I’m sure there will be glowing biographies about Steve Jobs and his many accomplishments in time, but that guy deserves every single bit of the massive praise that is heaped upon him. Some of the most interesting comments come from the journalist disciples who all but compare Jobs to Jesus at every opportunity, and from the corresponding messiah-doubters who say that Jobs was nothing more than a savvy businessman who understood timing, manufacturing and product placement. However, other contrarians are understandably uncomfortable with his role in the commercialization of independent software and his control over the iUniverse, like a charismatic sort of software dictator type figure. Many of these people have Apple on their “modern hypocrites list” and might tell you so if the conversation wanders in that direction.
Here’s maybe the one valid way I could compare Steve Jobs to Jesus: Jesus was all about ideas that could outlast and defeat humans, no matter how powerful they might seem at the time. Steve made computers and computer systems that will outlast their owners. I can’t possibly imagine a day when my iPad (2) is any less useful or amazing than it is today unless it smashes, no matter what the next ten versions look like. We are going to have to explain to our kids that this is a weird new thing! Computers used to be rickety, noisy boxes with all these wires and different parts sticking out everywhere, and they used to break all the time when a competent engineer wasn’t available to keep things working! All you early majority consumers of a certain influential desktop operating system know exactly what I am talking about…
Somewhat ridiculously, the very approach that allowed Steve and Apple to end this massive problem with casual computing was his uncompromising, even autocratic management of the platform. It feels like I might be stepping on the dreams of the free and open software communities a bit here, but I think I’m starting to understand the actual logic in favor of Apple’s paradoxical mecha-fascism, if only because I program sounds and other fast things. Not every computer has the luxury of being some genius freedom-fighter’s personal data management device. Many computers have to control cars, and medical machines, and all those other things that can’t break or otherwise present an end user with some unpredictable software issue that needs debugging. When my grandma is trying to call me on video chat, it has to be the same way. That was his reasoning, I think, and I have to agree that it makes a lot more sense than it used to.
One day, when we’re donating these old tablets to needy kids or whoever, we might remember Steve by understanding what he wanted to create: a world united by its magical and powerful technology – technology we can use to do formerly impossible things, without losing all of our time in the process.
GusBook 