Steve Jobs
The tech world lost a visionary figure this week with the passing of Steve Jobs. His illness was common knowledge, and his deteriorating health wasn’t hard to deduce as his once taut turtlenecks started to sag on his slender form. Even so, he managed to keep the exact details of his condition quiet enough that the actual announcement of his death came as a bit of a surprise. While I’m a dedicated consumer of Apple products and eagerly await the live blogs chronicling the announcement of their shiny new gadgets, I can’t claim to have known the man outside his role as Apple’s spokesman. Still, it’s hard not to feel a little touched by his loss when I reflect on the ways his technologies have changed my life, and run down the staggering list of his life’s accomplishments. He may have left this world, but his greatest achievement will continue to live on in our collective memory.
I don’t mean revolutionizing personal computing with the Macintosh, or changing the way we think about music with the iPod. I don’t mean taking the telephone to the next level with the introduction of the iPhone, or magically creating a new class of device with the invention of the bigger iPhone. I also don’t mean taking the guess work out of the Academy’s Best Animated Feature category with Pixar or turning the fashion world on its head by finding a way to make “business casual” look over dressed. Rather, I mean his single most impressive feat, the one that best defines his life, his legacy, and his place in history: sleeping with Joan Baez.
Of course, a big part of what made Apple’s business strategy was implementation rather than invention. After all, Apple didn’t invent the smartphone or the touchscreen, but they utilized them in a way that set the standard for mobile communication, and in doing so ensured that every knockoff that came after would be relegated to the newly minted category of “iPhone killers.” Similarly, Bob Dylan may have had the idea of sleeping with Joan Baez first, but Steve was in a position to observe his methods, avoid his mistakes, appropriated the most crucial elements, and refine them into what I can only imagine was a superior user experience.
Billions of dollars, legions of fans, and enough unproduced iPhone prototypes to make the entire tech blogosphere foam at the mouth, they’re all great in their own right. But they will never buy you a night alone with the queen of the coffeehouse vibrato. Credit where credit is due, Steve. We’ll never see another like you, and you will be missed.
-TC