“No one can accuse Steve Jobs of indifference. In an image-obsessed fit of pique, Apple Computer banished books published by John Wiley & Sons from the shelves of Apple’s 105 retail stores recently because of Wiley’s plan to publish an unauthorized biography of Jobs, the Apple chief executive,” Katie Hafner reports for The New York Times.

“It is not clear whether Jobs or anyone else at Apple has read the book, ‘iCon: Steve Jobs, The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business,’ by Jeffrey Young and William Simon, which will go on sale this month,” Hafner reports.

“The ambiguity of the title – Icon, or I Con? – is the first clue that the work may not be hagiography. But in the publisher’s view, the details are probably beside the point. But Young said the title had not been intended to convey negative overtones, that it was a playful twist on Apple’s iPod and iMac. ‘He’s become an icon, bigger than life,’ Young said. ‘It was clear they didn’t want us to publish the book,’ Susan Spilka, a spokeswoman at Wiley, said,” Hafner reports. “Wiley, in response to increased interest in what it calls an ‘intimate look at a controversial leader,’ has decided to double the book’s initial press run of nearly 50,000 and to race it to stores by May 13, a few weeks ahead of its original publication date.”

Full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Steve Jobs must really want this book to sell.

Related MacDailyNews articles:
Publisher says Apple removed all its books from Apple stores due to upcoming Steve Jobs bio – April 26, 2005