Apple is at the first major cross-roads since the passing of its late co-founder Steve Jobs 12
years ago. It finds itself still largely dependent on the product lines and businesses that Jobs left behind. Its Vision Pro has received mixed reviews on launch, while it is also facing several other headwinds including a major lawsuit against what the DOJ claims are its anticompetitive practices.
Steve Jobs was a piece of shit human being who contributed nothing to technology.
That said, he was a hell of a skilled bullshitter/marketer. Most people fucking looooove to be bullshitted, and Americans more than most.
It’s why we elect virtually no wonks/technocrats, even though thats who we should elect almost exclusively. We’d rather some snake oil motherfucker sell us on magical lies while telling us we’re pretty.
I’ve never complimented, or defended Steve Jobs before, because he was a grade A piece of shit…but, Steve Jobs transformed technology precisely because he was a phenomenal salesman, with a great eye for technical talent.
Just because he wasn’t an engineer, doesn’t change the fact that he forged Apple into what it became, and that absolutely contributed to modern technology - for better, and worse.
I think the big complaint about Jobs is not the lack of engineering skills, but that he got where he did through deception, taking advantage of people, and often treating folks like garbage. Many of us view him as unworthy of celebrating, because the ends don’t justify the means.
(There’s also the fact that what Apple became was not all good, but perhaps that’s a separate discussion.)
I think marketers should get to take credit for ad campaigns they create, and engineers should get to take credit for technology they create.
Capitalists just want to take the credit for what others do. Societal leeches. I don’t buy into their false narrative that providing the means of production they hoard out of greed means they deserve most to all of the credit for what they permit talented people to engineer and produce by the swear of their brow and the migraines of their solutions.
We should be rewarding the Teslas of the world for what they invent, and punishing the Edisons that would claim other’s inventions as their own. But we suck, so we won’t.
Moving goalpost?
You said he didn’t contribute to technology, so I pointed out that he’s responsible for Apple becoming what it became, which itself transformed technology.
Now, you’re saying he shouldn’t get technical credit for…making the iPhone?
Okay…I never said he should…but it you want to go down that path, he was very hands-on with in the design processes for two of their most pivotal products: the iMac and iPod.
Again, he was a grade-A douche bag, who died a fucking hilariously stupid death, but that doesn’t erase, or override his impact.
I think the argument is that the motivations society allowed him under capitalism are what drew him to do what he did, not just that he was some brilliant asshole but that he wanted to own the work those beneath him had done.
Lots of us who have spent our lives being told “yeahuh but that’s how it’s supposed to work!” probably have a hard time grappling the concept that just because it turns out good sometimes doesn’t mean we can’t do better.
So to the original point of the rebuttal - we’re lucky it only turned out like it did, and not way way worse (and some other high-on-capital folks have been busy proving that lately…)
If you want to congratulate his corpse for what he didn’t engineer or design, go ahead.
It has nothing to do with congratulating.
You made a false statement, and then moved the goalpost (motte and bailey) when I pointed it out.
Simple as that.
After listening to the recent Behind the Bastards episode on him, yeah absolutely. It’s amazing his legacy isn’t judged more harshly.
He’s one of those people who died at the right time to preserve their own legacies, before public reckonings for non illegal bad behavior became common.
I guess he died more or less pre-Twitter, so that’s something. He’d have a different legacy otherwise.
I work in tech and specialize in Apple hardware. I get really sick of industry folks talking about Jobs as being inspiring and other nonsense. No, he was an asshole and we should not celebrate him.