“In case you haven’t heard, Steve Jobs passed away last week,” Gene Marks writes for Forbes. “The praise has been pouring in. And deservedly so. He was a genius. A man that made a tremendous impact on the world. During the week, I probably read thirty or forty blogs and columns about his life and accomplishments.”
“But I wasn’t learning much about Steve Jobs the person. The boss,” Marks writes. “That is until I read this great piece from Ryan Tate. And I really began to learn something about Steve Jobs. Jobs wasn’t successful just because he was creative, brilliant and hardworking. There are a lot of creative, brilliant and hardworking people running technology businesses. Jobs had an extra little something going on that further separated him from his peers: He was a jerk. Good for him.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Good for Jobs – and for the rest of us.
I want to be jerk just like Steve Jobs
Jesus, MDN, this is like the fifth story that I’ve emailed you without getting any credit or acknowledgment. You guys suck Alec Baldwin’s schwetty balls.
John, I’ve had the same problem. Mostly gave up.
Yeah, I remember the good old days when MDN used to be good… Now I think it’s gotten a little too big for it’s britches. Which is surprising, because it’s nothing more than a news aggregator… and not a very good one because they’re usually about 2 or 3 days behind other sites (even though they have their RSS feeds on every page lol!) The takes aren’t even that clever or insightful anymore. MDN: Phoning it in.
There is a simple solution John.
Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out.
If all that were true, why have you spent so much of your limited time here on earth following, documenting, analyzing this “decline?” Don’t you have anything better to do? Why even pay attention- which I’m pretty sure you aren’t.
Way to aim high!
Anything else going on in your adventure filled lives, other than sitting around like baby birds waiting for mdn to drop a little “heads-up worm” into your mouths?
Whoa there Bunsen Burner – seems a little hypocritical to criticize someone for criticizing someone…
I suggest you get back to your “adventure filled” life and mind your own business, Honeypants.
Google “Bunsen Honeydew”. It’s a fake name (unless muppets are posting here now) 😉
I can’t tell whether you’re being sarcastic or not… Either way, thanks for the pointless comment, Captain Obvious.
Hey boss,
It appears you have posted 6 times here today on this article and are being a tad defensive. Maybe step outside and get some air. If you need approval from a website you rail against, maybe need a different hobby.
I suppose you’re oblivious to the irony of what you called me within the context of this article’s title.
However, Jobs in his second term at Apple was not anything close to be jerk. The media loves to run these ancient scary stories from early Apple or Next years, but there was improvement in Job’s manners.
He obviously was never that “disrespectful” to the leading Apple’s 50-100 people with whom he communicated in the last fourteen years, since these people stayed to work with him.
So before believing anything that a classless tabloid Gawker (the owner of Gizmodo) says, we have to filter it.
(Forbes usually is not that yellow and malicious, but they are fed with the same usual media cliché as anyone else.)
How do you know?
What all these dumbass hit-whores are forgetting is that Bill Gates was every bit a “jerk” that Steve Jobs was, if not more. Of course, Bill was also a thief and a liar. And yet all of that is conveniently forgotten because Microsoft is “open” [cough] and Gate’s communist wife is making him give all his money away.
I’ve got nothing to say about Gates giving money away, that is his choice and more power to him on that one.
I do agree that he was very much a jerk too.
I’ve heard stories from long time MS people. He could be known for the same things as Jobs when it came to products or ideas he did not like. Swearing, calling people idiots or stupid.
Age can tend to mellow a person also.
Really we are all flawed as human beings and those flaws are a big part of what make us unique individuals.
Trust me, it’s not his choice. His wife is making him do it. There are many anecdotal accounts floating around the internet that she wears the pants and dictates all the terms in that relationship.
She must be a hard driving gal… I mean she was the project manager for MS Bob… and went on to marry Bill after putting out the biggest product failure in the company’s history. lol.
Bigger than Windows ME?
I doubt it. Just on the pain factor alone ME has Bob beat hands down.
Time will soften the memory, after all no one was a bigger jerk than Edison, but you don’t hear much about that.
Jerkiness is a necessary, but not sufficient trait. There are way more jerks than the world needs.
A common trait in geniuses perhaps—at least in the way the rest of the world perceives them; but not a necessary trait I don’t think. Gandhi, for example, was in a different game; but he was no less a genius and he wasn’t a jerk. I think jerkiness, as applied to men like Steve Jobs, is just a dull mind haplessly striking out at something too far above their own level to ever be comprehended. The masses have always behaved in this fashion toward the inscrutable—either erecting idols or tearing them down. Just because Steve Jobs received lots of appreciation and made lots of money during his lifetime does not mean that the world at large understood him in the slightest. How could they? How can anyone really understand another unless they’ve stood in the other’s shoes? It’s impossible. All we can do is cough up our own preconceived notions about what kind of man a guy like Steve Jobs must have been. Everyone, with the exception of those who were closest to Steve, is just pouring from the empty into the Void.
iSorry, But Steve Jobs Was a Dick
http://www.pointsincase.com/columns/andrei-trostel/steve-jobs-was-dick
I’m a jerk, too. Good for me, and MY customers!
…wow, and I thought only doormats can become great!
Very disrespectful. The man just died.
This is not speaking ill of the dead. Being a jerk is sometimes even endearing as we see with characters like Archie Bunker and Feank and Mary Barone.
This was not meant to be disrespectful, just to describe Steve in another dimension. He was not a saint, or an angel. He was not universally liked. But he was very much respected.
Why? He was a jerk and many people that worked for him, or with him, would use much hasher language than that.
It wasn’t only with people that he worked with but he was his family. How can I say that? He spent a lot of time during his last year working on his biography and when asked why he was so open in his interviews for the book, he replied it was so that his kids could know him. He obviously spent very little time with his family which means that he had his priorities backwards. Sure that’s good for us but in the process of providing such wonderful devices for us he shortchanged his family.
The man was one of the greatest businessmen of all time but that doesn’t change the fact that he wasn’t a good man. There are other facts that prove this like the fact that Apple was charitable before Jobs return but that ended when he return and was never re-instated.
I don’t expect that the fanboys here that worship him will accept these truths but that doesn’t change the truth.
Je wasn’t a “good man”? According to who’s definition? Yours? Moron!
Easy there, fanboy.
I’m as big a fanboy as you can get but I’ll admit it, Jobs was probably not a good man but he was a great man. I don’t think he was evil of course, he just wasn’t a good, pious, soft hearted kind of guy. I don’t think we would have wanted him to be any of those things either. We wanted him to change the world and he did. Jobs was irreverent, he did his own thing. That doesn’t leave much room for any of the qualities we usually associate with goodness, piousness, meekness, charity, he wasn’t good, he was great.
The qualities you associate with “goodness” are Christian virtues, which (needless to say) represent just one of many ways of defining the quality of “goodness”. It is obviously a mistake to equate the absence of our own favorite virtues with the absence of “goodness” in another. Whatever else he was, Steve Jobs was a phenomenon. Isn’t that enough?
I think it was meant to say to all of the people who are coming out of the woodwork to try and pile crap onto Steve’s legacy, so what, big deal.
Good for him. Good for all of us.
Well, yes, he was after all a mere mortal, with human faults, we should remember that. And we should also remember that Gizmodo isn’t exactly the most neutral observer nor have the the purest of motivations.
Oops, Gawker (not Gizmodo), me jerk too.
Just another envious loser’s exhalation polluting the blogosphere.
Reminds me of the line from “Flight of the Phoenix.” “You behave as if stupidity were a virtue.”
Anybody who swears in court that he is that he is infertile so he can legally ignore his daughter IS a jerk.
This article is a waste of 4 minutes of your life. It is typical “I have nothing relevant or important to say, so I’ll just try to be controversial” web punditry. The author implies that were he a jerk, he’s be a multibillionaire, hence all truly successful people are jerks. In other words, he’s making an excuse for his own blatant mediocrity and tacking it on to a Steve Jobs hit magnet.
+1
The hit piece by Ryan Tate is just that, a collection of distortions, half-truths, and legends. Then it’s repeated by somebody like Marks, who can then plead ignorance when called on it (“I only know what I read in the papers.”) Zero integrity from both “journalists”.
Yes!
Couldn’t have said it better.
+10 to each of you.
exactly.
as i tell all those assholes who insult Steve’s significance:
1. do it better, then talk.
2. do it better, then talk.
3. do it better…
everyone has a big mouth. yet those haters say so much crap, because they are
1. jealous
2. suffer from mediocrity complex
3. use significant moments in life such as death, to promote their stupid philosophies in hope of a 15 min fame moment – the only one they’ll ever get, though ironically, it’ll make them even more stupid in the eye of the public to the point that they might as well commit suicide, as no one cares for their brains or hear
4. suffer from Stockholm Syndrome
5. silly: were they so smart, and they surely seem to know more than Apple or Steve, why is it that they are poor in every sense?!
6. get a life!
7. if iSteve is a jerk for you, go jerk off! relax. the rest of us might be brainwashed by Steve’s marketing as you say, but the dozen of you, who are smarter than the billion of us, are never as happy as we are…
there’s so much disrespect out there it’s so shameful to feel human! on Steve’s death, so many naysayers are opening their hateful, disgraceful mouths with insulting Steve into oblivion & insignificance.
they can list 1000s of inventors that were more significant. so what. they never used Macs but judge.
plus who cares who invents things 1st?!
Apple/Jobs never claims they did, just that they do it better, easier, more efficiently, simpler.
plus it’s how you invent, how you implement inventions, how you simplify them enough to be a joy to use, for the masses, not few. that’s invention! it’s practical. why bother inventing otherwise?! Apple doesn’t necessarily invent, they interpret & implement better than anyone.
as for Steve’s philanthropy myth busting: Steve gave more than any human ever – are all his innovations that brings smiles to the world not the biggest human accomplishment ever? happiness is rare. appreciate it! plus Steve was the real philanthropist, besides the Red initiative, as the did it quietly, transparently, without fake bloat like Gates Foundation: me, me, me awards!?!
Hitwhore journalism should be annihilated. it’s so irresponsible. but then again, we live in a supposed freedom of speech democracy. still, i’m not for political correct lies, but speaking so much crap & showing so little respect, esp. when you probably use an instrument made or influenced by iSteve to spit your words, that is despicable, arrogant, hateful, and bad karma will get you – in this life, not the next: if you still think you’ll make it to the NeXT iLife, beware the tyranny of iSteve – haha – eat your own words (shit)!
Almost all of my bosses were jerks, too. Trouble was, not a one was creative, brilliant or hardworking. Which is why it is easy to celebrate the life of Steve Jobs: an imperfect person driven to create perfect devices.
The idea that great men/women should be without flaws in order to earn our admiration is absurd. History is replete with flawed… but great people. From Kennedy to Ford to Jefferson to Patton to Edison…. you get the picture.
I am not sure that even Mother Teresa would make the cut with some of these commenters.
təˈmātō, təˈmätō
I knew he was an elitist a-hole prick, doesn’t mean I wasn’t sad that he died though… Nothing new here… Move along…
This is nothing but bastardization of the English language.
A jerk is in the eyes of the beholder.
Just because anyone got shit dished to them by Jobs whose standards of excellence were the bottom line and because he had zero tolerance for mediocrity, doesn’t make him a jerk – jerk .
I just got sidetracked by the idiotic ‘economic policies’ in the comment’s section. Americans want to do the exact same job as the Chinese but at 5 times the pay? What for? What lunatic company would hire them?
That is very American – the article, what it describes and some of the responses to it. It certainly is not European and/or that which the article describes would be considered wholly unacceptable in Europe.
May be that is what is required to be the sole surviving superpower? Perhaps the lack of manners and enforced familiarity across various levels of seniority is what enables people to achieve beyond their particular station – and to form sole start-up businesses or enterprises.
I could never imagine the Head of State of France, Germany or even the UK eating in a McDonalds. I would find it horrific. But then I suppose neither do we have the dynamic companies that exist in the United States – or its power.
Yeah, notions of seniority, class and aristocracy don’t play as well in America as they do in Europe.
We try and treat even those of extreme wealth and position with the same decorum as your everyday Joe. That might appear as a lack of civility, but it’s really the highest form of respect. To treat someone differently than others is something that Europeans have cherished for a long time.
But since you’re so eager to make comparisons – Tabloids are a European invention, Macs are from the US. So this crap Gawker article should be more suited to your sensibilities.
With the exception of a few German engineers, the best people in Europe… left.
Maybe Steve Jobs used the lack of not a so perfect personal life and put ot on is products. Maybe he just wasn’t cut out to be a perfect husband/dad. Either way i think he’s family misses him a lot and dearly.
I never worked for Steve Jobs, but it is obvious that he was an extremely complex and intelligent man. I suspect he was very polite to some and not so much for others. Jonathan Ive, Atkinson, Alan Kay, and the other geniuses at Apple were likely treated with courtesy. It is interesting that Steve could get so much work out of people. I choose to think he challenged most of his employees, and did not berate the good ones. Hard driven single minded leaders are often perceived as “jerks.” They, in turn, perceive some employees as “lazy, do nothing people.” I also think working at Apple is a lot like working for an NFL football team. You produce or you are out.
I think it is well known Steve was not one to suffer for fools; and, if you were one of those fools, he made you feel his point.
It seems that the author didn’t do his proper research or maybe he has an axe to grind, but there are many inaccuracies in the article… Apple has no factories, for one. Very much like a troll wrote it… Cynical comments leading into outright lies. My take, some jerk trying to get attention from SJ passing…
Being a jerk is not a flaw when you use it to achieve great things. It is a common denominator of great people who get things done. People who think you get things done by being nice have usually never achieved anything.
He must have had anchor arms:
This just in: Steve Jobs was not perfect. He did not embody every person’s ideal of humanity.
The last couple of paragraphs of the article are laughable. Oh no, at some point he didn’t want to have a family!!!!! That is called a personal choice about which I have no opinion.
I stop respecting the original article when I read this
“built literally on the backs of Chinese workers, many of them children ”
really? can he support that? I remember Apple’s auditiors found 10 out of 127 factories it uses had underaged workers . The minimum age allowed is 16.
Where I live in North America you can work legally at 15 and don’t ask the farmers (or the small business owners) what they require their kids to do (some are driving machinery on the farm at 12) … !
Great article and great MDN Take.
Child labour and bad Chinese working conditions suck. They suck alot.
They are not strictly Apple’s fault. However it is a shame that Apple partook.
Great candid article.