*Note* October 6th, 2011
With the sad news that Mr. Jobs has passed away I feel it necessary to add my condolences to the families both intimate and corporate.
Despite my Vitriol below I have admired and desired nearly every product Apple put out under the tutelage of Mr. Jobs. I still stand by my statement that he and the company had (and most likely have permanently ) forgotten their free for all, crash the gates beginnings.
Thank you Mr. Jobs, for all of it.
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Whether you are a fan of Apple or, more specifically, of Jobs and his dramatic itinerant tenures at the helm, together they have created some of the most technologically innovative and visually stunning products. When a new Apple product is announced you either sit on pins and needles waiting for yours to arrive or pine for a version by someone other than ‘The Fruit’ –(usually too long and without the panache Job’s baby has).
Apple has always had a passionate community who extolled the virtues of the products and who built support infrastructures, on their own time, where millions evangelized for them, keeping the faith and business in the black. Apple owes its very current day existence to this formidable army of crack volunteers, for without them Job’s company would only be an asterisk in the book of computer and online media history – just above Be OS and just below the Amiga.
I was amongst the faithful for years, helping out with local user groups and brandishing the rainbow apple on my board, skates and car. My distance from the group simply came as my professional life led me into working with applications and programs that did not –then- run on the Macs. I still proudly maintain my Powerbook 540 (active matrix screen!), I still use my 2nd generation iPod nearly every day and dream of the day I too can work on an Apple widescreen display. My point being that while I drifted from a daily use of apple products, I always maintained a respect or perhaps a worshipful admiration for Mr. Jobs and his company.
The last couple of weeks of embarrassingly draconian actions by Jobs have left me wondering - When did Steve Jobs become Mr. Cold Miser?
Mr. Jobs history of secrecy and his reputation as a demanding and harsh task master is well discussed in the media, but the recent actions attributed to him have caused me to rethink my opinion and to hold my wallet. From the seemingly random approval or rejection of iPhone apps, to the letting loose the dogs of war –and the police – on the Gizmodo editor and most recently attempting to trademark iPhone icons (the style, look, etc), I have to wonder if Jobs has lost his mojo.
Updated 5-22-----------
Steve Jobs now procliams to be the tech worlds moral compass http://huff.to/bzBz6o
My issue with this new side of Jobs is not his anti porn stance persay, but his presumption to to limit an internet acess tool into a moral compass. I wonder if there is an app for that? (Actually, there is)
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I have previously commented on what I have begun to see as the danger in letting one charismatic company become the sole – for all intensive purposes – conduit for which mobile media is accessed and viewed. To be sure the iPod/Phone/Tunes business model made the mp3 and podcasting a viable social movement and I feel we are better –(and better informed) for it. I wonder aloud if Jobs has succumbed to the same claustrophobic paranoia Adam Curry -(father of the Podcast movement)- is fabled for.
Don't you remember when you built illegal Blue Boxes?
Hey Steve, Baby- Don’t you remember when you were a teenage anarchist?
