Steve Jobs Was a Jerk

In the hype leading up to the release of the Steve Jobs book it was always stressed that it would be a no holds barred account of his life. Jobs wife reportedly told the author Walter Isaacson not to whitewash anything.

And there was this exchange between Isaacson and Steve Kroft on 60 Minutes:

Steve Kroft: I think it’s a tough book.

Isaacson: It’s a book that’s fair. I mean, this is a real human being.

Kroft: He had lots of flaws.

Isaacson: He was very petulant. He was very brittle. He could be very, very mean to people at times. Whether it was to a waitress in a restaurant, or to a guy who had stayed up all night coding, he could just really just go at them and say, “You’re doin’ this all wrong. It’s horrible.” And you’d say, “Why did you do that? Why weren’t you nicer?” And he’d say, “I really wanna be with people who demand perfection. And this is who I am.”

Coming into the book, I didn't really have an opinion on Steve Jobs. I had an Apple IIc growing up, and then, like most people, I was out of the Apple universe until I came back for the Ipod, and then a Mac computer, and then the Iphone.

I was expecting to learn about a difficult genius who revolutionized computing. Instead, I learned about the world's biggest asshole.

Steve Jobs wasn't just a petulant man with a lot of flaws. He was a monster.

There wasn't a page of this book where I didn't hate Steve Jobs more than I did on the page before it. It's incredible that anyone accepted this behavior or he's revered the way he is. But I guess that's how awesome the Iphone is.

I haven't seen this interpretation before, but I honestly haven't read a book about someone I despised this much. Usually you root for the guy you're following, good or bad. But not here. He's constantly doing things that are unforgivable: impregnating a girl, claiming the kid isn't his, calling her a slut, sabotaging his own company, telling people their work is shit, freezing out his "friends", stabbing people in the back, stabbing people in the front, stabbing people just cause he can. There is nothing redeeming about this dude. Nothing.

Oh yeah, there is one thing: he made boatloads of money making gadgets.

I guess when all is said and done, that's all that matters and all people will remember.

But I always think of the people who actually had to put up with this shit on a day to day basis. The fact is that if any of us, even the most Apple adoring assholes, had to have Steve Jobs as our boss, we'd want to murder him. And I don't think that can be forgiven just because the Hanging With Friends App is so fun.

I guess his accomplishments made him great, but even some of those are a bit questionable.

I knew that Jobs started Apple and then was pushed out in the '80's. And from what little I knew this seemed like madness. Jobs was the genius! They screwed everything up! But now that I read the book I know that it was all his fault. He's the one who screwed everything up.

And then he didn't even learn from those mistakes, and repeated them again with his next venture, NeXT. He was a maniac to work with, and it wasn't even working.

The only parts of the book I liked are when Jobs and Bill Gates get together, because Bill Gates was the only guy who could look him in the eye and tell him he was a dick. I read the Paul Allen book and didn't like Gates that much. But after reading this one, he's my new hero.

Which brings me to another misconception: Jobs would frequently say this about Bill Gates:

“Bill is basically unimaginative, and has never invented anything, which I think is why he’s more comfortable now in philanthropy than technology. He just shamelessly ripped off other people’s ideas.”

That is the Pot calling the kettle a turtleneck wearing wannabe hippie. He did the same thing. Steve Jobs never invented anything.

The genius behind Apple in the beginning was Steve Wozniak. His invention of the Apple I and the Apple II is what carried that company for a decade. Jobs big thing was the original Macintosh, which he stole from the same place Gates stole from, Xerox.

The genius behind Pixar was John Lasseter. Jobs deserves credit for investing his money in it, but he wasn't the reason it became successful. Far from it.

His whole career was letting other people come up with things, and then trying to put his spin on it. For 2/3's of his career, he couldn't even get that right.

He wasn't a perfectionist, he was a man without an original idea.

He was pretty much a failure until 10 years ago. That's a testament to his drive and wealth. He kept getting chances at the plate, and he finally knocked one out of the park. Because of that, he will always be remembered as an innovator and a genius. But to me, he'll always be a jerk.