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Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

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Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#151
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say that as if Nokia didn't produce some world class products but they did. There was a era when Nokia handsets were the one everyone wanted. And they were instrumental in building GSM, of which without no mobile phones would exist, let alone iPhones. I'm not going to deny that Nokia lost their way with Symbian handsets but my point is I don't see Apple as being uniquely brilliant. You often see this tide where o…

Not to belittle Nokia or anything, they took already available eg. smart calculators' digital displays adopted to GSM phones. Steve Jobs (Apple) did something no one ever expected, knew, or supported at the time (Steve Ballmer reaction*) Although they make great objects of desire, Toyota is no Tesla, Nokia is no Apple. Wozniak is acting like an ex partner probably because he owes his entire identity to Jobs, an ident…

> Not to belittle Nokia or anything, they took already available eg. smart calculators' digital displays adopted to GSM phones.

They co-created GSM! Both the specification and then deploying the first GSM network too. Nokia basically invented how cell phones work. I'd say that was little more involved than taking something that was already available.

Which is ironic because the iPhone was exactly what you described about Nokia: existing technology. Apple did a fantastic job putting it together. The form, feel and entire UX is top notch. But Apple didn't invent new technology to create the iPhone - they very much stood on the shoulders of giants.

> Steve Jobs (Apple) did something no one ever expected, knew, or supported at the time

The iPhone was far more evolutionary than the first ever cell phone. By the time the iPhone was in development there was already smart phones, feature phones, PDAs and tablets on the market that lead some weight about what worked and what didn't. There were design documents published about UX too. And thus there were a few similar devices in R&D from different companies at the time, all converging on a similar UX as the iPhone. So I'd argue the iPhone was only unexpected if you weren't already paying attention to the way the market was heading.

> *Wozniak is acting like an ex partner probably because he owes his entire identity to Jobs, an identity that he enjoys but perhaps coming from an ex he never liked, maybe he's seeking catharsis. Perhaps feeling indebted to a bully who he never recovered from, not being able to reach that peak again on his own, is the reason why we get these interviews from him where he says these things about Jobs. Who knows.*

That's a grossly unfair comment. In fact, at risk of being blunt: it's ridiculous and petty.

If you want to understand Woz a little more then I'd suggest you read into what Woz is doing with his time now and why he left Apple.

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#152

Some 15 years ago or so? I don't remember. I was working at Apple on the color and graphics team. I don't even to this day remember what the exact circumstance was, but for some reason me and another engineer were urgently called into a conference room just a week or so before some big Apple product reveal. I feel like it was when the "Aqua" UI was to be revealed — I feel like it was something about the seven label c…

I was in the 'war room' backstage for a keynote (I think?) iCloud demo (or at least, something that touched iCloud, if only briefly).

After our successful 2.5 seconds, they wheeled in a trolley of champagne. I never found out what would be on the other trolley...

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#154
post #35
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, Steve Jobs didn't luck out. Instead, he never went through the filters. Had he tried to become an Aircraft Engineer or a Doctor, he might get filtered out but he and Woz ventured into an unestablished field that was about to boom. There were no filters to keep him out and though he lacked a scholar formation he was exceptionally brilliant and managed to walk the path better than the most. Peter Thiel says…

I don’t agree with Thiel on a lot of things, but in this instance I do. When someone says “I’m very competitive,” I hear that they want to live inside boxes created by other people.

[deleted]

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a cheesy movie from Tom Cruise, Minority Report, whomever takes those displays to market, finds a scalable profitable way to produce them, finds enough courage to resist status quo and find massive product market fit, will be the next Jobs or Musk. Idea wise, everything literally was on either Star Trek or on Star Wars previously. I know these personalities are not exactly likeable but we'll keep this conver…

gorilla arms are a thing you cannot dream your way out of. While a display projected 'in air' is cool a standing gesture based ui is very much not.

Brain-computer link bypasses the gorilla arm problem entirely.

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#156
post #53
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, Steve Jobs didn't luck out. Instead, he never went through the filters. Had he tried to become an Aircraft Engineer or a Doctor, he might get filtered out but he and Woz ventured into an unestablished field that was about to boom. There were no filters to keep him out and though he lacked a scholar formation he was exceptionally brilliant and managed to walk the path better than the most. Peter Thiel says…

> instead of making better phone than Nokia he would make something that no one at Nokia or anywhere else even dreamed of. The interesting thing about the iPhone is that people assume that was always the vision when in fact it was an idea that evolved and matured through the R&D process. Just as Android started out as a camera OS and pivoted to smart phones, the iPhone started out as a tablet, which was already a mar…

Magic is a lot of never seen work, followed by a reveal.

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long term motivation is a very, very rare characteristics. I'd say it is almost born or influenced by childhood experience, not grown.

Artist Jenny Holzer wrote in 1999: "Monomania is a prerequisite of success", that quote has stuck with me. Most people (myself included) get distracted and change focus easily, which I think is healthy, but being long-term obsessed probably helps your chances of being really successful in late capitalism.

Indeed. Sometimes I do hope that I have certain kind of characteristics that boost focus. Maybe even a mental illness can fit the bill.

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#158
post #63
post #2

What really set Steve Jobs apart is that he never should have gotten to where he did. I don't mean he didn't deserve it or anything but based on that structures that exist to filter people who attain the positions that he did. By luck, or accident, or raw determination, he became a person in the drivers seat that no one would have chose to put there. He was so much not the person they would have chosen that they kick…

Would another Steve Jobs personality have a chance at today's corporate environment? I have doubts: leadership is a hot iron where laissez faire approaches are favoured. The cite from Kawasaki that he was "unpleasant and always scary" would surely give a today's Steve Jobs a date with HR. A leader like Steve would be today called "toxic" and probably never promoted at all.

> would surely give a today's Steve Jobs a date with HR.

If he was running the company, HR would just bury the issues.

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP, but that's a solipsistic method of "debate", similar to "your pointing out racism is the real racism". It's a way to delegitimize an opposing view by making the position seem insincere or possibly meaningless (in the semantic satiation sense). The person using this tactic may cynically thinks its just a game of words, and the other side really doesn't genuinely hold the views they communicated; so they too wi…

Nope! Not using any tactics. I'm sorry you felt so much cynicism in my commentary though, it's good to be aware of how good-faith discussion can be interpreted like you have mine it seems. Leadership is a science, most people suck at it without training except for the very gifted few. The good news is you can train on it. Because a norm exists of believing leadership is a "have it or not" vs. a "have it or train it"…

We may have crossed lines here - I was criticizing @late2part's[1] reply to your comment which said - in its entirety - "Your comment is toxic and offensive to me." I take no issue with your original comment (I mostly agree with it), but late2part's comment doesn't seem like it was given in good faith; hence my rant.

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30601390

edit: I've realized what may have cause the confusion: I ought to have said "parent" rather than "op" in my first response - oops!

Re: Steve Wozniak: Steve Jobs wasn’t a natural-born leader

#160
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Steve Jobs (Apple) did something no one ever expected, knew, or supported at the time Folks have a tendency to overlook the inevitability of certain technologies. The light bulb, for example, was going to happen regardless of whether or not Edison's lab came up with it. There were tons of people pursuing it. You could say the same thing about the airplane, the telephone, phonograph etc. Tons of competition and prio…

I think about this a lot from the point of view of economic fairness and wealth inequality. You have a higher probability of being rich if your ancestors "owned the land" first. Similarly, you have a higher probability of being rich if you "created" the market. Owners deserve some piece of the pie for stewarding the land well, and innovators deserve some piece of the pie for playing a difficult role in the march of t…

You'd be interested in Progress and Poverty, a seminal work by late 19th century economist Henry George that tackles these issues of monopoly (of land, ideas, network effects) and their economic consequences.

Full text here: https://oll.libertyfund.org/title/george-progress-and-povert...

Blurbs from famous people who enjoyed it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progress_and_Poverty#Notable_r...

edit to add because a link to a book is not a discussion:

> Owners deserve some piece of the pie for stewarding the land well, and innovators deserve some piece of the pie for playing a difficult role in the march of technology.

Landowners "deserve" all the value that comes out of their "stewardship" (i.e. improvements, developments, labor), and none of the value that is inherent to the land or location (i.e. the value of being located in a city center, or the value of natural resources). In practical terms, this would mean a just policy is one that levies zero taxation on anything the owner does on the land, and levies a full tax on the value of natural resources and locational advantage inherent to a plot (calculable as the market clearing rental value of the land minus any developments).

The same holds for having ideas first. Inventions are insightful combinations of natural facts, but they are closer to discovery than true creation (we don't create the laws of physics that underlie every patentable mechanism). To lay exclusive claim to a discovery and wield it as a tool to fight competitors is anti-progress. All inventors have the claim to the fruits of their labor, but not at the exclusion of any other independent human to have and utilize ideas of their own.

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