“It’s a tribute to Steve Jobs’ vision for personal computing that despite Apple’s minority position in the technology landscape, he has taken up residence in the upper echelons of those business leaders and technologists responsible for shaping the next generation of computing,” Seb Janacek writes for Silicon.com.
“We all know the story of how Jobs and Steve Wozniak formed Apple in 1976 and hit a home run a year later with the Wozniak-designed Apple II. Then in 1984 the launch of the Macintosh cemented Jobs’ position as a leader capable of understanding and defining the technological zeitgeist,” Janacek writes. “Likewise we’ve heard about his exit from Apple a year later, buying Pixar, starting software firm NeXT – and then selling it to Apple, the move which brought him back to the company he founded. Jobs soon ousted solid but unspectacular Apple CEO Gil Amelio and set about dragging the company out of the mire… As US technology journalist Nick Arnett once wrote: ‘Without Jobs, Apple is just another Silicon Valley company and without Apple, Jobs is just another Silicon Valley millionaire.'”
Full article here.
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What happens when Steve Jobs dies? – August 20, 2003
“…Jobs is just another Silicon Valley millionaire.'”
I think you mean billionaire.
first yahoo!
Mark
The only thing Apple needs is a competent and visionary leader & executive team. That’s the reason Apple floundered in the 90’s: it wasn’t because Steve wasn’t there, it was because they lacked the kind of leadership that Steve provides.
Every companie “needs a competent and visionary leader & executive team. “
what would the church be like without the pope?
“that Steve provides.”
should read: ‘that Steve and his teams provide.’
‘Every companie “needs a competent and visionary leader & executive team.” ‘
Yeah, and we all know what happened when Apple didn’t have that.
That is something that worries me. Apple hasn’t been succesful w/out Jobs. I do hope that Apple starts grooming someone to take over down the road.
If something happens to SJ Apple would be in a lot of trouble.
JEG et al:
Steve Jobs only role at mac was to find the road map find products that he can promote. He is a good accountant who knows to make good products you need good research and he has read in so many sales books that if you focus on customers needs and wants you will never go wrong.
Apple wont die so as long as theres someone to listen to the people. You have that you will work.. When SJ was not there they did not listen to the people, the gamers, the coders, hackers.. instead Apple conformed.. they made their machines off white, redundant and ugly.. which is why i hate them still.
I am not saying that anyone can do SJ’s job but its the apple users that make the company. I admit I am hated in ALOT of posts for being the guy that pisses on peoples comments but I do give credit where its due..
The customers make apple and Apple users are the few if not the only users that keep the company on the short and narrow. instead of microsoft who “made their customers”.
I will always be the first to try to be the first to shoot down apple because i believe there should be an Agent Smith to your Neo, ergo the perfect balance to the equation.
As long as theres a CEO who listens we will have a Apple Computer. Because When SJ left apple.. so did I.
I just have not gone back.. even though SJ did.
http://www.grapegraphics.com/zippers/
choose “visionaries”
it was way too obvious
Amelio was a “solid” CEO…? Would you describe a doctor as “solid” who couldn’t stop the bleeding?
(The “unspectacular” part I can agree with.)
Never forget the Dark Days.
Steve is Apple, beautiful and on the edge of monoculture.
Music Label:
no one here gives you a hard time for using Windows – but could you please keep the noise down about the viruses and spyware and trojans? Some of us are trying to get some work done around here.
seriously – compared to other guys that work from home, like my brother, one Windows machines, they spend incalcuable hours and weeks on virus protection, spyware, melting and repouring their Windows installs, removing viruses by hand, hacking in regedit, etc.
i just make my videos, distribute previews to them over the internet, and manage 4 graphic arts shops who are all running Macs… while i have real day job simultaneously.
my brother is trying out a new type of firewall today because the one he was using is conflicting with something he’s doing from home to work.
Microsoft’s products are made by people that really understand computers.
Apple’s products are made by people that really understand people.
i just lead them – and they do wondrous things.
“Steve Jobs only role at mac was to find the road map…”
If you are going to comment on the company, at least get the company’s name right.
Steve is nothing but ego. Apple is successful in spite of him. Visionary? He doesn’t design or build the products Apple sells. As a shareholder I’d like to see him go, but too many worship at the altar of this fakir.
I wish that Woz would come back to Apple and I wish that Apple would ADVERTISE!!!
“what would the church be like without the pope?”
Anglican.
I believe Jonathan Ive is being groomed for the position of CEO for Apple. Steve has so much respect for him, and Jonathan knows how to listen.
What will Apple be like without Steve Jobs? We’ll find out in 20 years I suppose.
It’s funny this guy saids without apple jobs would be just another sillicon valley millionaire. It was pixar that steve made his first billion, 2nd billion and part of his 3rd billion. I think steve only has around 500 million in apple stock since he sold all of his apple stock but one when he left Apple the first time around. And it wasn’t till very late in his CEO position with Apple again that he got stock options and the gulfstream jet. No matter, without Apple, Steve place in history was already in place with the 1995 release of Toy Story. Its just more magnified now that Steve is starting a second revolution. First it was the computer, now its how people listen to music.
typo. 500 million dollars worth of stock, not 500 mil in stocks
Apple suffered during the ‘Dark Ages’ after the two Steves left- not because it needed Steve Jobs as much as it didn’t need some faceless suit from another Fortune 500 company. Apple will eventually have to continue without it’s founder and will need someone with vision– not necessarily an MBA.
The stagnation of H-P is the example of a company adrift after it’s founding generation moved on. Once one of the most innovative technology companies in the world– it now makes most of it’s money selling ink.
NASA is another example. In the 1960’s with the goal of reaching the moon, NASA had a clear vision and focus. Afterward, without a clear roadmap and vision, the agency became another large government bureaucracy.
(I wasn’t going to ever post here anymore b/c of the zealotry… I digress)
Right on dude. You’re so right I’d give you an A++ if I was a school teacher. (And if I was a computer science teacher, you’d have just had your mark incremented.)
We see it time and time again. I’d hate to think how many companies have gone backwards since losing either a great (if not meglomaniacal) leader or have no vision or goal for the future.
It appears accounting driven management aren’t taught the vision thing in school. Its amazing to see how well the first few years can go, but after 5-10 years with no vision, the company sets itself up for a take over by a young upstart, or another stodgy old company looking to either eliminate the competition or rejuvenate their own failing business!
Apple’s been going from strength to strength since Steve Jobs returned and are creating and/or using some of the most innovative ideas in computing (just look at how Quartz and Core Image works for example). Solid computer science and engineering, coupled with Steve’s usual flair and taste for brilliant industrial design have all been key here. I think they’ve even made the boring world of I.T. relatively exciting again (from a nerd’s point of view…. I mean, the easiest to use desktop front end sitting on top the most geeky OS known to man? Who’d have thought!)
Huh, magic word is “force”.
That is an easy question, one word: Dead. w/o Jobs and his visionary ability I don’t think apple would be where it is today and I don’t see how it could survive w/o him. Long live Steve.
I went to work for Apple after Jobs had been ousted and while Sculley was still at the helm. Sculley’s only failing was his drive for quarterly profits. Unfortunately, that failing almost killed Apple and drove it into its minority marketshare. Had Apple been more competitive on pricing, gone for volume rather than high margin, i think the clearly superior Mac OS would have carried the day. That failure lead to the rise and dominance of M$.
Other than that, Sculley was a very capable CEO, and a surprisingly good visionary. And i am absolutely convinced that if Jobs hadn’t been ousted from Apple in the mid-1980’s, Apple would not have survived.
So when Jobs returned to Apple, i feared he was going to finish the job and kill Apple for sure this time. But Steve has matured quite a bit since his ouster, and his performance has been nothing less than amazing. Normally i am not one to believe in alien abductions, but a strong argument can be made that the old Steve and the new Steve are so totally different, it is hard to believe they are one and the same person. (I am now reconsidering my position on alien abductions.)
So the man who almost killed Apple in the 1980’s is now the man who has resurrected it and will propel Apple to great heights at he dawn of the 21st century. If Jobs were to keel over dead tomorrow, Apple would be severely wounded. But there are others who could lead the company as successfully as Jobs has done. Finding them, however, could prove difficult.
So i wish Steve good health, and much success and happiness at Apple.