A thought crossed my mind. Well, sometimes it happens...
Then I discover I'm not the only one to be thinking it.
Steve Jobs.
There's a plethora of outpourings of grief, and some steps toward deification. There's no doubt he was an extraordinary man, a visionary. Amongst those who are protesting about the disproportionate distribution of wealth, in Wall St and numerous cities around the U.S, there will be many who carry their ipads and iphones, who are tapping away on iconic white keyboards, devotees of the apple brand, people who see Steve Jobs as the creator of all that is good, versus Bill Gates of the 'evil' microsoft.
Well, think, good people, as you scroll through your gigabytes of itunes, Steve Jobs is toward the top end of the 1% you're protesting about. Unlike Bill Gates, he eschewed charity, and delighted, it seems, in the accumulation of wealth. Well, lets be more pointed. He delighted in the accumulation of YOUR wealth.
Muse on that as you mourn his passing.
(p.s. me? I don't own a mac, or any i-things. I find myself drawn to their good design, but repulsed by their price, their monopolistic software etc.)
I confess to being left out here. Why such acclamation for Jobs? An inventor etc but why adulation?
ReplyDeletePeople without God look for one to follow I suppose.
Jobs definately made technology better for everybody. I heard an interview with him, talking about early computers, that he wanted them and their processes to be easy for all of us to use, with beautiful images, fonts etc. Early computer users were science types, people who scoffed at those ideas, but for the rest of us, it was the right idea, and led Bill Gates to copy Job's ideas. Bill Gates is also a good guy, for different reasons. I don't see any reason to get uptight over either of them, but they are the 2 Henry Fords of our day, just not anti-semitic fascists :)
ReplyDeleteHere's one of my latest favorite sites...I should link to her...
ReplyDeleteclick here
Adullamite: I'm with you on the adulation, but he deserves tremendous respect for his achievements.
ReplyDeleteGary: Yes, he was instrumental in bringing computers to the masses. He was ahead, when it came to word-processing (remember that term?), and graphics, ease of use, not needing to know how it was done, that's true. But he did it by locking nerds like himself out of the system.
What I don't like about his legacy is the locked down monopolism of apple. The haughty 'Don't mess with it, don't try to figure it out, just keep on buying stuff from us and us alone' attitude.
Whereas Microsoft, for all the odium heaped upon it, delivered a fully owner tinkerable device.
I have a friend who has only ever had macs, who's forever showing me what clever things his computer can do, then being surprised and a little offended when I tell him that the enemy can do the same thing too.
Bulletholes: Exactly!
While I don't deify Jobs, he did create a computer for computer phobics like me - one that is easy to start up, get typing, create a blog on...you know: easy peasy. I don't tinker with computers. I'm lost with all that a microsoft run computer can do. You left me all these wonderful toys on my Bill Gatesian PC, but I'm afraid to use them .... I can't remember how! Alls I'm saying is: Apple found a niche market and I'm part of it.
ReplyDeletexxx