Steve Jobs 1955-2011

[Duckay]

Well, I'm a fail Apple fangirl: it took me until getting home to find out, because I was trying to abstain from social networking on the go.

Actually, my first instinct when I saw it was disbelief, it took me a second to catch on.

RIP Steve Jobs. Any problems I would want to express are not for today; today is for polite acknowledgment and remembrance.

[gcninja]

I disbelieved it when my mother informed me. Enough times I've seen "will smith is dead" "george clooney fell off a cliff" etc.

[JackSlack]

I disbelieved it when my mother informed me. Enough times I've seen "will smith is dead" "george clooney fell off a cliff" etc.

I was initially, "Wait, what? Really?" And checked the newspaper site first. And there it was. Man.

But it was plausible. He'd been very ill and had stepped down, and... yeah.

[gcninja]

But its one of those things you never expect. You see all the jokes like

and such so you think "lol, cant wait for what steve has for us next" then BAM he's dead

[Duckay]

I disbelieved it when my mother informed me. Enough times I've seen "will smith is dead" "george clooney fell off a cliff" etc.

Yeah, that's pretty much it. The first time I saw it, I thought it was the opening to some sort of "lol Apple" joke.

[Metcarfre]

I've been with Apple since the IIe.

Thanks, Steve, you'll be missed.

[gcninja]

its odd, I watch videos on him and read about him now and the geek part of me is like
but rationally i think "I didn't even know him, wtf am I like this for"
Note: I have not cried, my those is like "do it you pussy"

[TheRocket]

He has gone to the cloud.

[Dromos_GHG]

Found out via a popup news notification on my iPhone. Seemed app-ropriate.

I grew up with PC's so I was all about them until I started working with Mac's in my profession. It wasn't along before I was a Mac convert. I've spent enough time with both formats in pro and personal environs and I really do prefer Macs.

My first iPhone (the original on launch day) was one of the best purchases I ever made, I have never been dissatisfied with my iPhones.

I'll miss future innovations from him, but I'm glad with the stuff we did get while he was around.

[gcninja]

my first smart phone was motoQ myself, but it wasnt that good, especially compared to other Microsoft phones at the time. However, when my father found an iphone on the ground and it became mine, I loved it. Mostly til i started updating it and found out that the updates were newer phone specific and slowed mine down (twas a 3g). But still, its a great phone in general and I wouldnt mind a 4s.
tid bit, read a funny post about the 4S or the 4Steve phone

[Evil Jim]

WTF? He didn't get much of a retirement.

Fuck cancer. Fuck it in the face.

[Lisra]

Mh.

No one should have to die at age 56.

[GaProgMan]

As I'd said on twitter:

He, literally, changed the world. It doesn't matter if you have never used or owned an Apple product, he changed yours, too. #ThankYouSteve

And my G+ status on the matter:

One of the most influential men in modern technology. Without him and Wozniack, the WIMP GUI (Windows, Icons, Menus and Pointers) may have just been a throw away concept used on Xerox's Star. Without him, we'd have no iTunes. Without him we'd have no iDevices. Without him, Apple would have died out... again.

Thank you Mr. Jobs.

At least he can rest, now.

[taza]

Nobody can say he didn't have a positive effect on the technology market - without him we'd basically be living in a monoculture.

But innovator? Not really, no. He took things other people had done before, then repackaged them. His genius was not innovation, it was marketing.

Though, if you like Pixar, the credit is well-deserved there. Pixar would have died early without Jobs.

[Geoff_B]

But innovator? Not really, no. He took things other people had done before, then repackaged them. His genius was not innovation, it was marketing.

Um... really?

http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/apple.html

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, the duo who began Apple Computer in 1976, are among the most well-known revolutionaries of the computing age. Their invention of the first true personal computer changed people's ideas of what a computer could look like and what it could do for them to make their lives easier and their work more efficient. Apple continues to be one of the best-known and most popular brands of personal computing devices in the world.

[Dutch guy]

But innovator? Not really, no. He took things other people had done before, then repackaged them. His genius was not innovation, it was marketing.

Jobs's innovation comes FROM that repackaging. People had done a lot of the things before BUT they were never truly a success. Apple redesigned and repackaged things in such a way that they look good, are easy to use and just work almost all the time. This might not seem like innovation to you, but for a company to be so focused on industrial/consumer design is indeed revolutionary.

[empath]

Look, Jobs wasn't a TECHNOLOGY innovator, he was a BUSINESS innovator, and yes, he FOSTERED innovation by virtue of the market and product he chose to do business in.

But yes, because he got into the consumer electronics industry, he made it better - he found people that DID create revolutionary new things and put them in a position where they had the resources to develop those innovations. And he sold them.

No more than Bill Gates is a programming genius (bought DOS from another person and sold it to IBM), Steve Jobs's skill and accumen was in management (getting a good friend to come up with smaller and more efficient chip designs for game cartridges) and in marketing.

And he SHOULD be lauded for those accomplishments, but PLEASE stop telling me the equivalent of "Al Gore invented the Internet."

No, I personally didn't like him or his marketing style, but I will give credit where credit is due; he fostered the world into the way we see it today, and really didn't deserve to be sidelined by cancer and eventually succumb to it.

Peace, man. Hope the next thing is even better for you.

[Fugiman]

Seems like I was the only one not shocked by this? I mean, the guy was diagnosed with cancer 7 years ago, and he'd been gradually removing himself from the daily operation of Apple this year. For somebody who dedicated himself to his work, that was a red flag to me.

Though I don't like any Apple products, and I'm not convinced the direction Steve took the industry is the best (I'm not a huge fan of "apps" on my computer), I can not deny he's done a LOT of good. And at the very least, he was a man who could get non-technologically-savvy people excited about tech, and that is something I greatly appreciate.

And as Lisra said, 56 is too young to die.

[MowDownJoe]

Mh.

No one should have to die at age 56.

Main reason my only comment on this story is "Fuck cancer." (Plus, that's how old my parents are, and my mom's mom died of colon cancer... I never cared for Apple, but those two facts together make this story touch a little close to home.)

[SPACExJUMPxJOSH]

The world has lost a great man today

RIP Steve

[Graham]

I'd recommend this as a great read:
http://robcottingham.ca/2011/10/steve-jobs/

[Elomin Sha]

Nice piece and I like the last cartoon the most.

[SPACExJUMPxJOSH]

it really is a shame, seen so many people actually happy about this it makes me loose my faith in humanity : /

[Sieg Reyu]

Hipsters like Macs even more now that Steve Jobs is underground.

-Rob Hawks

[empath]

Yeah, thanks for that, Graham - it IS a good read. And best of all, Cottingham summed it up with a closing line from someone else (Alexandra Samuel) that says the most important thing about Steve Jobs:



He got it, he grokked it, he felt it deep in his soul. And he took advantage of that understanding to do great things with that link that paid off for EVERYONE involved, even the poor little End User.

Thanks, Steve.

I took a poll of the deli staff when I started work at noon - out of the eight people today, four of them had iPhones on them, and another two had smartphones that essentially copied the functionality of the aforementioned Apple product. A little later, a co-worker checked how much his pay was by accessing his bank account through a bank-provided App™.

We live in The Future, and Steve Jobs had a big part in that.

Thanks, man, and again I'm REALLY sorry (and still a more than a little creeped out) that I cracked a joke about your cancer maybe an hour before I found out about your death...


ADDENDUM: Rumor: The new iPhone wasn't the expected iPhone 5 but the iPhone 4S because it was renamed "4 Steve".