As news came in today about the death of Apple Co-Founder and Visionary, Steve Jobs, I felt a piece of my youth had died with him.
Although I realize my memories will forever last, I still felt deeply saddened by this news.
Steve Jobs wasn’t just some billionaire who created something and made a fortune. He was no Bill Gates. He was unique. You see Steve Jobs created a revolution that reverberated through the computer industry for the past 35 years. He not only gave us the personal computer – he was the ONE and ONLY creative in the normally otherwise “stiff” PC world.
Just look at his track record with fantastic uncontested products like iTunes, iPad, iPod, iPhone and of course…the Mac. There never has been and there never will be, another individual so skilled at pushing his employees to perfection.
Growing up, this man was someone to aspire to be like. My youth is filled with memories of the rise of Apple by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. As a matter of fact just the other day I once again watched The Triumph of the Nerds – The True Story of the PC Revolution.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg even compared Jobs to Einstein and Newton. He was a genius!
Read more here: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/10/05/us/steve-jobs-reax/index.html?hpt=hp_t1
You see I like to remember my youth and I’m sure I’m not alone on that. Maybe it’s part of getting older.
Now that I have my own son, I will bestow the same drive and passion for success that I came to learn while growing up in Canada as a child. And I will tell him stories about the man I looked up to as a child…Steve Jobs. He will be sadly missed. The entire world felt this one.
Hello, Don Halbert,
So happy for you – you have found your spot in the sun, or have it made in the shade. (Great quote = planted a tree a long time ago).
Oh so many years ago, I worked where Apple HQ is now. Was called Four Phase, they built mini-computers for hospitals and retail. Were bought out by Motorola, then Apple knocked down the buildings, and created “Infinite Loop”.
I grew up a few miles from the Steves, and owned a house a couple of blocks from Apple. I had the same phone exchange as they did – It isn’t poaching, if the customer calls you, right?
A serious “Leap of Faith”, where Steve Jobs sold his VW Bus for $600. to buy chips for Woz to build early Apple Computers. Jobs could not have done it w/out Woz, Woz could not have done it w/out Jobs. What a team!!! And Jobs was worth about $11Mil by age 25 – now that is what I call ROI = Return on Investment.
This world has lost many Greats this last Month.
Steve Jobs – articles are still being written.
Dennis M. Ritchie – Creator of the “C” programming language, that is where most of the Internet comes from. His book is close at hand, as it has been for the last 40 years.
John McCarthy – Creator Of Lisp – one of the first AI languages.
I’ve read several articles that said Steve Jobs’ time at NeXT was wasted. Almost none mention that the World Wide Web’s first page was created on a NeXT computer. How soon they forget.
I’m glad you enjoyed this article.
I had no idea Ritchie passed away and yes…I to have his book always close by. Do you remember Logo? I wrote another article here on Growing Up Mac you might enjoy. http://www.donhalbert.com/growing-up-mac/