Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs's stepping down as CEO of Apple raises of a lot of interesting questions in technology and the history of technology. News accounts have reported a great deal of affection for Steve Jobs, probably more than any other business man of our time. Why do we feel so passionately about him? We probably couldn't even name the CEO of other companies like IBM or Microsoft or even Google. It is interesting that Jobs was not a typical engineer and had more of a liberal arts background than an engineering background. (How many engineers would think to attack a competitors product by saying "it had no poetry"? Here is a story about Jobs's passion for detail. Here is an anecdote from a reporter about Jobs. Here is a story from Fortune Magazine about Steve Jobs and how Apple works. Here is a description of some of his patents. Here is Jobs's introduction of the MAC in 1984--the crowd reaction gives you a sense of how radical it was for its time. Here is an early side by side look at Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Also here is a classic: Steve Jobs's 2005 commencement speech at Stanford University.

One interesting theory about the reason Jobs stepped down is that he did so to make sure that Tim Cook the new CEO didn't leave to go to another company. This theory says that as long as Tim Cook was just the acting CEO, other companies would try to lure him away from Apple and with Jobs stepping down, Tim Cook is less likely to be tempted away from Apple. One piece of evidence in support of this theory is that Apple granted Tim Cook options for 1 million shares of Apple stock (worth a third of a billion dollars) with one hitch: Cook has to stay around for ten years. So the story behind Steve Jobs's stepping down from Apple may not be that Steve Jobs is irreplaceable, but that Apple doesn't want to lose a very competent, but less charismatic leader.