Apple co-founder Woz delivers Silicon Valley Comic Con

“Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak had a front row seat as the personal computer began to reshape society. So it made perfect sense to him to bring a convention meshing technology with pop culture to Silicon Valley,” Michael Liedtke reports for The Associates Press. “The convergence will occur March 18-20 in San Jose, California, with the debut of Silicon Valley Comic Con. It’s a new twist on an idea that has brought together fans of science fiction, fantasy and superheroes at packed shows held around the world for years. ‘I don’t like doing the same thing as everyone else,’ Wozniak told The Associated Press Wednesday. So he teamed with four other partners to try something slightly different.”

“A sold-out crowd of about 30,000 engineers, entrepreneurs and pop-culture connoisseurs is expected to swarm into the Silicon Valley event,” Liedtke reports. “The agenda includes a panel devoted to the quantum realm and an ‘app alley’ featuring products from technology startups. The marquee attractions on the entertainment side include William Shatner from the original Star Trek and Back To The Future stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd and Lea Thompson.”

“Wozniak, 65, is confident the hybrid convention will be a hit. ‘The emotions we have for technology now are the same as we get for movies, celebrities and the whole pop culture side of our lives,’ he said. That veneration of technology helped turn Wozniak’s late partner, Steve Jobs, into an icon — and his October 2011 death into a worldwide wake,” Liedtke reports. “Silicon Valley Comic Con is the first major event that Wozniak has backed since the early 1980s. While on leave from Apple following an airplane crash, he financed the US Festivals, a pair of three-day concerts held in the southern California desert… Jobs frowned upon Wozniak’s involvement in the US Festivals and probably wouldn’t have thought much of Silicon Valley Comic Con, according to Wozniak.”

Liedtke reports, “Although Apple hasn’t introduced another hit product since Jobs’ death, Wozniak doesn’t believe the company has lost the ‘innovation magic’ that hatched the iPod, iPhone and iPad during the final decade of its late CEO’s tenure.”

MacDailyNews Take: Lie.

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“‘Apple is in great shape to innovate for the next 200 years, just with their cash (totaling $216 billion),’ he said. ‘That buys a lot of failure. One of the things about innovation is you have to risk failure,'” Liedtke reports. “Wozniak is hoping Silicon Valley Comic Con inspires some of the engineers and other entrepreneurs in attendance to gamble on ideas that may seem a little kooky.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Sounds like it’ll be a very fun event!