Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Rocky Bleier]

I asked him "Do you have any proof or is it just blind irrationality?" and he posted about Jobs being a bad daddy.

Well, I wasn't sure what it was you were asking for proof of, but I think he responded before he offered the bad daddy comment.

[whodean]

The guy brought you cool gadgets and phones with shiny buttons.

Angry old fart time. I realize there is a big anti-Apple movement, many Apple believers can be arrogant and easily mocked, but focus on that and you will miss the true innovations made over the years.

Jobs was integral with IT history, he is personally responsible for revolutionizing GUIs, his contribution led to huge productivity improvements in many industries. He was indeed a genius.

[Rocky Bleier]

It's like George Carlin said before he died. America is going to hell in a handbasket, but people don't care because they have all these fancy gadgets to distract them.

[Jamie H]

Apparently whodean wants me to be a patent attorney.

All I said was that tech patents are a dime a dozen (I even have one that I think is pretty stupid) and that whoever the boss is ALWAYS tacks his name onto the patent so that he gets credit. It's not very hard to see that Jobs could easily have tacked his name onto hundreds of patents that were created by employees in his company, whether they were really his idea or not.

The main thrust of what I'm saying is, listing the number of patents a person has tells you exactly zero about them or their level of innovation, because if you are in charge, you can easily manipulate things so that your name is on whichever patents your company gets. What are the employees going to do, complain?

As for the personal stuff, Jobs is hardly the only asshole to be successful at business. I just find it amusing to see everyone lionizing a guy that pretty much everyone who was involved in his life said was at best a childish jerk and at worst a complete and utter dick.

I laugh when people talk about how much he "changed the world". As if computers, smart phones, and MP3 players, and basically the entire internet wouldn't exist without Apple. Apple is a brand, and if they weren't around, some other brand would step up and fill the "luxury tech" niche. Would they be as good as Apple? Probably not, but people's lives would hardly be altered in any perceivable way. In fact, during a good chunk of the tech revolution, Apple was a bit player, and before they figured out how to sell overpriced MP3 players as the Walkman of the 90's they were on the edge of bankruptcy.

Celebrate the man as a great marketer and businessman if you want. But all of these odes to how he changed the world and is some awesome person just crack me up.

[Rocky Bleier]

Jobs stole the GUI from Xerox. Some idiot who was head of a team there let him see it despite the protests of project programmers.

[Pasadena Blue]

Jobs was an innovator and visionary. He was a showman and an arrogant ass as well, but that shouldn't take away from his genius.

I know I am very happy for the products he brought to us. And after being a Mac-hater and Windows-apologist for years, switching from Windows to Mac was the best decision I ever made.

[whodean]

All I said was that tech patents are a dime a dozen (I even have one that I think is pretty stupid) and that whoever the boss is ALWAYS tacks his name onto the patent so that he gets credit.

Hmm, if Jamie knows what the hell he's posting about then I wonder why CEOs at Apple's competitors don't have patents?

Jobs has 317 to his name (among Apple's thousands), wonder what Ballmer, Gates, or Google’s co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin have?

In fact, during a good chunk of the tech revolution, Apple was a bit player

http://newsone.com/nation/technology-nation/associatedpress4/steve-jobs-apple-products/

Sour grapes dude.

[Hannibal]

They're really reaching with the NeXT and the iMac. In between Windows 95 and the first iPod, Apple was wholly irrelevant. They benefitted tremendously from the fact that the mp3 player market was populated by terrible terrible manufacturers who couldn't get basic features right.

[Jamie H]

Hmm, if Jamie knows what the hell he's posting about then I wonder why CEOs at Apple's competitors don't have patents?

Jobs has 317 to his name (among Apple's thousands), wonder what Ballmer, Gates, or Google?s co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin have?

http://newsone.com/nation/technology-nation/associatedpress4/steve-jobs-apple-products/

Sour grapes dude.

Just because the CEO CAN slap his name on every patent he wants to doesn't mean he HAS to. It's not a very ethical practice, and really, unless you are an egomaniac there is no real reason to do it. No one really gives a shit about what name is on the patent--it is the company that holds the patent that is important.

[Jamie H]

They're really reaching with the NeXT and the iMac. In between Windows 95 and the first iPod, Apple was wholly irrelevant.

Yeah, the claim that the NEXT is the basis for the current Mac OS is just flat out wrong--the Mac OS is just an altered variant of UNIX, which has been around for decades. Maybe the NEXT was UNIX too, dunno.

[Hannibal]

It's like George Carlin said before he died. America is going to hell in a handbasket, but people don't care because they have all these fancy gadgets to distract them.

George Carlin is the wisest man who ever lived.

[Hannibal]

I've got to give Apple a ton of credit for the iPod and the iPhone. I know that the iPad is popular, but I'm not sold on it yet. But both the iPod and the iPhone were huge steps forward in their field. Especially the iPod. I resisted buying an iPod for about five years and I tried at least five or six other brands of mp3 player. They all sucked horribly. Every last one of 'em. I still use iPod's exclusively although their durability is basically shite. I go through about one per year and the last few have been essentially free since I get the 3-year extended warranty every time.

[Jamie H]

Looking up the Next OS, it looks like the Next OS was built on Unix and Apple eventually purchased it and rewrote it as OS X. So that is where Next fits into the OS X picture, even though OS X is still essentially just a UNIX variant.

[Hannibal]

Eh. I'll have to take your word for it, but...who cares? The devil's so much in the details that implementation means everything. It's one thing if you get people to buy a shitty product by marketing the hell out of it (e.g. the Nintendo Wii, Microsoft's gaming consoles, etc), but there's something to be said for making it better by making it extremely easy and/or fun to use.

[Jamie H]

Oh, I thought you said they were reaching with the NEXT info in that article.

I actually worked for a summer on NEXT machines back in the early 90's. They were a neat toy , but never had any chance of gaining market share.