“It has been a year of tumult—from volatile markets to viral outbreaks to a striking return to Cold War politics,” Fortune writes. “But throughout all this disruption, our top candidates for Fortune’s annual CEO award kept a steady hand on the tiller—and took their companies full speed ahead.”
1. Larry Page: What do you do after you’ve built the Internet’s most profitable franchise? If you’re Larry Page, you aim far higher. Revolutionize transportation? Check. Upend medicine? Check. Nearly four years into his tenure, Page has shown himself to be the world’s most daring CEO. His fabled ‘moonshots’ now launch with regularity. Any one of them could change the lives of billions and help Google to remain at the top of the technology heap for generations. Improbably, Page has built his factory of the future while keeping Google’s multi-billion dollar business humming and positioning the company for a dominant role in the era of wearables and Internet-connected cars and homes. In a world where only the paranoid survive, Page has redefined paranoia into unbounded ambition. — Miguel Helft
MacDailyNews Take: Before being credited with “revolutionizing transportation” and “upending medicine,” don’t you, you know, have to actually do them? What kind of alternate reality is this? You sucking down ‘shrooms again, Fortune?
Fortune mistakes fanciful promises for actual accomplishments.
Congrats for taking “moonshots,” Larry, even if you’ve never come close to hitting and likely will never hit the moon. You’re #1 in our book of delusion!
What a fscking joke.
#2. Tim Cook: Replacing a legend is an exercise filled with peril. Yet three years into his stewardship of Steve Jobs’ company, it is becoming increasingly clear that Tim Cook knows what he’s doing as CEO of Apple. The company’s stock is at an all-time high. Booming sales of larger iPhones and renewed enthusiasm for Mac computers are making up for slowing growth in iPads. The coming Apple Watch and the already released Apple Pay service show that Apple remains an innovator—even under a CEO known more for operational prowess than product savvy. Cook has replenished the management ranks at the top of Apple with relatively little rancor. The company remains secretive but has a whiff of openness. And with the purchase of the Beats headphone and streaming-music offering, Apple is reversing Jobs’ abhorrence for high-priced M&A deals. The low-profile Cook even stole the spotlight by matter-of-factly becoming the first openly gay CEO in the Fortune 500. The light still shines brightly in Apple’s executive suite, even without the legendary impresario who switched it on in the first place. — Adam Lashinsky
Full list, for what’s it’s worth, here.
MacDailyNews Take: This list goes into the Fuckwits Hall of Fame.
Apple in fiscal 2014 generated $39.5 billion in profit. Google’s last four quarters (Q413-Q314) totaled $13.06 in profit. If 1/3rd of Apple’s profits came from Apple Online Store, iTunes Store (Music, Movies, TV Shows, Books, AudioBooks), App Store, Mac App Store, iTunes Match, iCloud storage, etc. — not a far-fethced possibility — then Google is not “the Internet’s most profitable franchise, ” as Fortune claims. Tim Cook’s Apple is.
Regardless, Fortune needs to revise their “methodology” unless they like producing lists that make them look batshit insane.
Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!
I bet the people at Google don’t even buy this load of rotted halibut.
Ever think why the politicians can get by with lie(s)? Yup, lacking “comprehensive” knowledge by the collective media.
Apple is the go to to diss company.
Who needs facts when we have agendas?
“Fortune mistakes fanciful promises for actual accomplishments.”
Just like the low-information voters in the 2008 and 2012 U.S. presidential elections.
For reading feel-good bromides that create the illusion of problem solving off of a teleprompter, let’s give him a Nobel Peace Prize, too!
This is the era of insanity in the U.S.A. I pray that it’s finally coming to an ignominious end.
Broken Record
Broken Record
Broken Record
At least we can agree that this is indeed an era of insanity in the USA. But what you offer is just more of the same, obviously. You like the red Kool-Aid. They like the blue Kool-Aid. I’m sick of both your Kool-Aids. I’m into cooking up chicken soup with no artificial anything.
“In a world where only the paranoid survive…” oooh there goes that monoculture desire again. Didn’t it used to be “In a world where only the blonde blue eyed pure Ayrian perfect race will survive.””?
Oh well, I’m glad to see Tim Cook in the top 10. I suspect that Fortune came to MDN as part of their research and saw the comments Jay Morrison made here and that’s why Tim did not make the number 1 spot.
To really put some perspective value on these lists, Forbes (and others) list of “The World’s Most Ethical Companies 2014” doesn’t include Apple on it but does include Microsoft.
How about a list of items that would not make a top 10 list, like a top 10 list of analysts with integrity. I just might try that at the next party.
What happened to Jay Morrison and other anti-TC ilk here? Since the iPhone 6 they seemed to have crawled into a cave. No comments. Even the general Apple bashing news guys are recognizing TC’s worth to Apple and the world!
He is not Steve, and he isn’t supposed to be.
I speculated something about Jay Morrison in my post but I think he may have gone the way of Zune Thang. That’s what usually happens to one topic wonders.
Larry Page – dabbling jack of all trades , master of none. Emperor Of The Year, sans clothes 2014.
I do so hope Apple Search becomes a reality at the 2015 WWDC. Be nice to yank the flimsy rug out from under Google.
FORBES? WTF? 😕
“What a fscking joke.”
Transportation? Medicine? Really ????? What kind of alternate universe does Miguel lives in? Doesn’t he know Google’s wearable is a huge failure? And no one uses Goigle Wallet before Apple Pay?
Epic fail, Fortune. Google is a one-trick pony: online advertising. Big deal. They figured out a way to steer web clicks to certain sites for pay. This is not what I would characterize as “making a ripple in the universe”, as Apple has done and continues to do. Moreover, I don’t even consider click-ads as being high-tech, except to the extent it is made possible by the high-tech world we live in. It is unlikely that Google will endure the harsh criticism of history.
The one thing that this does explain perfectly well is WHY Google keeps pushing these fanciful ideas. Its not that most will ever see the light of day anytime, certainly in the foreseeable future if ever, its that there are people out there who buy into the excitement of it, despite all the evidence and as such give the company a cachet that is a total illusion, or should I say delusion. And thats the point, the only way that Google can look remotely exciting is by promising things it can never truly deliver to hide the mediocrity of those that it can’t. Dreams over reality and that sadly is increasingly the norm in the West, an almost Disney view of things as it struggles to hang onto its own sense of superiority in an increasingly dangerous and competitive World.
That MDN take is music to my ears.
As usual.
Concept: Tim Cook makes it to the top of the list by announcing that Apple is working on:
1) A flying car.
2) A never dying battery.
3) A human transporter device with a sending radius of 500 light years.
4) Safe fusion power generation.
There’s no need to actually DO these things. They’re simply useful as HYPE to make all the coke addict, thrill seeking analcysts HapHapHapHap HAPPY! 😀 🐂💩 😀