't expect the people you ran over to all of the sudden see the light and respect you as a person. You can respect a persons accomplishments while also despising who they are as a human being.
- brisance 15y ago
  There is no way to please everyone all the time. I saw the HoF induction speech. Did it come across as self-centered... yes, I thought it did. But that's his privilege, he earned it. About a person's qualities as a human being: I feel there isn't much need to pass judgment on others, whether they are celebrities or not. Each of us are also humans and are also prone to our own lapses of judgment, integrity etc. That's what we are. Otherwise we'd all be saints and life would be predictable and boring. :) There was a time in the 90s where there was all this talk about being a "role model" and Barkley famously got into trouble for it. It's touching on exactly the same issues. And I agree with Barkley: that parents should be the ones bringing up their offspring, not the media,entertainers, sports/tech heroes et al. Coming back on topic: I respect Jobs for the things he'd done, to "push the human race forward". He was a giant, and my opinion is that the world became a better place for it. You're free to disagree (refer to RMS's stance), but that doesn't mean my own opinion is any less valid, and I'm sticking with it. :)

sjs 15y ago

I hope he also avoids products and media made my anyone who has not been an absolute saint their entire life. It's perfectly acceptable to dislike Jobs, no question about that whatsoever. It's also acceptable to stop buying Apple stuff for any reason. But if you're going to put a proverbial line in the sand on moral grounds then you had better stick to your guns and apply that to everything or you just end up looking ... silly. (Nice attempt at a clever title, but it misses the intended meaning of "think different" which is not "think differently" but more along the lines of "think bigger", as in "think of something different".)

andrewcooke 15y ago
you really think that "anyone who has not been an absolute saint their entire life" is a equivalent to "Devoid of any kind of feelings towards anyone else, he shouts, screams, cries and sulks his way through his petulant life"? because i don't. i think there's quite a difference. everyone can be an arsehole sometimes, sure. but that doesn't excuse those that are consistently unpleasant. there's a clear difference. so you can distance yourself from the latter without having any problems with the former.
- sipefree 15y ago
  > Devoid of any kind of feelings towards anyone else, he shouts, screams, cries and sulks his way through his petulant life Sounds like full-on Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Various people who knew Steve have also said that he must have had this. As far as I can see, it's probably true. I don't think it's right to attribute malice to the man if it's the case. Neither is it right to insist that someone be prevented from being successful in business because they have something wrong with their brain.
  - jonhendry 15y ago
    "Sounds like full-on Narcissistic Personality Disorder." And/Or some OCD and some kind of autistic spectrum disorder, combined with early success which probably encouraged or reinforced some things that a regular person would have to learn to avoid doing.

ethank 15y ago

Wouldn't it be nice if the people behind the things we loved were as pure and perfect as our love for the products they created? It doesn't happen. I ended up great friends with someone who created a body of work I hold dear. He isn't perfect. His faults make the relationship between who he is as a person, as an artist and the body of work he's created complex. But that fissure between the creator and the created is what makes the work that much better. Jobs seemed to be similar. The art of creation is a messy thing indeed.

codelust 15y ago
It is not limited to just creation, we seem to be giving up easily the ability to grasp that not everything is black or white. There was much to admire and like about the man, there was much that was flawed about him. But, for most, it is either fully angelic or 100% the devil's cohort that they work overtime to fit him into.

Olih 15y ago

Did u know the man personally? NO. But you're happy to denounce him, based on others comments. Do u honestly feel qualified to denounce a man you've never met? Never worked for? Who has contributed more than u ever will, to the world & to individuals quality of life? I'll point u to another quote from the book, where Steve asks a blog editor who is likewise trying to attack him: what have you ever made? I'll leave it at that, friend

andrewfelix 15y ago
Steve Jobs aside, that's a pretty weak argument. I never knew Idi Amin or Moa Tse Tung personally (I'm not comparing them to Steve Jobs), and while they made some contributions, it's no reason not to make criticisms of them.

richcollins 15y ago

I doubt many will try to emulate his sociopathic behavior unless they themselves are sociopaths. Hopefully all entreprenuers will try to emulate his focus on product and his refusal to accept anything other than the best work that the company can do.

rdl 15y ago

The main thing I learned from the book (having read a lot about Jobs in the past), is that he actually seems like a good father, especially to his son Reed, toward the end; after being horrible to Lisa early on.

joelmichael 15y ago

You either hold yourself and others accountable to a high standard, or you rationalize their failings to avoid the sin of judgment. I'm with the former camp.

philwelch 15y ago
The question is, how harshly do you judge Steve Jobs for not being nice, and how harshly do you judge mediocre but nice people for not reshaping a half dozen different industries in a single lifetime?

nirvana 15y ago

Isaacson's book is a hatchet job, with many errors, and some downright dishonest statements. It is a shame that Jobs cooperated with that hack. In numerous passages, Isaacson will quote Jobs saying something perfectly truthful[1], and then follow it up with a claim that Jobs is lying. Most of the time, he doesn't provide any evidence that Jobs is lying, just the assertion, because, as Isaacson is careful to tell us many times in the book, Jobs is famous for his "reality distortion field". I guess this means that Isaacson doesn't have to back up his assertions, and of course Steve Jobs isn't around to defend himself. One example of this is Jobs talking about how NeXT's software gave the Mac new life. Isaacson says this is a lie, and then goes on to quote Bill Gates who says none of the NeXT code made it into OS X. Now, this is an obvious and bald faced lie on Gates' part, but Isaacson doesn't know any better. He's decided that Jobs is a liar, and therefore , whenever someone says anything that disagrees, it must be evidence that Jobs was lying. Reality is, OS X is NeXTSTEP with the Mac UI put on top of it, and at this point another 10 years of evolution. Gates was lying for whatever reasons Gates lies (and gates really is pathological in this regard). Another example is how he treats the statements of Alvy Ray Smith. One of the really nice things about the PBS show on Jobs a few weeks ago was getting to see Alvy. He's clearly disgruntled. And this makes sense, given the extreme difficulties Pixar had in the early years before they were able to start doing features. As a result, as the company kept needing money, and since they couldn't' get outside Capital, they kept using Jobs' capital, and other founders would get diluted as Jobs would buy more and more shares by putting more and more money into it to keep it afloat. In Isaacson's book, however, this isn't really explained, and it comes off as if Jobs was ripping off the others. Isaacson takes Alvy at face value.... but doesn't seem to ask Catmull or others about it. This makes Isaacson a sucker for anyone who has any "dirt" on Jobs, and he clearly didn't ask Steve about many of these claims (or if he did, he didn't put Steve's response in the book.) The book is an excellent piece of propaganda. It pretends to glorify someone who it is obvious the public recognizes as a major positive impact on society, while subtly and at every turn, engaging in character assassination. For the past 30 years, I've seen constant repetition of lies about Apple. I'm not really surprised to see Isaacson do a hatchet job-- as every other book about Jobs has been one as well. His is a little more classy, but a hatchet job none the less. If you think you've got nothing to learn form Steve Jobs, or that he was a bad guy, well, that reflects a lot more on you than on him. It's sad that, now that he's died, it seems the haters-- all of whom seem to be completely ignorant about the history of Apple and constantly repeating the same mindless party line-- feel that they are free to keep posting these bullshit stories and voting them up. Its time to stop. I know you kids think its cool to bash Steve Jobs because "android android derp derp derp!" but this is Hacker News. This is the site for technology enthusiasts who want to do Startups. If you don't respect Steve Jobs for taking a garage startup all the way to being larger than Exxon Mobile in 30 years, by doing a small number of products exceedingly well, I don't think you should be hanging out here. [1] I've had Apple products for 25+ years. I've been following the company for that long and have met a fair number of their executives over the years and a lot of Apple employees. I'm extremely well versed in all things Apple, to the point that I caught many innocent errors in the book. There are things I don't know about, of course, such as current plans, and things Jobs said that were private. But when I say "something perfectly truthful", I mean, the statement is something I know to be a fact from an independant source (not Steve Jobs) and it is at least a fair statement of the facts (leaving room for some of the statements being opinions. On at least one occasion, Isaacson calls an opinion a lie.)

csallen 15y ago

Human communication is a funny thing. We possess fragile egos and staggering amounts of pride. Consequently, we take great offense if even the simplest of statements are misworded (regardless of intention). Consider the difference between, "Give me the salt", and "Hey, would you mind passing me the salt? Thanks." We constantly pollute our speech by adding phrases whose only purpose is to prevent offense. And anyone who doesn't is an asshole. An arrogant jerk. You've heard the advice, common in books on communication or leadership, that the best way to persuade another is to avoid harming his ego. Allow that person to save face at whatever cost. Lie if you have to. Suggest that your idea is really his idea, and that it's brilliant. Is this type of manipulation (and let's be honest -- this is manipulation) really so much better than blunt honesty? It's more effective, to be sure. If you don't already command the respect of a deity, you have to play this game. But for a Gates or a Jobs, is bluntness really such a travesty? Is it really the end of the world because Steve Jobs told you that your shitty design was shitty?

jonhendry 15y ago
"Is it really the end of the world because Steve Jobs told you that your shitty design was shitty?" Especially if you then went on to make a truly great design.

alexwolfe 15y ago

I think the real take away should be that we are all flawed as human beings. No matter what we do, how much we achieve, how great we become, we are still human and very imperfect. There are certainly some detestable people on this earth, I wouldn't put Steve Jobs in that category even if I didn't agree with his treatment of others. There are much worse people out there, he simply had many faults. I think its good you don't want to be like Steve Jobs, be yourself. If you hold yourself to a high standard of morality, even better. But don't judge someone completely based off this book, its hard to know what someone felt or thought unless you walked in there shoes. Also, never buying another Apple product is a little short sighted. Jobs, while a great visionary, is hardly everything Apple. There are many many talented, hard working, brilliantly creative people that helped Apple become what it is today. I think it is human nature to want to point to a leader, a genius, "the man". The reality is that these products were created from the collective genius of many, not one person. Anyways, my two cents.

podperson 15y ago

I think there's a difference between being pleasant and being good and the writer of the linked article appears not to. A lot of good people aren't especially pleasant (Richard Stallman, much as I disagree with many things he says, might serve as a nice example). Jobs certainly seems to have been unpleasant in many ways, especially when he was young. As far as I can tell, Jobs is guilty of three major sins in the book: 1) He screwed Woz on the Breakout deal. (Well-documented.) He did not screw Woz on the Apple IPO, however, and made him a very rich man. 2) He behaved abominably to his daughter Lisa's mother, but tried to make up for it later. Lisa's mother comes across as a dissolute user (e.g. she cons Lisa into signing over a house Jobs had given her to live in but bought in Lisa's name, and then sells it to go traveling with her guru). We don't know if Jobs had reasons for what he did, but Lisa chose to live with him. 3) He screwed Kottke out of equity in Apple during the IPO, deciding that his contribution was insufficient. This seems pretty unfair based on what we learn (which isn't much) in the book. That's it, as far as I can recall. There's probably a few minor things, but those are the ones that stuck with me. Aside from that there's a lot of screaming, shouting, and whining, but it's basically pretty much a story of an incredibly dedicated guy trying to make great products and not really caring about money. (How is Jobs supposed to have used Ives? By making him rich and giving him a huge amount of power?) If you wrote the life story of pretty much any businessman, I think you'd be unlikely to find fewer immoral acts. He also did some really mean things to some of his friends early on, but -- at least in most cases -- he owns up to them and tried to make amends. This is not like, say, Bill Gates who pretty much screwed everyone he did business with at some point and rationalizes it all away. But hey, he's curing malaria now so all is forgiven. (Bill Gates also comes across as an asshole, not to mention unhygienic and smelly, in various biographies.)

grandalf 15y ago

I don't care what Steve Jobs' personality is like... or Larry or Sergey's, or Hans Reiser's or Linus Torvalds'. If a product is well-engineered I can respect the narrow aspect of the engineer's brilliance, which is enough. The rest is silly to waste time on. Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.

nice1 15y ago

The author of this article understands precious little about business. The weird comment about female businessmen being nice is rather telling too.

Bratwurst 15y ago

The book just didn't have the Mona Simpson speech moments, or the Pineapple Pizza moments in Steve's life: http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Pineapple_Pizza.txt&characters=Steve%20Jobs&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Date http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&s...

jamescridland 15y ago

I said "think twice", not "refuse"...

billpatrianakos 15y ago

I'm impressed with this post for a few reasons. Usually we see people either wanting to tarnish Jobs' image because they're just not in his "camp" or because they're RMS lovers or some such nonsense. Then there are those who go out of their way to justify and excuse all of Jobs' shortcomings. I'm a Jobs fanboy but I appreciated this so much. I'm not too far into the book but I do see the OP's point about Jobs acting like a spoiled brat at times and really being a misanthrope. That said, I see a lot of redeeming qualities in him as well. The great thing a out this post was that I felt it approached the topic from a really fair and grounded perspective. I would agree that others shouldn't try to emulate Jobs because his behavior just isn't acceptable in a lot of cases. Jobs could get away with it because he was Jobs. He was just one of those people who were one of a kind. There can only be one Jobs and to emulate him would most likely doom your prospects for success. There are qualities and anecdotes that can inspire us, teach us, and that can be safely emulated in our own style but speaking to what the OP is talking about I'd agree that what he talks about are not the things to be emulating. I'm just really impressed. It's rare to see such a grounded perspective when talking about someone like Steve Jobs. That name can really stir up a debate and cause some heated discussions and, to repeat myself, this post comes at it from a great, grounded perspective.

c3d 15y ago

There's one thing about Jobs I didn't see mentioned here or in the target web site. Jobs did things out of love: love for his customer, love for his products. As a result, Apple was one of the few companies that self-improved with each flaw in its products. Self-improvement is hard, and it takes a lot of discipline. Jobs' screaming and shouting may have not been the best way to achieve the goal, but it worked. And until we have proof by counter-example, it may be the most efficient way to achieve the greater good. Think about your own teachers or coaches. For me, the ones I remember most are not the one who always told me "good job". It's the teachers who fought my flaws, pushed my limits. In many cases, that involved tedious exercises, boring discipline, "coldness" or shouting. I have yet to see a good sports coach who is always smiling on the field and drives the team with "good job" during the match. To me, Jobs is the best illustration of "There's a difference between knowing the way and walking the way." Jobs knew the way, and made others walk it.