A Device that Loves You

Hi! I am Still Here!!

With the accolades piling on after Steve Jobs announced his retirement from his active role as Apple's CEO, I could not help but feel that I have been reading eulogies. But, to state the obvious and to paraphrase Mark Twain, Jobs' earthly departure has been greatly exaggerated.

More platitude

Jobs is known, today, for a string of i(Stuff) after he took back the rein as head of Apple. To that point, I think the most insightful comment is AEI's observation that his success is built on a series of spectacular failures. For old timers in Silicon Valley, Jobs' original notoriety was for supposedly "being inspired/borrowed/stole" the GUI (graphic user interface) and mouse design after visiting Xerox PARC to create the original Mac. On that score, one cannot help but wonder if we would still be using command line interface today without him.

On Jobs-ness

I was watching two kids playing with an iPad recently. Predictably, I marveled at the ease in which these kids, with an average age of 3, interacted with the device. What is the magic sauce? Design is important, but there are plenty of studios with world class designers. Interface is important, but it is actually a well analyzed science with its own conferences. Technology is important, but nobody buys Apple for its CPU speed or new interface cards. All of these seem to be necessary but insufficient conditions. Then, it struck me that what makes a Steve Jobs device compelling is its laser-like narrow focus on the actual user at the risk of excluding everyone else. It does not try to play nice with your corporate IT support team. It does not like talking with your friend's Android device. It actually does not do a lot of stuff that most technology types would consider important. On the other hand, I have noticed in conversations with Apple users that it often sound a bit like a love-affair.

Maybe that is the point. Steve Jobs builds a device that loves you and expects nothing less in return.


* NY Times on Steve Jobs: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/j/steven_p_jobs/index.html

* Steve Jobs: America's Greatest Failure http://www.aei.org/article/104051

* Jobs the innovator (not inventor): http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/apples-jobs-should-be-remembered-product-innovator-not-inventor/2011-08-29?utm_medium=nl&utm_source=internal

* Working with Jobs: http://venturebeat.com/2011/08/25/michael-dhuey-apple-engineer/