Steve Jobs!
The sound of this very name brings in front of the eyes a powerful, innovative, a unique image of the personality that made digital world close to the people.
Its not the same anymore. On hearing the name now, what accompanies the image is the feeling that a star has lost the light in it. It was on the 5th of October, 2011 that Apple announced the passing away of this great, yet a humble man.
Jobs passed away due to pancreatic cancer and he had announced this in 2004.
(The cause of death has not yet been officially confirmed, but is generally believed to be pancreatic cancer)
His family issued a public statement "Steve died peacefully today surrounded by his family."
Further it thanked the people who shared their wishes and prayers during the last year of Steve's illness and said a website would be provided for those who wish to offer tributes and memories. It also humbly requested people to respect it's privacy at the time of grief.
And from the now orphaned Apple, an official statement voiced, "We are deeply saddened to announce that Steve Jobs passed away today. Steve's brilliance, passion and energy were the source of countless innovations that enrich and improve all of our lives. The world is immeasurably better because of Steve. His greatest love was for his wife, Laurene, and his family. Our hearts go out to them and to all who were touched by his extraordinary gifts."
And now suddenly, the question arises as to "Why was Steve Jobs unique?"
We knew Jobs as the man who rapidly caused huge changes to occur in the world of technology. It may be his apple computer or the iPhone or the iPad, this man was one genius human being being.
Steven Spielberg was quoted as saying "Steve Jobs was the greatest inventor since Thomas Edison. He put the world at our fingertips."
Facebook's current CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg wrote on his wall “Steve, thank you for being a mentor and a friend. Thanks for showing that what you build can change the world. I will miss you.”
They are indeed right, Jobs was no less than any inventor for his remarkable achievements helped reduce the "digital divide" (not sure about the iPhone but it surely is in case of all our personal computers). It is a well known fact about him that, he never would compromise with the quality of work for another thing, may be even profitability or reputation.
Apple was unique. Until today.
And now?
They’re just another manufacturer that knew they had a problem, but were so arrogant that they decided to release their product anyways. Jobs says that the Bloomberg article “was a crock”, which begs the question of what kind of testing did Apple actually do?
So, Jobs’ answer to the masses? “Let them have a free case!”
Its a commonly known thing that he went on about releasing a product only once he had achieved the satisfaction.
Jobs was not blindfolded to go about the conventional method of market searching for enhancing customer satisfaction and thereby the company in overall. He used to say - "You can't just ask customers what they want then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they'll want something new."
This was what I liked most about his ability in seeing the people's mindset, and implementing his overall ideology and bringing out the best products of the world.
This is regarded one of the key reasons of his success.
Could we just wind back the clocks and see this?
Before the iPod appeared in 2001, there was relatively little interest in MP3 music players. Those products that did exist were chunky, often fiddly to use, and were largely bought by early adopter tech enthusiasts.
But when Apple put it hands into trying this field, it saw a huge positive change. So appealing were gadgets such as the iPod, iPhone and iPad that the public quickly engaged with them.
That was due, in no small part, to Steve Jobs' ability as a salesman, a man with farsightedness - explaining his products simply in a way that everyone could understand. Jobs sure was an outstanding competitor in every place he set his foots on.
Jobs was a person of simplicity when it came down to personal aspects.
And although he was a personality people looked upon in the society, Jobs had minimal tastes. For the past decade, Steve Jobs almost always wore the same outfit.
This was the same even for official interviews with even Bill Gates!
From top to bottom, it was a black St. Croix mock turtleneck sweater, blue Levi 501 jeans, and New Balance 991 trainers shoes. Like I said, the items may reflect his minimalist tastes, or perhaps his flair for personal as well as corporate branding.
Steve Jobs was undoubtedly a product of 1960s and 1970s counter-culture California. As a young man, he traveled to India to stay in an ashram. Eastern philosophy would continue to be a part of his life, and he remained a Buddhist for the rest of his life. This might be accounted for his simplicity i guess.
Money appeared to matter little to Steve Jobs. His words told to the Wall Street Journal: "Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful. that's what matters to me."
And a fascinating trend he sometimes presented was to save the best to last. Jobs regularly did that when launching products. Having unveiled a raft of new gadgets, just as guests were getting ready to leave, he would utter the now famous words
"One more thing..."!
When he did so, there was always a mischievous smile. It was part of his genius as a showman. He would then go on showing the gadget in spotlight of the event - iPod, Facetime Video calling, etc.
Coming back to the recent present, we know that it was a breaking news when he resigned as the CEO on Aug 24 2011. Personally I felt that there was a possibility that he was in his final stages. Therefore, he decided to resign in a way to make sure Apple wouldn't lose shares when its CEO died if was still continuing.
We might say that the challenge for Apple is to maintain this culture and Steve had already put a strong team in place. Apple Inc's shares just fell less than 1% on Oct 6, 2011.
So obviously we know Jobs left the company in strong shape. How thoughtful he was to carefully mentor and leave his company in the capable hands of new CEO Tim Cook and others.
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| Tim Cook and Steve Jobs |
Hats off to you Steve !!
Well guys.
We must never fail to learn that though he was having a disease that had very little scope for treatment and conventional healing, he was a person the world would never be able to forget, his works always memorable.
Indeed he was a great man.
I think I really do not have anymore to share with you guys.
Let us pray for his soul. God give their family strength to bear the grief.
RIP Steve Jobs.
I wish his footsteps lead us towards a higher degree of making wonderful things possible.
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