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What is Apple Without Steve Jobs?
necro81 writes "David Pauly at Bloomberg has written a piece that asks 'Does Apple Inc. Have a Future Without Steve Jobs?' He writes in the context of Jobs' latest success in launching the iPhone, set against the backdrop of stock backdating troubles. In Pauly's worst-case-scenario, the SEC prosecutes Apple, and the board is forced to oust Jobs.Even without resorting to such scenarios, it's an interesting question to ask the fanboys and detractors out there: could Apple succeed and continue to innovative without Jobs at the helm?"
In Pauly's worst-case-scenario, the SEC prosecutes Apple, and the board is forced to oust Jobs.
They'll just bring him back as an "independent consultant" and it'll be business as usual.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
No problem. They just need to replace him with someone else that's exactly the same.
It doesn't necessarily have to be Jobs, but I have a hard time imagining who else could be as effective. The Reality Distortion Field is a very real thing and must be taken into account. Anything Jobs says is automatically newsworthy. The black turtleneck has become an icon of geek chic. Apple and Jobs are, in the minds of the believers, inseparable.
Regardless of who sits in the big chair, that person must positively sweat charisma. People have to want to believe them. And whatever else is true, they must never ever have worked for HP :D
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
No, that's what Apple would have been with Steve Wozniak.
What happened last time was Apple fell downhill, as Jobs became rich on Pixar and, well, interesting with NextStep. I'd bet if Steve leaves, that will happen. But this time, he'll just run Pixar, and end up as the CEO of Disney as a whole. Jobs is charismatic, and, heck, his description of the iPhone was the only one that made it look good. In a time of Apple innovation, not only will Jobs stay, but will be the center of promotion, and loved by $$$-hungry investors, who see his talents in selling
History says no. Apple without Steve was not the same...
Successful launch of the iPhone? What launch?
They've only announced a future product, and the general sentiment seems to be that it won't be a hot seller. That's a far cry from being a success.
What is Microsoft without Steve Ballmer?
For me the more interesting question is how much of Apple's success can be ascribed to Jobs' leadership style. Perhaps that should be in quotes because he is rumored to be an asshole to work for. Did his uncompromising behavior and standards create the iPod? Would it have been less of a hit if his vision didn't push it in the right direction? Or did it require a perfectionist?
Clearly he won't settle for less than best in him employees--but viewing from the outside, it's hard to say if that helped or hindered Apple's success.
(Jobs) I loved Mac's in the 80's. High-res screens. Mice. Cool apps.
(No Jobs) I hated Mac's in the 90's. Slow. Ugly (my opinion). No cool apps. Crashed as often as PC's (I worked at a graphic design firm, macs at work, pc's at home)
(Jobs) I love Mac's in the...2000's(?). Beatiful. Fast. Tons of cool apps + lots of OSS stuff.
So, anecdotally I'd say that Jobs makes a huge difference. That being said, I think Apple would still have a good chance if the Jobs appointees stayed in power after he left.
Apple without Steve Jobs would be like what De Lorean was without John De Lorean. No one really wanted De Loreans after John De Lorean left either.
a leader stands on the shoulders of his people. some other chief could inspire the same level of achievement from his tribe; it would be a different style of company, maybe just as successful.
apple definitely needs inspired, talented, and charismatic leadership to survive in its niche; that only Jobs can provide it is doubtful. whether they can find that some one else who can do it is another question entirely.
+1 fashionably cynical
it's an interesting question to ask the fanboys and detractors out there: could Apple succeed and continue to innovative without Jobs at the helm?"
As the first result for a google search on mac fanboy, I feel qualified to answer this.
Answer yes. Last time Jobs left, Apple was left with mediocre CEOs (who seemed determined to run Apple to the ground). It entirely depends on who replaces Jobs.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Today, he has produced a new phone with deliberate limitations, much like the Mac of 22 years ago. There's the chance it won't take off. Will that destroy Apple? No. All businesses strike out sometime or other. The good businesses have more successes than failures.
If at this point, with the stock options stain, he has developed a sense of entitlement and therefore expects to get extra special treatment, then he will be a drag on the company, and he must go. The graveyards are full of tombs of irreplaceable men. Someone will step up and fill the void. As for innovation, do you think that the hordes of Apple designers and engineers are just a bunch of dodos?
Jobs is certainly a more charismatic figurehead than Gates or Ballmer, but plenty of companies do just fine without a reality distortion field, so why shouldn't Apple? I believe the key man behind Apple's current run of success may well be Jonathan 'Jony' Ive, not Steve Jobs.
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
I'm sure Steve's influence on the company's success is overrated. They did just fine without him, launching many successful products under the wise leadership of their brilliant interim CEOs.
In Pauly's worst-case-scenario, the SEC prosecutes Apple, and the board is forced to oust Jobs.
Forced, how? Because if they oust Jobs, Apple's future looks brighter? It's stock goes up? You're kidding, right?
meh...
/that is all
He's the asshole in charge that knows his shit. He worked in electronics parts retail and I bet none of the MBA groomed directors/boardmembers/whatevers had ever such jobs pertinent to their business. He gets things his way, and most of the time he is right. I am not apple fanboi, I use many platforms, but you can really admire his affinity for simple things. Its almost like zen. He is a role model too for many nerds in that way.
Without steve jobs they still have long way to go , but slope will change direction almost immediately.
He's got the stone and knowlege to do things. Not many directors/whatevers have such initmate knowlege of technology feel. I some respects he is like Kevin Mitnick - when they started questioning about his expolitation of computers he got emotional and cried. Whatever.
Without jobs apple is just another e-bit hardware maker.
Without a mouthpiece, a horn is still a horn....
Well, if we're going to play the game of hypotheticals, in the unlikely case Steve gets booted out, Steve could hypothetically start his own product design consultancy and consult for Apple.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
Wall Street will punish Apple in a huge way if Jobs goes, either by choice or force. For many people Jobs is Apple, and the useless analyst at places like Gartner will paint awesome forecast of doom when Jobs does go.
Just another x86 machine running FreeBSD
They would survive without Jobs since they now have some momentum in certain areas such as digital music and consumer electronics. As long as they make incremental, evolutionary improvements to their already-existing popular products, they will do fine. Now that they have a name with things like the iPod, they just need to make sure that it remains perceived as "cooler" than the other devices which means making small changes (bigger screens, touchscreens, higher capacity, smaller size, etc.). They might get in trouble if Jobs was replaced by someone who wanted to take the company in a "completely new direction". Just look at HP as an example of what new directions can do to a good company. Or look at what almost happened to Apple when they let Steve go before.
"Oh dear, she's stuck in an infinite loop and he's an idiot" -Prof. Farnsworth (Futurama)
"could Apple succeed and continue to innovative without Jobs at the helm?"
Continue to innovate? Last I checked, they don't really innovate now. Or does adding "i" before the word "phone" pass for innovation these days? Or is it enough just to have a lot of fanboys? (like Nintendo? *cough*)
Face it, all they've got is a pretty OS and a bunch of expensive, pretty hardware that's not much different from the rest of any given market, aside from the fact that they try to enslave you with it.
Now, excuse me while I kiss my karma goodbye...
One of these days, I'm going to cut you into little pieces.
He's good, he's smart, he's richer than Cresus. He's the master of drama and slick stuff that works. He did very little himself, however, except running a tight ship.
Apple is not a marketleader, save in one very popular segment. Don't mistake that for being IBM-- they're less than 1/10th the size. He knows how to talk to Hollywood, because he IS HOLLYWOOD-- that's where Pixar and Disney get their $$ from.
Apple ought to break up into three companies: entertainment systems, computer systems, and software. Each would work nicely on their own, and be able to then attack their respective marketplaces less encumbered by the other. If they actually opened up things (no, don't look at the iPhone stupidity), they'd get the best of both worlds, as their BSD 'pedigree' is a bit of a sham.
Jobs ought to retire while we still like him, after choosing someone without a pony tail (sorry, Jonathon).
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
If Steve Jobs left Apple now, it is conceivable that the first thing that would happen is that he would become CEO of Disney. If Steve Jobs became CEO of Disney, the first thing he would do is buy Apple Inc - business as usual. Why - quite simple. Sony makes films and also makes consumer electronics. There are considerable benefits in doing both, so by buying Apple Disney get in on the market. It is something called Vertical Integration - an old business model that coming back into fashion.
MAN!
I guess the Apple fanboys are out in force early.
Considering that the couple of folks that tried to clone the AppleII way back when were mercilessly hunted down and killed, (legalistically speaking), by Apple, and the short time Apple tried to license out their OS to clone makers was such a miserable failure due to their overly restrictive terms and high fees, I think my opinion is an honest one, not a troll.
Contrast to IBM and M$, who let the IBM PC clones freak flags fly, welcoming any and all third party developers and apps.
The attempt to quash my opinion by modding it down just validates it.
Somebody within Apple (strongly rumored to be Jobs) who has a lot of power has exceptionally high standards for design an usability, and this is why we get iPod+iTunes from Apple (killer app - even my little sister can rip CDs onto it) and Media Player+Some strange OLED WMA player from others.
Thats the key, somebody who will say no to an average product which would make a fair amount of money until its even better. If they lose that, they're the same as everyone else and they can't command premium prices anymore.
"XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, use more." - Anonymous Coward
Jobs himself seems to be clean with respect to the stock-options fiasco, so I have a hard time seeing how he could be "forced out". And it seems highly unlikely at this point that Apple's board (which is a lot friendlier toward Jobs than the board which ousted him way back when -- these days, Apple is controlled almost entirely by friends of Steve) would ever want to get rid of him in the absence of legal force requiring it. A better hypothetical to pose is what would happen if/when Jobs ever decides to retire.
The one thing Steve Jobs has been is ruthless in getting well-thought out design and integrated software projects working across multiple product teams, so that the final user experience is a unified one across most of Apple's products.
Compare this to Sony's reported "silo" approach to developing hardware, software and services, music and video--where many times individual managers within Sony actively squabble over the right approach to take, each fueled more by the individual needs of each division within Sony rather than the needs of the overall company. Such a "silo" mentality is inevitable at any large company unless someone at the top actively forces people to work together for the benefit of the entire company rather than for the individual gains of a particular division.
I don't know if there is a technologically savvy enough uber-geek asshole out there which could replace Steve Jobs if he were to leave Apple--which means Apple would eventually fall back on the habits it had under Spindler and Amelio, where every division internally competed without any sort of unified direction, beyond the imperitive that the sell something.
Apple would do just fine without Steve, because the management under him understands why the company has been successful since Steve returned, and has enough common sense not to change the formula unless its obvious that the change makes the company stronger. These are not stupid people.
At this point, Steve immerses himself in product development because he has fun doing it, not because he doesn't trust the people under him to do a good job without his involvement. Does he think his presence in the process makes the product better? Of course! Does he think Apple products would be second-rate without his presence? No -- he trusts his people and he trusts the culture.
Yes, the "media superstar CEO" part of the formula needs to change. But with smart people making the change, there's no reason why a comparatively "faceless" Apple can't be just as successful as the Apple of today that has Steve Jobs as its face. There are many ways to successfully market a product, a rock-star CEO is a marketing luxury, not a necessity.
But they need Jobs to sell the innovations to the public and the media. No one does that better. He gives Apple its style, not its technical ideas. Without him and without a worthy replacement (can anybody name a successor?), the same thing that happened to them in the Sculley era might repeat itself: riding a few years on the strength of their existing winners, then a slow decline until suffocation or rescue.
The main problem is that Jobs and the company are viewed primarily as symbiotic to one another. Can we really imagine Apple run by anybody else?
Even if they did have to oust him, what would keep him from consuting with Apple on new products, etc? Even if he couldn't do the keynotes, he'd sure vet whoever did. As a consultant, of course.
In the course of every project, it will become necessary to shoot the scientists and begin production.
Apple needs Steve Jobs like a fish needs a bicycle. I think. Or maybe like a woman needs a man. No, that isn't right... when a man loves a woman... ugh forget it
When he dies, they'll just replace him with another guy in a turtleneck. No one will know the difference. Mac users are more emotional than logical anyway. ;)
I'm an investor in Apple and I also work in the investment industry. My take is that Apple would lose about 40% of its market value immediately if Jobs got the boot. At today's price that's about $37 Billion of equity going poof, supposedly in the name of protecting Apple's shareholders. Sure, some or all of that value might come back eventually. But the point is, it's never going to happen. The regulators might find some way to publicly reprimand him, but he's too important to the company --- and he's added too much value to the company --- to be pulled out for this. Technically speaking it shouldn't matter, so there is something of an ethical dilemma. But the market ultimately is more practical than that. It wouldn't serve anyone's good. Of course, I may be completely wrong. But my portfolio hopes that I'm not.
I always mod up spelling trolls.
Those are very strange definitions for "success" and "launching". First, they haven't sold a single unit yet. Second, they won't sell any for another 6 months. Third, the response among potential purchasers went from zealotry to "Actually, that kind of sucks" in less time than it took to break an iPhone touchscreen. The iPhone (in its current form) is shaping up to be Apple's PS3.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
it's almost pointless to speculate, especially when all speculators are classified either as a "fanboy" or a "detractor".
can't we be trusted to make our wild, speculative guesses objectively?
One thing not mentioned is that AAPL has split twice since Steve Jobs returned. Both were 2:1. So if you bought 500 shares of AAPL back then at $10 a share ($5000), at yesterday's record close, your shares would have been worth $196,000. That's pretty good for 10 years. If you had bought MSFT at the same price, in 1997, it would be worth $124,000. Still pretty good.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
>
> Contrast to IBM and M$, who let the IBM PC clones freak flags fly, welcoming any and all third party developers and apps.
It was a weird time in the industry. Everyone was trying to figure out whether or not to go with open or closed architectures, and changing their minds about it every couple of years.
Compared to the Mac, the Apple ][ was an exceptionally open platform. It not only had slots, when you bought an Apple ][, you got the schematics for the hardware, and you got a commented disassembly of the ROM in your documentation. Whereas the Mac needed a special Programmer's Key just to reset the machine.
And as for IBM, the same IBM that let the clones out of the closet... was the same IBM that came up with the PS/2 and MCA (Micro Channel Architecture). Sure the second generation of IBM machines had slots and ran DOS (whether it was PC-DOS or MS-DOS :-), but what good were the machine's slots if you had to sign a licensing agreement just to build hardware for 'em?
it was the Lisa. A $10,000 flop, even if they tried to clear out the left overs as Mac XLs. The Mac was expensive compared to, say, the C64. The Mac became a project for Jobs after he was *forced out of the Lisa project*. His grandiose-ness-ess as a personality helps move product, but he's always been the leader of high priced flops that had technology that later payed off. See NeXTStep/OS X.
Even if the real Steve Jobs is fired, we'll always have The Fake Steve Jobs to inspire and comfort us.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
It is actually exciting to live in a time where we have a CEO like Jobs. He's the only example of a true living Willy Wonka in my lifetime.
I can't think of one more individual like Steve that inspires me to not only pull out my wallet and hand over thousands of dollars, but do it with a smile.
Do people really think Apple can maintain their mighty 3% marketshare without Steve Jobs?
It's like I've entered like a parallel universe where nobody remembers anything. Apple has ALWAYS struggled. Just because they succeed in one market doesn't mean they're some sort of divinely graced company. Even under Jobs' leadership they've had plenty of failures.
I used to think that Apple would be doomed without him, but since his decision to lock down the iPod to open development, I have to question that. Obviously, the guy makes incredibly stupid decisions at times. The things he brings are 1) salesmanship, 2) perfectionism in design and usage (empathy for users), and 3) motivator for engineers at Apple. His skills as a salesman are undisputed and rarely matched. As a chief visionary and leader of the design teams, he certainly has beneficial impulses in usability, but seems frightened of participating with other players in the industry, and tends to favor controlling the ENTIRE device, to the detriment of interoperability. He fails to understand the value that openness and loose controls bring to a product.As for his skills as a motivator, there are plenty of horror stories floating around that speak of the (hate to say mercurial, but there it is...) way he can deal with people at times, so I'd say there's certainly possibility for improvement in this regard. This is not to say that his motivation techniques haven't proved effective, but they certainly must have had their toll on the lives of the engineers beneath him...
I think there's definitely room for improvement, though it will be tough to find someone with such a powerful reality distortion field to give keynote presentations...
"I like systems, their application excepted", George Sand (French)
Apple without Jobs showmanship really wouldn't be the same. Apple is a company that profits by pushing envelope to develop products and then requiring high price for it. That business plan is inherently unstable yet Apple thrives with it. The only reason that works is because Jobs has a good technical background to define a direction for a product and the showmanship to get people excited about it. The iPhone announcement illustrates this beautifully. He took the spotlight off CES, had the attention of major news outlets, and generally had people excited with a product that might be fraught with too many limitations for its price. Steve Ballmer can't do that, but that is exactly Apple's bread and butter. I don't think Jobs has any formal college degrees, yet, he undeniably has the qualities needed to be a good "Apple" CEO. Apple with any other CEO would not be what is Apple today. We will one day have to accept that ineveitable change.
You don't have to be smart to use a Mac, you just have to be smart enough to buy one
Go play with your Zune - that's real open ain't it?
I meant his decision to lock down the iPhone, not the iPod. For the market the iPod is targetting as a media player, as long as you can load standard media files onto it, not being able to load new 3rd party software is not really an issue. For a smart phone, however, it's just plain wrong.
"I like systems, their application excepted", George Sand (French)
Is Jonathon Ives.
Not that Steve Wozniak wasn't a great engineer, but are you seriously suggesting that Apple would have been successful with him as CEO?
I'd be willing to bet that Apple already has a replacement or three for Jobs incubating in the warmth of Jobs' RDF. Apple has likely learned from their mistakes in the past what it takes to lead Apple, and Jobs' recent bout with cancer may likely have prompted some sort of replacements to be formed just in case for the future. Remember that younger guy who co-presented the 10 (well, sort-of) features in Leopard back in WWDC? I say that's not because Jobs couldn't do it all himself, it's because he needs to teach someone else how to conjure up a halfway-decent RDF.
Then put Woz at the wheel. The man is incredible, when you meet him you cant not like the man. He has great ideas, Is an incredible prankster (we need a CEO prankster to shake up the industry) and actually knows what he talks about.
Problem is, Woz will never EVER do it.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Expect him to be the successor if and when Steve Jobs steps down.
If you don't know who he is, he's the designer who came up with the iMac, iPod and iPhone designs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Ive
the same IBM that let the clones out of the closet...
If you jump in front of a parade that doesn't mean you organized it.
KFG
I seem to have adopted a new role over the past few days; Apple Fan boys Advocate. But is that about to come to an end?
You see, I think Apple without Steve Jobs is like Virgin without Richard Branson. Branson is the Spirit of the Virgin group, know for his wacky publicity stunts and appearing to be a harmless, benign hippy, while in reality, being an unlikely corporate billionaire. Indeed, one of his business rivals so underestimated him that he referred to Branson as "The grinning pullover".
Not that Jobs has that image, it's just the close association each man has with their companies product which is where I'm making the comparison. Branson is still pretty much Virgin, while Jobs is definitely Apple. He's the one who appears to have the vision and drive which is taking the company forward.
Apple without Jobs would definitely be perceived differently by consumers.
While of course Jobs gets (and deserves) tons of credit, what would Apple be like without its design wizard Jonathan Ive? Ive is responsible for the design of all of Apple's "iconic" products since the late 90's: the iMacs, the iPods and the iPhone. While Jobs may be the rock star CEO, Ive is the reason Apple designs sleek and chic products while Microsoft designs a brown boxy turd called the Zune.
I have to call that too. Show me a stock analyst that has revised outlook down since Tuesday -all have raised guidance significantly, while tech. writers I've read think it's great. Sure some point out valid (and annoying; screw Cingular) flaws, but that's not the main message. You must mean "mixed opinions" like those in the scientific community about global warming, i.e., you can find (or pay) a naysayer.
And whatever else is true, they must never ever have worked for HP
Freaking eel - Carly Fiorina heading up Apple? That would be a tragedy worthy of Shakespeare himself!
This is a tad OT but i thought I'd mention that for some reason the iPhone is available for pre-order at Amazon in Germany. It's 999 for the 8Gb model and already tops Amazon's top 10 sellers list. http://www.amazon.de/gp/bestsellers/ce-de/ref=pd_t s_c_th_head/028-5061788-4808524
Contrast to IBM and M$, who let the IBM PC clones freak flags fly, welcoming any and all third party developers and apps.
Uh, not hardly. They had a proprietary BIOS and they wouldn't share it with anyone. Compaq reverse-engineered the BIOS so as to make clone, and IBM sued them for copyright infringement. Seeing as this was pre-DMCA, and Compaq did a good job of clean-room reverse engineering, they won the lawsuit, and were able to start manufacturing IBM-compatible machines.
That wouldn't have been the end of it, except IBM made a strategic error in not signing an exclusive license with Microsoft for MS-DOS. So Microsoft started selling DOS to Compaq and all the other clone makers that cropped up like weeds. Now the thing that made a PC a PC was not IBM, but Microsoft, and overnight control of the market switched to MS. Oh, and the market exploded as the clones became cheap and popular.
Make no mistake about it: IBM "allowed" clones only under duress. It was only after being beaten up badly in the 80s and early 90s that IBM started to learn some lessons about openness.
The enemies of Democracy are
Uh... the programmer's key was not a key like you insert into a lock. It was a key like a key on your keyboard. It was a button that stuck out the side. And there were two of them: one to reset, one to drop into the debugger. Those two buttons persisted on all Mac hardware until well into the reign of the PowerMac G4.
Perhaps you're thinking of the custom case cracking tool that the early classic-style Macs required to get inside the case....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
A cuddly baby tapir.
... and then they built the supercollider.
A rhetorical question for someone with a legal or serious finance background...
Just how bad (under what conditions) would this backdating issue have to get before the board would HAVE to let Steve go?
While much could be uncovered, what has been uncovered seems to be relatively minor and Apple appears to be dealing with the issue in a forthright manner... Of course appearances can be deceiving - and investigations are undertaken in order to uncover such things...
I certainly don't want to make light of this - while several mil isn't much to his Steveness, it is still a chunk of change... But really, this doesn't seem THAT bad...
What am I missing?
Woz never left Apple. He is still on the payroll.
Steve Jobs is a great businessman... he finds ways to make money on dud products through clevelr marketing (mac's are easier--even twhen they aren't), sleek designs... (look, an iMac!), and product lock-in. He's a master at getting the highest price for his products that he can, which is the best way to make money, according to traditional microeconomics.
But, as a geek, he sucks... instead of wanting to change the world and let the world share and expand in his success, he only seems to care about the bottom line. His products are so expensive, that he has trouble getting market share (iPod excepted). He closes up the systems so tightly (afraid of losing his precious monopolies), that no one can work with his stuff unless you beg the grand master for his favor. These closed philosophies further erode Apple's market share, preventing it from once again being the dominant giant in the computer industry.
When Jobs hired Scully from Pepsi, Jobs asked Scully whether he would rather sell sugar water or change the world. Twenty years later, it seems that Jobs is only interested in selling the electronic equivilant of sugar water--sweet, but lacking any substance.
Is there a future for apple WITH Steve?
He tends to get them moving the right direction, then derails the train along the way. Hes a good 'starter' with big ideas, but a good long term pilot for the day to day grind..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
> ...perhaps a non-fascist technology company that embraces third party developers and applications, rather than a company that engages in propritary pogroms against any and all that think they can add to the glory that is Apple?
/geeks that want to be able to hack something to death just for hte sake of doing it are an insignificant and thus unimportant segment of the market. Nobody cares if YOU don't buy their products... it's the gazillion 18-40 year olds with skads of disposable income they're after.
Once again... who cares what YOU personally want? The 10 of you
After the shocked reaction to the iPhone, various Wall Street institutions have done their best to play up the options issue, claim Steve Jobs is about to go on a leave for health reasons, and generally spew FUD from every direction. As a general rule, if you introduce a story from Bloomberg or the WSJ having financial implications for a stock just days before an earnings report (next Wednesday for Apple), you're likely just carrying water for someone with a special agenda.
NASDAQ up.
AAPL down.
Good team work guys!
he doesn't "do" anything with regard to the manufacturing of product. He, like gates is just a slick salesman.
would be Apple Computer Inc.
Why exactly would the board be "forced" to fire Jobs? This isn't written in the rules anywhere. Companies just do it as a symbolic thing -- "Look stockholders, we got rid of the guy who caused the problems. Things will be better now."
In this case, I doubt there will be an angry mob of stockholders demanding his resignation. They all know his ability to demo things at Macworld is half the reason their stock is 6x what it was a few years ago.
Maybe they'll fine him some. It'll effectively be a slap on the hand, as he has a boat load of money and he's gonna be even richer after they sell a few million iPhones and the stock goes up even more. But I don't see why he'd have to leave.
Just a question: why did you use all those extra syllables to create that horrible word, when it would be easier (and more correct) to simply use the word "legally"?
... and then they built the supercollider.
Al Gore!
... and then they built the supercollider.
As Jerry Pournelle (long of Chaos Manor from Byte Magazine in ages past) has noted
The LA Times has a We Hate Gates series. Most of the press seems to have a similar crusade against Apple. One wonders if some press consortium has sold Apple stock short and is working to make it come true?
Because whatever irregularities in the stock option of many years ago, Jobs has taken Apple from a struggling company to a major player, and the stockholders were rewarded with a 1200% stock value increase.
Why regulations designed to protect minority stockholders are now being used to smear Jobs is a story someone with more resources than I have should dig into. I doubt it's really coincidence.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Skadet, your homepage weblink goes to a defunct spam autogenerated website. Would have loved to see the original.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Apple outed jobs before and it nearly destroyed the company. Jobs may be an ego-manic but so far he has been the most successful in recognizing and exploiting the innovators at Apple.
The 5200/6200 was basically an LC475 motherboard with a PPC chip jury-rigged on it. Yes, a M68K motherboard, with a PPC chip thrown on in the 68LC040's place. This happened on Spindler's watch. This is why he is synonymous with the almost-doom of Apple.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
The iPhone (in its current form) is shaping up to be Apple's PS3.
/// was Apple's PS3.
I thought the Apple
Oh, really now. Why is it that everyone always seems to start dropping their panties the minute somebody mentions the name Steve Jobs? I mean, I'm as much (or more) of an Apple (and Steve Jobs) fanboy as anybody you care to name, but the fact of the matter is that it's quite well documented that Steve Jobs can be a complete and utter dickhead and/or spiteful jackass when it suits him. Not that he has anything even remotely approaching a monopoly on that sort of behavior.
Is he a genius? In some ways, yes, in others, no. But very often, Steve has proven that concepts which really ought to be, and sometimes *are*, obvious to most people are very often concepts which they will either willfully ignore, or are too terrified to embrace. What makes Steve special is the fact that he doesn't accept the current state of technology (ever), and he brooks very little in the way of compromise when it comes to product design. As the saying goes, Steve wants everything he has a hand in making to come out "insanely great". Sometimes he misses the mark, but he's right more often than not because it's clear that he gives a shit about the product (and in his own small way, the people) rather than just wanting to make a load of greenbacks. Not that Steve doesn't want to make money, because obviously he has, but he does it by making some really cool shit happen.
Aside from the considerable mystique that Steve has built up over the years, it really wouldn't be all that hard to replace him. In fact, I will only semi-jokingly propose that Apple replace Steve Jobs with *me*. Seriously. I'd love to have the job, and I'd even do it for a modest salary because I think it would be one of the coolest jobs on the face of the Earth and I don't really *need* all that much money, in the end.
Here's what you need to be the next Steve Jobs:
1. The ability to see beyond what technology has become to what it ought to be. This is the most essential aspect. Steve Jobs ranks up there with the greatest figures in the history of computing when it comes to a vision about what the role of technology should be in our lives.
2. A black mock turtleneck. Simple, understated, not quite elegant, highlights your face on camera, and makes you look slimmer, to boot.
3. Friends and associates like Steve Wozniak, Jonathan Ive, Andy Hertzfeld, Avi Tevanian, etc (not to mention a whole bunch of people over at Pixar). Go take a look at the list of people who have worked for Apple and/or Pixar and what they've done. It's freaking shocking. Apple alone has, over the years, made both Microsoft and Google combined look like a bunch of kindergarteners. And Pixar? Do I even need to go into it?
4. The willpower not to accept a compromised design. Don't settle for less than "insanely great". Money isn't everything, you know, and it's not even the only thing.
5. And, of course, target the high end of the market, and make no apologies for it. Quality over quantity.
That's it, really. It's not all *that* difficult. Unfortunately, even most people involved with technology tend to forget that it's not all about the actual techie bits. It's also about design and philosophy, and a whole lot of other fuzzy ideas about Life, the Universe, and Everything that most brainiac gearheads have a difficult time wrapping their eggheads around. Those of us who can *do* exist, though we may be a extremely small subset of the population.
writes in the context of Jobs' latest success in launching the iPhone
I realize the Slashdot community believes that the sun rises and sets out of Steve Jobs' pants, but aren't we going a bit far here? Not only is the iphone not yet in production or available for sale, it doesn't even have FCC approval to be made or sold yet. Then there is the matter of that little debate over the name.
Calling the launch of the iPhone a success is almost as over zealous as most OLPC stories are on here.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
Without his Reality Distortion Field, people will figure out they sell high-priced doodads they can get elsewhere for less. No magic -- just a really effective salesman.
"eave imaginative thought to those with the capacity for it."
Do you mean the Linux geeks?
I think Phil Schiller, while not quite the rock star Jobs is, would be a good replacement. He knows the Apple way, is an integral part of all Jobs's presentations and plays his part well. I'm certain he has the same commitment to quality that Jobs has and he's a pretty good showman in his own right. I think he'd be able to fill Jobs's shoes pretty well
Good post.
My sense is that in some ways as the overall telecommunications market converges over IP, Apple is facing many of the same stresses with regard to openness as Apple is now. It will eventually have to face up to the diversity of an already oversaturated market and the trend to more open standards necessary for interoperability in a multinetworked environment. I think this is why the iPhone fiasco seems to have created a disturbance in the force for many inhabitants/captives of the Apple universe. It creates a realization that simply being "cool" and PR savy doesn't necessarily equate to strategic longterm viability and market influence in a universe of coliding universes. The iPhone fiasco only drew attention to the strategic weakness of proprietary platforms such as Apple's. If its gravitational pull is small a proprietary platform has little chance to hold its elements in orbit.
In this sense Cisco with its enormus size is much more stragically and centrally placed. Its size provides the gravitational pull in the marketplace and the fact that given its position is essentially pure networking and hence, TCP/IP at its core. Hence, it is platform agnostic and able to coexist with multiple platforms that it draws into its orbit. Having TCP/IP at its core creates a more general form of an "open platform" than is available to Apple.
My sense is that overtime, "smaller" players, such as Apple, will only become buisness elements embedded in much larger corporate entities either merged or in strategic alliances. Apple doesn't extert enough influence in telecommunications to alter the direction of the overall market over the longer term. The iPhone "launch" shows the Apple's weakness and just how constrained and squeeze it is in attempting to enter the larger telecommuncations market. I do wish them luck as a consumer, we need as many choices as possible. However, also as a consumer, I must also recognize that with convergence comes the essential need to scale up in order to address market diversity and interoperability. Otherwise, I will simply be hostage to $500 phones (that do not even include the fees to access the network).
A more interesting question is whether ATT, which now owns Cingular and upon which Apple's phone will live or die, will use its constraint on Apple to ultimately swallow it whole or just place it firmly in orbit, as ATT girds to battle other corporate titans, who seek global control in a converging telecommunications/multimedia universe. In that sense who replaces Jobs might be a moot question, as the next CEO might be simply a VP in a much larger enterprise. My own sense is that this won't happen over the next few years, as the air must clear to determine how much damage has been done to Apple's financials over the stock options problems.
I think there's a little confusion here. I think many analysts understate the sheer visual appeal of this device and its user interface design.
I went and did some homework. I looked at the user interfaces, design and features of the Palm Treo (PalmOS and Windows versions), Blackberry Pearl and Sidekick III. I believe these products to be representative of the broader market. What I found out is that the iPhone has few truly unique features, but they are refined to a smooth polish that the competition can only envy. For example, the web browser is a full powered program that uses a big screen and responds to smooth gestures that make web browsing natural. The other phones have web browsers, most of which don't work well, and none of which are as slick or have as big a screen.
Then I looked at prices. $499 is not an unprecedented price for a brand new phone design. The Nokia N95, for instance, sells for about $ 700 without contract, or about the same as the iPhone probably would. The Treo sold for $399 with contract when it was first introduced.
The reason this is all confusing is that the cellphone industry on the whole has not had a radical new platform introduced in some time, so prices have settled down. The iPhone is a new category of product and so it starts expensive, like all innovative electronics, and goes down in time.
Now, I don't remember the exact market share figures. I think smartphones were something like 10% of the market and so the iPhone would have to take 10% of the smartphone market to get 1% of the overall market. Right now, if my memory serves, Microsoft has 45% or so of the market, with most of the rest shared between Palm and RIM.
Finally, I listened to the public. There's a good percentage of the public that really wants this phone. The grumbling over price is remarkably similar to the grumbling over the iPod's price, which was $399 - just $100 less. I've noticed that often I will react to something initially by carping about the price, and then I'll think for a while and say, well, you can do a lot with this thing, and then in the end buy it. I'm sure many people are facing the same situation with the iPhone.
Now, since the best selling Palm phone is $200 and the Blackberry Pearl is $200, both with contract, we can see that the iPhone is quite a bit more expensive than the other options. This is the only thing protecting Palm and the consumer RIM purchasers because the iPhone's capabilities absolutely crush both phones. At the same time, I look at the greater capabilities and realize that personally, yes, it would be worth $600 to have something that has a "real" web browser, has super-convenient controls, a gorgeous music player and even has a non-obnoxious voicemail implemetation. So as I have said elsewhere on slashdot, as long as it has SSH, I'm in.
I think a lot of people will make this same decision. However, it seems dicey to make 10% of the smartphone market, seeing that the competition is so much cheaper. However, Steve is predicting those sales by the end of 2008. I predict the iPhone will sell well but not outstandingly during its first six months, and then around January 2008 the price will go down to $250 with contract, and at that price it would easily get 10%, maybe even 25% of the smartphone market.
I guess whether it will be a hot seller or not depends on your definition of hot seller. The number of people who really want this thing, and at a high price, indicates to me that it will sell well enough to be a modest success at first, and then break away in the next calendar year.
Stilll, that's just one man's opinion. In the end, you are right that we don't really know how well this will do until the launch. But I think the signs are overwhelmingly positive because of the reactions from consumers.
I think the biggest obstacle is not the price, but consumer hatred of Cingular. The people who were grumbling about price were kind of half-hearted because they knew this thing has a lot of
.... Not ripe enough?
Sorry if that left a sour taste in your mouth!
Isn't a little early to call something that isn't yet shipping a success?
Support SETI@home
History has always proved you can sell a (crappy) product if you are a good salesman & got it packaged beautifully.
Jobs isn't going anywhere soon. By the time he goes, he will have driven Apple so far in the right direction that it won't matter. And that will go well; an organization like Apple is not made of one person.
You are feeling very sleepy... repeat after me:
Steve Jobs is a superior race of omnicient overload and will rule Apple forever.
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
And look how IBM is doing in the PC business nowadays. Oh, that's right, they aren't.
Besides, the whole IBM clones thing was an accident, and by no means intentional on IBM's side.
Has Steve Jobs become the Willy Wonka of the Computer Industry?
;)
Yes I'm refering to the childrens story/movie "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", but think about it... sure Willy Wonka was a very private individual, but there are quite a few parallels that can be made between Steve/Apple and Willy/Wonka's Chocolate Factory
They both started off famously...
Steve was forced out, and the competition started to catch up supposedly (I think probably, but thats a matter of opinion) by stealing ideas from Apple
vs.
Wonka's chocolate ideas were stolen by the competition so he closed the factory
When Steve was brought back he brought back his new company NEXT with him, to which much of OS X can apparently be accredited
vs.
Wanka Reopened his factory with the help of "Oompa Loompas" he brought back with him from where he dissappeared while his factory was closed
and now we get to the storied question, who will replace Steve Jobs (Willy Wonka) after he is gone?
or better yet, is Steve/Apple going to do a lottery to find a successor? (-- ok this is a joke question, but it helps to point out the issue
Well on the mac, the mac 512K, the mac+, the SE and possibly other early models, the programmers switch was a pair of detachable buttons that came in the box with the computer. It wasn't installed by default and users generally didn't install it unless they needed to use a debugger. Later models like the Classic and the Classic II pictured at wikipedea had it integrated. Since the early macs were so small, the power switch on the back of the machine was just about as easy to reach as a reset switch on the back of the left side.
one almost does believe in the reality distortion field theory. most of apples products are SHIT: poorly built, badly designed and not that much better, if not worse, then the competition.
when they are better, it is in nonfunctional suface looks, exactly like selling sugar water (Jobs famously remarked to a ceo he hired from pepsi, you wanna change the world or sell sugar water)
call me troll flamebait whatever: I think apple products suck.
And I could give you a long list of particulars.
but I'm not interested in talking to the apple brainwashed; I'm interested in talking to people who are sane - what is it about apple and jobs that makes people loose their common sense ? is it the same thing that makes people buy cruddy harley davidson cycles over hondas that run ? is it the same thing that makes corp execs resist govt mandated enviromental rules, even when those rules will result in profit ? is it the natural human impulse to not only not admit to mistakes, but to dig oneself in deeper (bush iraq come to mind)
I assume the journalists prostitutes are just morons who know nothing, and have to fill space on deadline, and the graphics artists know nothing abut computers - they just are , jsutifiably, to busy to learn a new OS to switch their software, but wht about normal people ?
Context is important here. To some extent Steve Jobs is necessary to
to offset the other maniacs driving the tech industry.
I think that the real question is something like:
What would happen if RMS choked to death on a sandwich and Linus decided
that he was tired effing with the Linux kernal, Bill Gates decided to screw the
public some other way and Steve Jobs got fired.
Having removed the manic drivers from the playing field you are left with looking
at the products in hand.
Microsoft will probably self-destruct over time no matter what Bill Gates does. It will take a long time for this to happen
so in a way it should be of no great concern to the faithful. In trying to follow everyone else its lost its way.
The Open Source movement has a chance but it has to find a viable economic model to
go along with the idea of freedom software. Economics isn't RMS's strong suit. He's basically
a software socialist and can't seem to see any other possibilities.
Apple has good products that its growing base of faithful customers like. It is diversifying
into consumer electronics and recognizes that more buttons and features does not make
a better product. As long as they keep a focus on end user functionality they won't need Jobs.
Remembering when Steve left the first time and what Microsoft has been like without Bill Gates, I would say that Apple HAS a future without Jobs, but it will be an "alternate" future.
Unless Steve hand-picks a protege who has vision and isn't afraid to express it, Apple will lose its will to live when Steve leaves/dies.
Personally, I'd prefer to see Steve hire someone from the Open Source community when the time comes, not because I think Apple needs to open source more software, but because what Apple will need in those straits is the kind of maverick independence and free-thinking that is the life's blood of the OSFS movement.
What's differentiated Apple from other companies is the hacker spirit and vision, the ability to say "we're small and maneuverable, and we CAN do some amazing stuff where other companies would be hamstrung by bureaucracy," and then going ahead and DOING it.
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
Without a doubt Steve Jobs has - through a complex mixture of personal will, creativity, foresight, leadership and absolute luck - deftly driven Apple's good fortune. But he hasn't done it all himself, of course. This guy's had incredibly good luck fall in his lap. Witness Wozniak, Pixar, Disney's funding of Toy Story, Apple's willingness to purchase NeXT in 1996 (in a $400-million deal when NeXT was essentially out of luck with no prospects), etc. To his credit, Jobs' knew how to leverage that good luck to birth revenue and success. But even when Jobs took over Apple from CEO Gil Amelio in 97, it was Amelio's 18 months of turnaround work that set the stage for Apple's comeback, not necessarily any super bright new idea Jobs brought to the table, wasn't it?
You know, there is a reason the company is not called Apple Computer anymore.
That was hilarious.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
I doubt Apple would be as good of a company without Jobs. What would be the reason for removing him from the CEO postion? If they do, I'm sure he'll stay involved somehow.