Steve Jobs RIP

Overrated is subjective, but you just listed many reasons why he was so great. I'll list more.1) He started Apple to begin with. I worked in the magazine publishing world in the late 80s/very early 90s, and Macs were it brother. Seeing those compared to what was being run on PCs then...just no contest.2) Apple goes to hell when he was away from it, and then he comes back and turns it into a behemoth once again.Dude was a visionary, but I think that label doesn't do enough...he was a genius, a brilliant maker and marketer of products that people want and need. More important to his company (LARGE companies) than any single person in over 100 years.Comparisons to Edison and Henry Ford and whomever else you want to throw in there are valid.

ryan foreman wrote:

I think people are overrating him. That said, it seems he was a real, true CEO. Someone who had vision and tirelessly stuck to that vision, while energizing and inspiring those who worked for him.

I recall an article about Jobs just after the I-Pod had become a booming success. It was about what he did different than other CEOs. It mentioned that with an idea like an IPod a typical company would take it to the engineers and they would give 30 reasons why its not feasible and shouldn't be pursued. Most CEOs would concede to that. Jobs initially was getting the same feedback, but he said, 'no, we are going to do this, make it work'. He totally changed the engineers thinking and they were inspired to make it work. And they did.

Lorenzo the Magnificent wrote:

Deceased

Upon reading an article last night on Steve I was reminded that he basically built Pixar into the company it is today. 'Toy Story' really started the whole computer animated, cartoon full length film industry. He made billions off of Pixar.

In the wake of Steve Jobs’ death, stories of how great a man he was is the current headline across the nation. His accomplishments speak to his genius as one of the world’s leading innovators of the IPhone and IPad. This guy even painted himself as a spiritual person. But even in the midst of his own genius, Steve Jobs had a dark soul. As owner of Apple, he was directly responsible for the production of the IPhone and IPad at factories in China where there had been a countless number of suicides among discontented workers during the months of March and April of this year. At several Foxxconn plants where Apple products are made, there have been horrendous policies in place such as workers being forced to work between 80 and 100 hours of overtime, workers being forced to stand on their feet for 14 hours a day, and workers being forced to sign No-Suicide Pacts as a condition of employment. According to the pact, the families of employees have to promise not to sue the company, cause any trouble that would interrupt operations in case an employee commits suicide, or bring any negative attention to the practices of the company. In addition, employees are literally crammed into company-owned dormitories. Employees living in a single dormitory room range from six to twenty-two. “Some of my roommates weep in the dormitory. I want to cry as well but my tears have not come out,” one worker told SACOM, a Hong Kong-based advocacy group, which contends that many of the practices that led to more than a dozen workers committing suicide in the months of March and April of this year continues to be perpetuated at Foxxconn factories.

How do you like them Apples?

common wrote:

Jobs actually lost his...er...job in a boardroom coup, which was facilitated in part by failed products pushed by Jobs himself. His next company...oh, the puns...NeXt was also a failure for the most part, although it did form the genesis of the OS X operating system, which was obviously successful.

Point is, not everything he touched turned to gold, but he was a good CEO and a market visionary.

NeXT was bought by Apple for $377 million dollars. I'd like to have a few failures like that. Jobs was ousted from Apple initially because they wanted to make a computer that you've never heard of and he wanted to make Macintosh.

If you have one truly original and great idea in your life that gave you the power to be influential in the world then you'd be pretty special. Jobs had no less than five revolutionary ideas (Macintosh, Pixar, iPod, iPhone, iPad).

fu jobs wrote:

As owner of Apple, he was directly responsible for the production of the IPhone and IPad at factories in China where there had been a countless number of suicides among discontented workers during the months of March and April of this year.

Where do I begin...

First, FoxConn produces products for just about every major tech company, including Acer, Amazon, Asus, Intel, Cisco, HP, Dell, Nintendo, Microsoft, Motorola, Sony, and Vizio - not just Apple.

Second, the "countless" suicides you are referring to are 14, and it was in 2010. The Foxconn facilities house many thousands of workers continuously. While tragic, the 14 suicides works out to a per capita suicide rate that is less than China as a whole. Looking at it in this context, this would tell you that a Chinese Foxconn worker is less likely to commit suicide than the average Chinese citizen.

Thanks you Steve.

Inshallah, may you rest in peace.

- from a fellow Arab-American.

Why didn't he acknowledge his dad or daughter?

jonentwine wrote:

Why didn't he acknowledge his dad or daughter?

They had an estranged relationship.

common wrote:

Point is, not everything he touched turned to gold, but he was a good CEO and a market visionary.

No one is always successful and never makes mistakes. But Steve learned from his mistakes, came back and steered Apple to be the most valuable company on the planet.

Flagpole,

I think Michael Jordan was an overrated basketball player. And at the same time I concede that Jordan was one of the top 10 American athletes of all time. Anybody except god himself can be overrated. That is where I'm coming from with Steve Jobs. He was a great CEO. But the hyperbole around him is out of control. Other people have the potential to do what Steve Jobs has done. Some younger people may even do it better because they can better envision the future.

And people need to consider what he didn't do. He didn't get too much into the details of operations. In fact a big reason Apple made a turnaround when Jobs came back is that they committed themselves to using cheap labor overseas. Before that Apple was still doing a lot of manufacturing in America. The Chief Operating Officer who I think has taken over from Jobs was a huge factor in bringing down expenses and creating huge profits.

But the main point I wanted to hit home was that Jobs defined how I think a CEO should generally be. I think a lot of CEOs come into established companies that already have cash flow. They have a rolodex of powerful contacts, they are very good organizers and know the ins and outs of office politics but they are really not visionaries or entrepenuers. At worst they are people like Wall Street executives who are in some Ancient Rome fantasy camp where they are vying for power against other executives and forgetting any real value they are providing to the public.

categorically wrote:

NeXT was bought by Apple for $377 million dollars. I'd like to have a few failures like that. Jobs was ousted from Apple initially because they wanted to make a computer that you've never heard of and he wanted to make Macintosh.

If you have one truly original and great idea in your life that gave you the power to be influential in the world then you'd be pretty special. Jobs had no less than five revolutionary ideas (Macintosh, Pixar, iPod, iPhone, iPad).

Palm was recently bought by HP for $1.2 billion. It would be hard to argue that Palm was not a failure as a company, even though it sold for a whole lot of money. NeXt was similar in that the hardware business side of the company was a failure, but the viable intellectual property was worth...about $377 million dollars, according to Apple. Not trying to pick a fight, just explaining myself.

I was talking with my wife last night about what our world would look like if Steve Jobs had lived to be 76 or 86 instead of 56. He didn't just make music players and couch surfing devices. He was in touch with the future in a unique way. Sad.

I'd have to see exactly the comments that you think are overrated. If someone calls him a deity, then I agree, that's overrated.I disagree with the tone though that "other people" have the potential to do what he did. First of all, potential is one thing...he DID it. Also, he was a trailblazer, and what he did inspired others (including outside his company) to greater heights. I just can't minimize his contributions the way you are. He was not ONE of the best...he WAS the best.There had BETTER be younger people coming up who can do it as well or better than Jobs, because our society has been furthered by Jobs and others, and we need more visionaries to keep it all going. Go back to when Jobs was working out of his garage though and up through today...nope...no one better. Not Meg Whitman, not the ridiculous Mark Zuckerberg, not even Bill Gates (though he's on the Mount Rushmore with Jobs in the last 30 years). And it's not hyperbole to say that about Jobs.

Seriously?

'Comparisons to Edison '

Did Jobs actually invent stuff like the iphone or whatever?

No, he pretty much stole stuff from Unix, then the whole Ipad thing was just totally ripped off of IRiver. Winamp, etc. etc. He sucked.

ukathleticscoach wrote:

'Comparisons to Edison '

Did Jobs actually invent stuff like the iphone or whatever?

didn't anyone else notice he was dying from cancer or am i the only one who expected him to die?

see your Fugi and raise a Gala wrote:

It's Fuji, not Fugi.

What an icon.

How many Apple products do you own? I have 4