Getting Steve Jobs Wrong

I'm currently reading the Steve Jobs biography but I have not finished it, so this comment is based on incomplete knowledge and you should take what I say with a grain of salt.

I will agree that the biography is far from perfect, and of course we can all find a bunch of things that we would have liked to see improved, especially knowing technology as intimately as most of us. But looking at the backlash against this biography I can't help but also feel that some of the criticism is a case of sour grapes, or maybe dashed expectations.

Leading into the release of the biography there were considerable excitement that finally someone would be able to tell the authorized story of Steve Jobs. This person had been granted unprecedented access to the man and people close to him, and had been working over a period of several years to put the book together. Finally, after the "smears" that were books like iCon, unauthorized and frankly pretty critical of Mr. Jobs we would finally get some real insight into his greatness.

And of course, a few weeks before the book is released the person is about passes away tragically at far too young of an age. I mean it sincerely when I say it was a pretty big loss. But look at everything written about the man in the days and weeks after, and the reaction to people who didn't toe the party line of deification. I mean even articles discussing Jobs' "dark side" then went to say how this was actually a positive and was integral to his success.

So now, finally, we can get our hand on the book we were all waiting for, the one where the biographer who actually got to talk to Jobs and people close to him reveals to us that, yes, he truly is as great as you believe. Actually he's even better, honestly he's the man of the century.

Instead, we get a portrait of a man with some very, very sharp edges, a mean ruthless streak that I think would startle most people on the other end of it, and of course a man who revolutionized several industries and did some pretty remarkable things.

It is definitely not the hagiography that I think some people secretly wanted, and I can't help but feel that this disappointment is behind a lot of the backlash. No biography is ever going to perfectly encompass anyone's life, especially so someone who has accomplished so much. But I also think that it is entirely fair to paint a portrait of the man that acknowledges his numerous flaws, the fantastic luck that accompanied some of his decisions, and the many failures he had. Because without this would his many successes, his vision, and his inspiring drive for perfection seem as impressive?

So in the end, I am actually enjoying the book and I am sure that someone else will come along and work from the notes and publish something even better. But to say that it is an utter mess, or a hack job, or any of the other brutal criticisms I have read is, in my opinion, pretty unfair.

It might come across as simplistic because it wasn't really written for people like you and me - it was written for non-technical consumers of apple products and the general public.

I noticed that too, but I stuck with him and didn't consider it "going off the rails" so much as just being the typical Siracusa obsessively-detailed critique. Have you ever read one of his reviews of new MacOS X releases? They're agonizingly nitpicky, and the presence of any particular criticism doesn't really imply that this particular detail has as much weight as any other criticism he has. He was clearly reading off of long, detailed notes that he had organized into sections. Still, he does also obsess about how he writes and edits his work, and had he written a review of the biography rather than stepping up to a microphone for a podcast, the thing about PA Semi may not have made the cut. Who knows.

I don't think Isaacson could yell at Jobs to come back with four different answers to a question so Isaacson could choose the one he liked, and keep requesting new answers until he was satisfied.

I think it's a little funny that people who don't personally know Steve Jobs have so many strong opinions on what he exactly was, and don't seem to want to give much credit to Isaacson for writing down what Jobs "chose" to share. I started reading Mark Twain's autobiography, and his assertion is that basically any autobiography is incomplete, as a person will end up backing out of telling the unflattering truth. So, while I may not be a huge fan of Jobs, the fact he let Isaacson paint a picture that wasn't total flattery is probably one of more impressive things about Jobs, in my eyes.

Edison you could make case for.

Turing, not by a long shot. In 200 years we'll still be talking about Turing machines and decidability. I don't think you can say the same for any of Edisons or Job's ventures.