[Danny ~~_/) ~~_/) ~~_/) ~~]

I believe in Steve Jobs, the Father of Apple, the Creator of Apple
and Mac, and in Mac OS, His only Son, our Operating System:
Who was conceived of Holy Digits, born of the Jobs, suffered under
Bill Gates, was crucified but never died or buried.
He descended into hell.
The third day He arose again with iPod.
He ascended into heaven and his mouse sits at the right hand of
Artists Almighty, whence He shall come to judge the Nerds and the PSP
Users.
I believe in the Binary System, Firewire, the networking of
computers, the forgiveness of PeeCees, the resurrection of Classic
Rock, and life everlasting.
Amen.

[Mr Soul]

I am saddened by Steve Job's death, not because he is a some great
visionary, but because he was so young and leaves his family with a
big void. Jobs was my age - 56.

I don't own any Apple products (never have). I think they are rather
over-priced & I don't like the Apple OS. Jobs was an incredible
entrepreneur but he had issues. His company Next was pretty much a
failure. From all I've read abot him, he was pretty hard to work with.
And since he left Apple (the 1st time), he's pretty much done only
consumer/entertainment type things - movies & MP3 players. In essence,
he has just invented new "sugar water" which is how he lured John
Sculley when he hired to run Apple back in the 80's.

Jobs was there when the Apple IIe, a revolutionary product, came out
but I wonder is if was Wozniak who was more responsible for this, not
Jobs.

I've also wondered if he "borrowed" Apple's logo & company name from
the Beatles, all things which make me wonder how innovative he really
was.

Here's what Wikipedia had to say about him: "While Jobs was a
persuasive and charismatic director for Apple, some of his employees
from that time had described him as an erratic and temperamental
manager."

Mike C

[Frank Stearns]

Mr Soul writes:

entrepreneur but he had issues. His company Next was pretty much a

NeXT was way ahead of its time, and in some respects ahead of the technology
available.

In the early 1990s NeXT loaned me (and other developers) NeXT cubes to evaluate and
play with for a few weeks -- they wanted our apps in their stable.

I was skeptical at first, but completely blown away in that the thing worked out of
the box. No hiccups, no gotchas, no BS.

It was real UNIX, but with an intelligent, functional GUI on top, called NeXTStep.
Sun had Sunview, but a lot of system configuration on a Sun box was still done in
many, many content-dense text files. Fine if you were used to it, but configuring
traditional UNIX took serious expertise. (Sunview did have some config dialogs, but
they were often cumbersome -- just as easy to tinker in the text files.)

NeXTStep changed that, for the radically better. Suddenly all the UNIX configuration
items were well organized and well presented, and made perfect sense. But, under the
hood, they were still those good old text files -- you could step around the config
GUI if you knew what you were doing; or use the GUI for reasonable guidance and
help. (BTW, we're talking real UNIX here, not linux; linux didn't exist then. Can't
remember which UNIX flavor NeXT was using; might have been their own, come to think
of it.)

Apple OS design got cute as it was a system geared toward consumers, and Windows was
just plain stupid, with a weird mix of "friendly" and cryptic. (I say this mostly a
reluctant Windows shop for the past 15 years.)

There was talk of porting NeXTStep to other UNIX systems, but the company was
already in trouble and that never happened. Makes me weep sometimes to think of this
loss.

But the cube was just too expensive for a small company, and perhaps not powerful
enough for the larger enterprises that could afford them in the first place.
Such places were often already entrenched with DEC and IBM, or the new upstart, Sun.
The cube listed around $22K IIRC; they offered one to me at $16K, but I'd just spent
$11K for a Sun baby Sparc. Tap city for a 1-man show.


failure. From all I've read abot him, he was pretty hard to work with.

That can be a good sign. Making changes to stupid orthodoxy takes some feather
ruffling, even feather plucking. Jobs is vindicated in this respect, IMO.


And since he left Apple (the 1st time), he's pretty much done only
consumer/entertainment type things - movies & MP3 players. In essence,
he has just invented new "sugar water" which is how he lured John
Sculley when he hired to run Apple back in the 80's.

Probably some truth in that, but I think it's perhaps a bit oversimplified when you
consider what it takes to get something to market that is the right feature set at
the right price at the right time, AND simultaneously presents a useful seachange to
the conventional "wisdom" of the day.

Jobs wasn't always successful, but paraphrasing Ted Sturgeon: you generate 90% crap
to get 10% that's worthwhile.


Jobs was there when the Apple IIe, a revolutionary product, came out
but I wonder is if was Wozniak who was more responsible for this, not
Jobs.

Seems there was a synergy between them.

I've also wondered if he "borrowed" Apple's logo & company name from
the Beatles, all things which make me wonder how innovative he really
was.

Possibly. The bigger issue is just how much did he "borrow" from Xerox PARC? OTOH,
we may well have him to thank for seeing what could be done with the cool thing that
the then lumbering Xerox had created. Xerox apparently really had no idea what they
had. Their answer was an $75,000 a copy workstation, completely closed hardware, and
with huge annual maintenance costs -- the old-school model that was doomed to fail.

Here's what Wikipedia had to say about him: "While Jobs was a
persuasive and charismatic director for Apple, some of his employees
from that time had described him as an erratic and temperamental
manager."

And that's sometimes just what you need to shake things up. I did a lot of
consulting for different companies in the 80s and 90s; it was eye-opeing to observe
the various operations. The ones that got things done and even survived were often
the ones with a charismatic character at the top.

As long as that person wasn't just a lunatic and had some workable visions, things
happened, sometimes even good things.

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[Mr Soul]

Yes - I agree that Next and NextStep were ahead of their time (didn't
mean to imply they weren't) but my point was the company as a whole
was a failure. Jobs was definitely a visionary, no question about
that. The Apple IIe was ahead of it's time. But so wasn't the DEC's
64-bit chip that failed, etc., etc.

Mike

[Scott Dorsey]

Mr Soul wrote:
I don't own any Apple products (never have). I think they are rather
over-priced & I don't like the Apple OS. Jobs was an incredible
entrepreneur but he had issues. His company Next was pretty much a
failure. From all I've read abot him, he was pretty hard to work with.
And since he left Apple (the 1st time), he's pretty much done only
consumer/entertainment type things - movies & MP3 players. In essence,
he has just invented new "sugar water" which is how he lured John
Sculley when he hired to run Apple back in the 80's.

Visionaries are hard people to work with. They know what they want, they
don't care what you want, they want what they want. This works out very
well when they are people who know what the market wants, and it works out
poorly when they aren't. Jobs knew what the market wanted.

Jobs was there when the Apple IIe, a revolutionary product, came out
but I wonder is if was Wozniak who was more responsible for this, not
Jobs.

The IIe was not so revolutionary, it was just a cheaper way to put the
old Apple ][ together.

The original Apple I was revolutionary, and turning it into the Apple ][
was revolutionary... and it was something that took both engineering and
knowing the market and what the market wanted, and that's why Jobs and Woz
worked so well together.

Here's what Wikipedia had to say about him: "While Jobs was a
persuasive and charismatic director for Apple, some of his employees
from that time had described him as an erratic and temperamental
manager."

That's how people with visions are. And that's a big deal in the audio
industry where many of us are employed in translating someone's musical
vision to tape.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Mr Soul]

Visionaries are hard people to work with. *They know what they want, they
don't care what you want, they want what they want. *This works out very
well when they are people who know what the market wants, and it works out
poorly when they aren't. *Jobs knew what the market wanted.
Yes - I know. I've worked with a few during my career.

The original Apple I was revolutionary, and turning it into the Apple ][
was revolutionary... and it was something that took both engineering and
knowing the market and what the market wanted, and that's why Jobs and Woz
worked so well together.
Like I said, I've never owned an Apple computer but I know that one of
those earlier ones was "revolutionary". I noticed that Woz seemed to
be very careful what he said about Jobs. Didn't they have a major
falling out?

Having said all this, I still think that Gates & MS have had a bigger
effect on us than Apple did.

Mike C

[Logic]

In article
,
Mr Soul wrote:

Visionaries are hard people to work with. *They know what they want, they
don't care what you want, they want what they want. *This works out very
well when they are people who know what the market wants, and it works out
poorly when they aren't. *Jobs knew what the market wanted.
Yes - I know. I've worked with a few during my career.

The original Apple I was revolutionary, and turning it into the Apple ][
was revolutionary... and it was something that took both engineering and
knowing the market and what the market wanted, and that's why Jobs and Woz
worked so well together.
Like I said, I've never owned an Apple computer but I know that one of
those earlier ones was "revolutionary". I noticed that Woz seemed to
be very careful what he said about Jobs. Didn't they have a major
falling out?

Having said all this, I still think that Gates & MS have had a bigger
effect on us than Apple did.

Mike C

Yeah but Apple's effect was positive.

L

--- Posted via news://freenews.netfront.net/ - Complaints to ---

[Mike Cressey]

Yeah but Apple's effect was positive.
Touche - LOL. Everyone like to rag on MS but we're better off with
them than w/o them.

Mike C

[William Sommerwerck]

"Mr Soul" wrote in message
...
Visionaries are hard people to work with. They know what they want, they
don't care what you want, they want what they want. This works out very
well when they are people who know what the market wants, and it works out
poorly when they aren't. Jobs knew what the market wanted.
Yes - I know. I've worked with a few during my career.

The original Apple I was revolutionary, and turning it into the Apple ][
was revolutionary... and it was something that took both engineering and
knowing the market and what the market wanted, and that's why Jobs and Woz
worked so well together.

Like I said, I've never owned an Apple computer but I know that one of
those earlier ones was "revolutionary". I noticed that Woz seemed to
be very careful what he said about Jobs. Didn't they have a major
falling out?

Having said all this, I still think that Gates & MS have had a bigger
effect on us than Apple did.


The original Apple ][ was a true "personal" computer because it was readily
expandable/customizable. The Macintosh has largely been a closed box, and
closed system. (I'm exaggerating, of course.)

Steve Jobs was a brilliant marketer, and nothing more. (I could say a lot of
unkind things about Bill Gates, too, but he isn't the subject of this
discussion.)

[William Sommerwerck]

Yeah, but Apple's effect was positive.

Yes. Owning a Wintel machine has utterly ruined my life.

Bill Gates did far more for personal computing than Steve Jobs ever did.

[Mike Cressey]

Steve Jobs was a brilliant marketer, and nothing more. (I could say a lot of
unkind things about Bill Gates, too, but he isn't the subject of this
discussion.)
Well I would give him a little more credit than that. He definitely
was excellent at marketing which is why he always unveiled all these
gadgets that Apple produced. But he also lent a BIG hand in designing
as well.

The only reason I brought up Gates is that to reflect upon Job's place
in history, I think you need to view him in relation to his
contemporaries.

Mike C

[William Sommerwerck]

"Mike Cressey" wrote in message
...

Steve Jobs was a brilliant marketer, and nothing more. (I could say
a lot of unkind things about Bill Gates, too, but he isn't the subject
of this discussion.)

Well, I would give him a little more credit than that. He definitely was
excellent at marketing which is why he always unveiled all these
gadgets that Apple produced. But he also lent a BIG hand in designing
as well.

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former being the
vital first step in the marketing process.

[Neil Gould]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Mike Cressey" wrote in message
...

Steve Jobs was a brilliant marketer, and nothing more. (I could say
a lot of unkind things about Bill Gates, too, but he isn't the
subject of this discussion.)

Well, I would give him a little more credit than that. He definitely
was excellent at marketing which is why he always unveiled all these
gadgets that Apple produced. But he also lent a BIG hand in
designing as well.

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed by the
same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of the requirements
are largely unique to each role.

--
Neil

[William Sommerwerck]

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Mike Cressey" wrote in message

...

Steve Jobs was a brilliant marketer, and nothing more. (I could say
a lot of unkind things about Bill Gates, too, but he isn't the
subject of this discussion.)

Well, I would give him a little more credit than that. He definitely
was excellent at marketing which is why he always unveiled all these
gadgets that Apple produced. But he also lent a BIG hand in
designing as well.

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed by
the
same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of the
requirements
are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

[Neil Gould]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:
I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed
by the same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of
the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product, and
"well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

--
Neil

[William Sommerwerck]

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed
by the same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of
the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product,
and "well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive products.

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...

Visionaries are hard people to work with. They know what they want, they
don't care what you want, they want what they want. This works out very
well when they are people who know what the market wants, and it works out
poorly when they aren't. Jobs knew what the market wanted.

Close. Jobs life is a great example of how having an appropriate and
well-shared vision is *the key* to effective leadership.

I would change your first sentence to read: Visionaries can be hard people
to work with, but they can also be the easiest. It depends on their style.
If they are authoritarian bosses, then it can be hard to live with. If they
are true servant leaders, then it can be blissfully easy. There's nothing
about being servant leader that eliminates the possibility of having a great
vision. In fact, done right it helps.

However, in either case the strength and appropriateness of the vision makes
all the difference. I've worked for enough people with vision and also many
more who lacked vision, or had a self-centered vision, to firmly appreciate
the difference.

You can say what you want about Jobs but the proof is there - his vision was
shareable to the extent that millions wanted to plow their resources into
it. People don't do that for eccentric, self-centered visions that lead
nowhere for long.

Give me a vision to follow or let me find my own, but if its a good one, the
rest is more likely to be easy and fun. Of course if your style is hiding
behind mediocrity, it can all be very threatening.

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:
I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed
by the same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of
the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product, and
"well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

In the end, well-designed stuff and poorly-designed stuff costs the same, or
the well-designed product is even cheaper. You may be confused by the fact
that initially, well-designed stuff can demand a price premium, and get it.

[Les Cargill[_4_]]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not performed
by the same person, and while creativity is in common, the rest of
the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product,
and "well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive products.




At retail or in terms of cost of production? They're quite adept
at capturing the margin between the two.

--
Les Cargill

[William Sommerwerck]

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive products.

At retail or in terms of cost of production? They're quite adept
at capturing the margin between the two.

Retail, of course.

[Neil Gould]

Arny Krueger wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:
I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not
performed by the same person, and while creativity is in common,
the rest of the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product,
and "well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

In the end, well-designed stuff and poorly-designed stuff costs the
same, or the well-designed product is even cheaper. You may be
confused by the fact that initially, well-designed stuff can demand a
price premium, and get it.

I'm not confused by this at all, Arny. My parent's motto was "...poor folks
can't afford cheap stuff...", and taught us to evaluate the quality of
products before putting out the cash. However, that isn't the basis by which
most folks buy things -- hence my above comment -- and I have several
friends that think there is no difference between, as an example, Squire and
American Standard Strats.

--
Neil

[Neil Gould]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Neil Gould" wrote in message
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I see no distinction between designing and marketing, the former
being the vital first step in the marketing process.

In many, if not most situations, those two aspects are not
performed by the same person, and while creativity is in common,
the rest of the requirements are largely unique to each role.

It's much easier to market a "well-designed" product.

Sales volumes suggest that it's easier to market a cheaper product,
and "well-desgined" products are seldom cheaper.

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive products.

Neither have the companies that sell cheaper PCs, mp3 players, eBook
readers, cell phones, etc. In terms of sales volume, there isn't one of
those markets that Apple dominates.

--
Neil

[Trevor]

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive...

....to manufacture

products.....

for more than their competitors. You gotta admire their marketing ability
though.

Trevor.

[Logic]

In article ,
"Trevor" wrote:

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive...

...to manufacture

products.....

for more than their competitors. You gotta admire their marketing ability
though.

Trevor.

I admire the fact they rose to the top for the right reasons--bringing
great advanced tech to the market--rather than via some iteration of
marketing. A rare event.

L.

--- Posted via news://freenews.netfront.net/ - Complaints to ---

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Logic" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Trevor" wrote:

Apple hasn't gotten rich selling inexpensive...

...to manufacture

products.....

for more than their competitors. You gotta admire their marketing ability
though.

Trevor.

I admire the fact they rose to the top for the right reasons--bringing
great advanced tech to the market--rather than via some iteration of
marketing. A rare event.

I would expand on that to say "me-too marketing".

The general marketing approach was at least a century old when they did it,
but the application worked. It was not about the idea, but the execution.

The iPod was hardly innovative in terms of what it did, or even generally
how it did it. The total package including iTunes made the difference. It
was just a matter of selling both the razor and the blades at the right
price and conveniently enough.

If it was so easy, why was Apple the first to do it well enough?

[Trevor]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
news
The iPod was hardly innovative in terms of what it did, or even generally
how it did it. The total package including iTunes made the difference. It
was just a matter of selling both the razor and the blades at the right
price and conveniently enough.

You're concept of "right price" is obviously different than mine. Of course
I admit you are not alone.


If it was so easy, why was Apple the first to do it well enough?

Hardly the first, perhaps the most succesful so far.

Trevor.

[William Sommerwerck]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
news
The general marketing approach was at least a century old when they did
it,
but the application worked. It was not about the idea, but the execution.

The iPod was hardly innovative in terms of what it did, or even generally
how it did it. The total package including iTunes made the difference. It
was just a matter of selling both the razor and the blades at the right
price and conveniently enough.

If it was so easy, why was Apple the first to do it well enough?

It's because Jobs had common sense, while everyong else was stupid.

Keep repeating: "Steve Jobs was not a genius. Steve Jobs was not a genius."
He wasn't.

[Les Cargill[_4_]]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Arny wrote in message
news
The general marketing approach was at least a century old when they did
it,
but the application worked. It was not about the idea, but the execution.

The iPod was hardly innovative in terms of what it did, or even generally
how it did it. The total package including iTunes made the difference. It
was just a matter of selling both the razor and the blades at the right
price and conveniently enough.

If it was so easy, why was Apple the first to do it well enough?

It's because Jobs had common sense, while everyong else was stupid.

Keep repeating: "Steve Jobs was not a genius. Steve Jobs was not a genius."
He wasn't.




In the common usage, he was. We tend to think of successful mavericks as
geniuses. He applied-Bauhaus style "design" to the computer industry.

But Droid is neck and neck with the iPhone. People see the big pile o'
money that Apple has accrued, and forget that from a service perspective
that the revenue model for cellphones is still the *pager*
model - no pager company ever made money.

--
Les Cargill

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Sat, 29 Oct 2011 07:30:23 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

Keep repeating: "Steve Jobs was not a genius. Steve Jobs was not a genius."
He wasn't.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Actually, Walter Isaacson's current best-selling biography reveals that when
Jobs was in 4th grade, they had his IQ tested and said he was at about the
same level as an 11th-grade high school student. So technically, he was an
actual genius.

Jobs was also a very difficult, abrasive, difficult guy, but that didn't make
what he said wrong. He had bad people skills, but he often made brilliant
products, generally designed with great taste.

Very compelling book, too -- confirming and elaborating on many great Jobs
legends from the past 30 years. Many skeletons in the Apple closet.

--MFW

[William Sommerwerck]

"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
.com...
On Sat, 29 Oct 2011 07:30:23 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

Keep repeating: "Steve Jobs was not a genius. Steve Jobs was not
a genius." He wasn't.

Actually, Walter Isaacson's current best-selling biography reveals that
when Jobs was in 4th grade, they had his IQ tested and said he was
at about the same level as an 11th-grade high school student. So,
technically, he was an actual genius.

Jobs was also a difficult, abrasive guy, but that didn't make what he
said wrong. He had bad people skills, but he often made brilliant
products, generally designed with great taste.

Very compelling book, too -- confirming and elaborating on many great
Jobs legends from the past 30 years. Many skeletons in the Apple closet.

The problem with viewing Jobs as a "genius" is the implication that others
cannot do what he did, thus eliminating any responsibility for
understanding -- and even emulating -- his work. Ignoring the talent
required to lead and motivate a company, any number of people in this group
could do what Jobs did.

I watched about a half hour of the "60 Minutes" report, and nothing in it
changed my mind.

[timewarp2008]

On Oct 29, 6:17*pm, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:
The problem with viewing Jobs as a "genius" is the implication
that otherscannot do what he did,

But that's not implied by viewing him as a genius.
Not at all. Perhaps it's your own obsession-driven
inference.

thus eliminating any responsibility for
understanding -- and even emulating -- his work.

What a load of crap.

You're really grasping at straws. So you don't like Jobs.
You've made that clear. But you're really going over the
top with your absurd and clumsy attempts at demonizing
him. You're not really putting Jobs down any more; rather,
you're putting yourself down. And you've succeeded.

Do you really need to discredit yourself more?

[William Sommerwerck]

"timewarp2008"
wrote in message
...
On Oct 29, 6:17 pm, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

The problem with viewing Jobs as a "genius" is the implication
that otherscannot do what he did,

But that's not implied by viewing him as a genius.
Not at all. Perhaps it's your own obsession-driven
inference.

If I'm "obsessed" with anything, it's that most people are smarter and more
capable than they think they are. Do you look at Jobs' career and think "Oh,
no. I couldn't possibly do anything like that!"


thus eliminating any responsibility for
understanding -- and even emulating -- his work.

What a load of crap.
You're really grasping at straws. So you don't like Jobs.
You've made that clear. But you're really going over the
top with your absurd and clumsy attempts at demonizing
him. You're not really putting Jobs down any more; rather,
you're putting yourself down. And you've succeeded.
Do you really need to discredit yourself more?

And how many times a day do you grovel at Jobs' shrine?

[None]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"timewarp2008"
wrote in message
...
On Oct 29, 6:17 pm, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

The problem with viewing Jobs as a "genius" is the implication
that otherscannot do what he did,

But that's not implied by viewing him as a genius.
Not at all. Perhaps it's your own obsession-driven
inference.

If I'm "obsessed" with anything, it's that most people are smarter and
more
capable than they think they are. Do you look at Jobs' career and think
"Oh,
no. I couldn't possibly do anything like that!"

No, I don't. Why should I\?




thus eliminating any responsibility for
understanding -- and even emulating -- his work.

What a load of crap.
You're really grasping at straws. So you don't like Jobs.
You've made that clear. But you're really going over the
top with your absurd and clumsy attempts at demonizing
him. You're not really putting Jobs down any more; rather,
you're putting yourself down. And you've succeeded.
Do you really need to discredit yourself more?

And how many times a day do you grovel at Jobs' shrine?

There is no Jobs shrine, and I don't grovel. I'm not the only one
to receive that baseless and ridiculous accusation from you,
simply for disputing your obsession with demonizing Jobs.

Nobody has to worship Jobs in order to disagree with your
ranting about him, and your accusations of such are among
the things you do to ridicule and shame yourself. It's similar
to the fallacy of the excluded middle. It's possible to disagree
with your vitriol for Jobs without worshipping him.

[William Sommerwerck]

"None" wrote in message
m...
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"timewarp2008"
wrote in message

...
On Oct 29, 6:17 pm, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

The problem with viewing Jobs as a "genius" is the implication
that otherscannot do what he did,

But that's not implied by viewing him as a genius.
Not at all. Perhaps it's your own obsession-driven
inference.

If I'm "obsessed" with anything, it's that most people are smarter and
more capable than they think they are. Do you look at Jobs' career
and think "Oh, no. I couldn't possibly do anything like that!"

No, I don't. Why should I?

You shouldn't. That's the point.


And how many times a day do you grovel at Jobs' shrine?

There is no Jobs shrine, and I don't grovel. I'm not the only one
to receive that baseless and ridiculous accusation from you,
simply for disputing your obsession with demonizing Jobs.

When you say I've demonized Steve Jobs -- which I never have -- you only
prove my point. I'm principally criticizing the ridicule-ous view of Jobs of
being a genius who's changed the world. In reality, he's produced a lot of
well-designed boutique products. Microsoft has done far more to actually
advance personal computing than Apple.

Jobs' real contribution has been making highly polished products that people
like. People ascribe this to genius, but it's nothing more than common
sense -- which no one else seems to understand. When Jobs accused Bill Gates
of "not getting it", he was dead-on. Microsoft had the resources to eat
Apple for lunch and spit out the bones, but didn't, because it didn't take a
user-centered view of its products.

I will NOW demonize Steve Jobs for real. The "I'm a Mac -- I'm a PC" ads
represent one of the all-time low points in prime-time TV advertising.
Almost all the claims made for the Mac are either gross misrepresentations,
or outright lies. Had I been Jobs, I would have pulled the ads immediately.

There are legitimate reasons for preferring Macintosh to Windows. If Mr Jobs
is such a genius, why couldn't he sell the product by telling the truth? A
person who lies about their products or services is a low-life of the worst
sort. It was because of these ads that I stopped recommending the Mac to
friends.

The lies about the Macintosh are so widespread that I nearly came to verbal
blows with an ex-boss of mine last night. He's an extremely intelligent
person, and though preferring Macs (mostly for the way everything works so
well), he keeps several Windows machines because of the wider variety of
reasonably priced software for them.

Yet he repeated the lie -- which has been thoroughly discredited over the
past few years -- that the Mac operating system, and Mac applications, are
inherently immune to malware attack. I warned him that he needs to find some
sort of protection and install it, but he replied that both he and his
friends have been using Macs for years, and have never been attacked. I
can't wait for the day when I get to say "I told you so". (He's
conscientious about backing up, so I won't feel too mean-spirited when I say
it.)

Tesla was a genius. Land was a genius. Jobs was a clever marketer who knew
how to give people what they really wanted. Nothing wrong about that, but
"Credit were credit is due".

As for Microsoft and the terminally myopic Steve Ballmer... W7 (and possibly
W8) suggest that Microsoft is finally starting to understand the "gestalt"
of operating systems -- that the "user experience" is far more important
than the feature set.

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Sun, 30 Oct 2011 06:06:03 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

I'm principally criticizing the ridicule-ous view of Jobs of
being a genius who's changed the world.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

I'm about halfway through reading the book, and the turmoil of Jobs' personal
life (ex-girlfriends, ex-employees, ex-friends, his sometimes-strained
relationship with his own children and sister, etc.) is very sad. His life
is not a happy story.

But I really do think Jobs did change the world in a few fundamental ways:
popularizing the GUI for home computers; creating the idea of an integrated
download music store, software, and portable hardware; perfecting the
smartphone; and making it possible for Pixar to produce the first
feature-length computer-animated feature. Bring Apple back from the brink of
bankruptcy wasn't a bad third act to his career, either.

I've always said that if any of us here accomplished even one of these
things, we'd be among the greatest people of the last 100 years. The fact
that Jobs did all of them is beyond incredible. No question, others may have
come up with each of these ideas before Apple, but nobody perfected and
commercialized them as well as Steve Jobs did.

While I think Jobs did change the world, I don't necessarily think all the
changes were for the better, and I also think his methods were sometimes
unnecessarily cruel. Even Bill Gates has said paraphrasing, "Steve Jobs
was a brilliant guy, but not great as a human being." It's hard to argue
with that -- and I don't think Gates was exactly a nice guy, either.




I will NOW demonize Steve Jobs for real. The "I'm a Mac -- I'm a PC" ads
represent one of the all-time low points in prime-time TV advertising.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

I understand why you feel that way, Bill, but you have to step back, be
objective, and not take the commercials as a personal attack on PC users.
They were actually pretty funny. And the main reason they worked as well as
they did was because of the brilliant acting on the part of John Hodgman, the
"PC Guy."

Bear in mind that when those commercials first started airing, Apple had
maybe 4% of the market. They have almost _13%_ of the market now, and they
pretty much own the high-end laptop business. I'd say the commercials
worked, just creating the impression that Apple was a cool company, and that
owning Apple products made you cool. No question, this is total smoke and
mirrors, but so is just about every TV commercial ever made.

That's the essence of what an "Image Campaign" is: selling a *attitude* vs.
selling an actual product. There's a fine art to doing this well. I was
just watching some Microsoft and Google commercials over the weekend, and
thinking, "these guys got it all wrong. They're horrible, horrible
commercials -- boring, not entertaining, with a total lack of style, and a
vague, muddled message." Mercedes, Apple, Coca-Cola... those companies
almost always make great, memorable, strikingly-beautiful commercials, done
with taste and style.

BTW, you can watch all 66 of the American "Mac vs. PC" commercials at this
link on ADWEEK:

http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/apples...ampaign-130552



W7 (and possibly
W8) suggest that Microsoft is finally starting to understand the "gestalt"
of operating systems -- that the "user experience" is far more important
than the feature set.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Agreed. And that's a large part of what Steve Jobs figured out about 30
years ago.


--MFW

[Meindert Sprang]

"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
.com...

W7 (and possibly
W8) suggest that Microsoft is finally starting to understand the
"gestalt"
of operating systems -- that the "user experience" is far more important
than the feature set.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Agreed. And that's a large part of what Steve Jobs figured out about 30
years ago.

Microsoft is still not even close. Don't get me wrong: I use Windows PC's
every day for work, next to a MacMini and a MacBook. And my "user
experience" wants a computer to be available for me when I need it. Open a
Windows laptop and it takes some 50 seconds before it is operational from
stand-by. Open a MacBook and it is operational within 2 seconds. Now THAT is
what I call a positive user experience. And it is beyond me why IE7 and up
need more than 10 seconds to connect to the internet when the laptop is on
and connected to the internet. Nuff said....

Thank you Steve!

Meindert

[Don Pearce[_3_]]

On Tue, 1 Nov 2011 15:21:04 +0100, "Meindert Sprang"
wrote:

"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
s.com...

W7 (and possibly
W8) suggest that Microsoft is finally starting to understand the
"gestalt"
of operating systems -- that the "user experience" is far more important
than the feature set.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Agreed. And that's a large part of what Steve Jobs figured out about 30
years ago.

Microsoft is still not even close. Don't get me wrong: I use Windows PC's
every day for work, next to a MacMini and a MacBook. And my "user
experience" wants a computer to be available for me when I need it. Open a
Windows laptop and it takes some 50 seconds before it is operational from
stand-by. Open a MacBook and it is operational within 2 seconds. Now THAT is
what I call a positive user experience. And it is beyond me why IE7 and up
need more than 10 seconds to connect to the internet when the laptop is on
and connected to the internet. Nuff said....

Thank you Steve!

Meindert


Really? I just saw a Youtube video of a Macbook bootup, and it was
nearly fifty seconds. the commentator said that was typical. And even
if it is quicker, so what? I last booted up my PC nearly four months
ago; the bootup time is a matter of no consequence to me.

I like PCs for their convenience, the fact that I am not paying four
times over the odds for being a fashion victim, the sheer variety of
software, the fact that everything (pretty much) has been designed to
run well on Windows. I like the stability of the Win7 platform and of
course the look and feel.

As for your experience connecting to the Internet, well I can only
suggest you sort out your connections. For me it is immediate.

d

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Meindert Sprang" wrote in message
...
"Marc Wielage" wrote in message
.com...

W7 (and possibly
W8) suggest that Microsoft is finally starting to understand the
"gestalt"
of operating systems -- that the "user experience" is far more
important
than the feature set.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Agreed. And that's a large part of what Steve Jobs figured out about 30
years ago.

Microsoft is still not even close. Don't get me wrong: I use Windows PC's
every day for work, next to a MacMini and a MacBook. And my "user
experience" wants a computer to be available for me when I need it. Open a
Windows laptop and it takes some 50 seconds before it is operational from
stand-by.

That Windows laptop has to be broken or misconfigured.

50 seconds to come out of standby?

Wow!

I have a six year old Windows laptop that comes out of standby in seconds.
In 50 seconds its been out of hibernation for 20 seconds, and hibernation is
far more complex and involves far more processing.

[Charles Tomaras]

"Meindert Sprang" wrote in message
news:4eb003e8$0$6902
Microsoft is still not even close. Don't get me wrong: I use Windows PC's
every day for work, next to a MacMini and a MacBook. And my "user
experience" wants a computer to be available for me when I need it. Open a
Windows laptop and it takes some 50 seconds before it is operational from
stand-by. Open a MacBook and it is operational within 2 seconds. Now THAT
is
what I call a positive user experience. And it is beyond me why IE7 and up
need more than 10 seconds to connect to the internet when the laptop is on
and connected to the internet. Nuff said....

Meindert...don't know what beast of a windows computer you are running but I
just did some tests with my 7 year old Dell Inspiron 700m which I keep by my
bedside.

Full boot to being connected to the internet...about a minute.
Starting IE8 from scratch on first boot (nothing resident in ram) about 10
seconds to a fully loaded home page.
Start up from Sleep Mode to being fully booted. About 10 seconds.
Close IE and then start it again to fully connected with home page
loaded.... 3 seconds.

It's a pretty lean XP Pro install with 2GB of RAM but it still works just
fine.

I won't tell you how much faster my dual quad desktop is but it really
smokes if everything stays in ram.

Jobs was a true genius and he won't soon be forgotten but please don't try
to paint Windows a crappy color in his absence.

[Paul[_13_]]

On 10/31/2011 10:16 PM, Marc Wielage wrote:
On Sun, 30 Oct 2011 06:06:03 -0700, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in ):

I'm principally criticizing the ridicule-ous view of Jobs of
being a genius who's changed the world.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

I'm about halfway through reading the book, and the turmoil of Jobs' personal
life (ex-girlfriends, ex-employees, ex-friends, his sometimes-strained
relationship with his own children and sister, etc.) is very sad. His life
is not a happy story.

But I really do think Jobs did change the world in a few fundamental ways:
popularizing the GUI for home computers; creating the idea of an integrated
download music store, software, and portable hardware; perfecting the
smartphone; and making it possible for Pixar to produce the first
feature-length computer-animated feature. Bring Apple back from the brink of
bankruptcy wasn't a bad third act to his career, either.

I've always said that if any of us here accomplished even one of these
things, we'd be among the greatest people of the last 100 years. The fact
that Jobs did all of them is beyond incredible. No question, others may have
come up with each of these ideas before Apple, but nobody perfected and
commercialized them as well as Steve Jobs did.

While I think Jobs did change the world, I don't necessarily think all the
changes were for the better, and I also think his methods were sometimes
unnecessarily cruel. Even Bill Gates has saidparaphrasing, "Steve Jobs
was a brilliant guy, but not great as a human being." It's hard to argue
with that -- and I don't think Gates was exactly a nice guy, either.



Steve Jobs was an asshole at Apple:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWyLOKjlAKA

Wozniak has seen this movie, and claims the personalities
were accurately portrayed.

Jobs was also a dead-beat dad for quite some time.


All this "Jobs was God" b.s. is delusional: the man was
a great marketing business man, nothing more. Digital music
downloading was already happening.

Xerox gets the credit for the GUI. And PCs are far cheaper than
iMacs, and work damn well.