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Wozniak: I Would Consider Returning To Apple
Google85 writes "Steve Wozniak told Reuters he would consider returning to an active role at Apple, the company he co-founded, and believes the consumer electronics giant could afford to be more open than it is."
Sorry to be obtuse, but has he done anything of note recently? I only know him from his achievements in the distant past...
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
See? Not everyone associated with Apple has the same mantra as Steve Job's closed off bricks of user inaccessibility and locked down interfaces that tell the user they can't modify their own hardware or software without voiding a warranty. It took the judicial system to rule that it was legal to jail break an iPhone. I have a feeling that if Woz was still a major player in Apple's development and ways of thinking, this would have never been necessary. I say kick that turtle-neck wearing skeleton outta there and reinstate Woz as new Apple overlord! ;)
"I hope you know how very lucky you are to know me, because I am so incredibly incredible."
"I'd consider it, yeah," the 60-year-old computer engineer said in an interview, when asked whether he would play a more active role if asked.
Someone asked him the question so he answered it.
1. Steve jobs retires or dies from his poor health.
2. The woz takes over at apple, rebuilds the OS licensed as GNU/FOSS.
2. ???
3. Profit!!!
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
apple needs to be open to more hardware choice.
What is so bad about makeing it easier to swap the HDD in the imac / mini?
What is so bad about desktop a system with imac power levels without a build in screen?
If apple does not want mini towers then lower the price of the base mac pro to $1500-$2000 or have a bigger mini system with a 7200RPM HDD at least (320GB-500GB) or SDD. Better video then on board video / intel video. AMD new on board video system in the cpu may be ok and desktop ram with 4gb at the base. Also have at least a desktop i5. NO i3 or i3 on board video.
But if apple where to have a mini tower have it with desktop i5 or i7, 2-4 HDD slots / bays, 4-6 ram slots (based on what chip set is used), pci-e X16 video slot + pci-e X16 slot (X4 speed) or TB port. Maybe have a higher system with room for dual video cards or just X16 + X16 (does not need to full X16 speed) + TB port.
and 1-2 ODD bays.
or just open OSX to non apple hardware.
Woz is a technical guy and is no longer needed there. Jobs only ever cared about the user experience and that's why Apple dominates.
I hate being bipolar; it's awesome!
just post the damn url, i'm not going to click on a tinyurl link and get goatse'd or something...
3. Wozniak continued and continues knowing this as his Apple wages/shares provide him a tidy sum.
I agree with your first two statements; but the one about the money is absurd.
Even when he worked full-time at Apple, he INSISTED that his salary be no more than one of their typical engineers.
His millions has come primarily from Apple stock, and some shrewd investments he has done over the years.
Too bad he didn't get that Gulfstream deal like Jobs, though; he would've gone for that one!
Many consumers like Apple products because they make it easy to buy and consume content without glitches, but the closed system that makes this possible locks customers and media and software providers into Apple's proprietary iTunes online store and iOS operating system. Some critics compare it to Microsoft in that regard.
Nobody asked the question, the reporter just made it up.
The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
And not Apple?
1. Who says he hasn't?
/// design!). And, everyone forgets that he is the principal designer of the Apple ][ gs; a machine that was sadly just a little too late to the party, but a DAMNED fine update!
2. Knowing Woz since 1978, I can tell you that he is one of the most OPEN persons on the planet. If you ask him a question, he will answer, unless the answer requires divulging a secret R&D project, and then he can hardly contain himself! I remember having some phone conversations back around 1979 regarding some work on what was to eventually become the Lisa (yes, the article was dead wrong. He worked on the Lisa project, as well as the pretty much only designer of the Apple 1 and ][, as well as the principal naysayer regarding the reliability-killing overcomplexity of the Apple
And knowing Woz for as long as I have, I can also tell you that his answer was NOT "off-the-cuff". He puts thought into every question in every situation. That's just the the "engineer" in him.
First, some background from me (macs4all) :
I just emailed Woz with an email I entitled "Storm a-brewin' over at Slashdot."
His instantaneous reply follows. When I asked him if I could Re-post it here, his reply was "PLEASE do that for me!"
So, here it is, straight from the Woz's Mouth, so to speak:
When I first saw the headlines it was just another totally wrong one. I did an interview in Brighton the other day with this female Reuters journalist. The entire interview was about Fusion-io, at the SQLbits European conference, with myself and David Flynn, our CEO. At the end she asked about whether I'd return to Apple and I thought and said "no" and told her some reasons it was impossible. So she sits there and asks "with all the exciting things going on at Apple, would you consider going back?"...I said "yes" but explained that it could not happen. What you read is based on the one "yes". So I didn't read a single article about it. I was on planes and am writing a speech now for a humanist award I'm receiving tonight in Boston and don't have time to get into this one. Too bad.
This reporter took notes by hand but I think the Fusion-io publicist Shannon might have recorded it.
I know Woz had an aircraft accident that resulted in brain damage. I have only ever found interviews and videos of him AFTER that accident. Does anyone know what he was like BEFORE the accident and how big a change in personality/problem solving he experienced?
Yes. I have known him since 1978.
It took him nearly two years after the plane accident to "snap out of if". in fact, a friend of mine that talked with him at a computer convention in Ohio about 3 or 4 years after the accident told me that Woz told a group of people at that convention that he was back to work at Apple, going through the motions every day, when suddenly, he looked down at his Hamilton Pulsar watch and realized that he had been in a fog for the past two years.
According to his comments, after that, he was "back to his old self".
I have had many, many email and phone conversations over the years with Woz, and he is just as sharp now as he was before the accident. Which, BTW, is pretty damned sharp!
What economy of scale? Your dim little mind is aware that Apple is currently one of the largest if not the largest PC maker in the world right? They have even beaten Dell once (haven't checked if Dell or HP has taken the lead again).
So what economy of scale? Someone going to sell Mac clones so successfully they outperform the largest makers by such a magnitude they can demand even sharper prices then Apple already can?
Actually, in your haste to comeback with a witty put down (I'll grant you managed to be half way there) you failed to consider the PC market is much vaster than Apple alone. That's where the economies of scale come to play. Adding the ability to run OSX as well as Windows merely increases the number of units to amortize the HW development costs and increases the buy quantity.
While Apple is certainly large enough to command good prices, there are plenty of PC OEMS who build enough machines to get good prices as well; and they can spread engineering and developmental costs over a number of units beyond just those for one manufacturer. If Apple were to license their OS they'd have to make it work on generic MBs or provide the tools needed to adapt them to OSX (much as independent hackers did to create the Hackintosh). Imagine if Dell could load OSX on a $500 Insperion - the $900 Macbook looks real expensive; especially since Apple really sells the OS experience. If you can get that on a cheaper clone, even with a lower build quality, it becomes harder to justify buying Apple hardware. Once OSX is running on may cheap laptops and desktops Apple will come under significant pricing pressure (and have fewer units to amortize their costs as clones cut into their sales); as well as support issues as hardware combinations proliferate. Neither is in Apple's best interest; especially since they have managed to maintain premium pricing by avoiding becoming a commodity like PCs.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.