What's news here? We already knew how much Steve Jobs loved to design products.
What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
31–40 of 138 posts
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm pretty sure that at that time I had tons of music (using winamp) and photos on my computer (scanning was the way at that time).
You must've been somewhere nice that had fast internet. I think most people back then had dialup, and downloading a single song would take at least 20 minutes on their 28.8k modem.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've only worked at small (<100 employees) companies, so I guess I've just never run into this. It's a little sad to think that you could work alongside someone and have to consider them a threat rather than an ally.
You should look back through the history of http://minimsft.blogspot.com Microsoft is worse than most because its ranking system actually encourages you to compete within your team not just outside.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#34Did I miss something here...? "In 1991, I started work at NeXT, as Product Manager for Interpersonal Computing. It was the internet, before there was much of an internet. We called it Interpersonal Computing, but nobody paid attention until 5 years later when the WWW was born." The web existed in 1991, and Mosaic was launched in 1993. I first saw it in 1993, and it was a pretty big deal at the time. Have I misunderst…
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#35Between this and the Safari story, I'm struck at just how deep Apple's internal secrecy ethos runs. The idea that there is that level of dedication to keeping a project hidden, not just from outsiders, but from almost the entire rest of the company just blows my mind. It certainly explains how they're able to keep projects secret for as long as they do.
>but from almost the entire rest of the company just blows my mind. I've worked at Apple before and it wasn't that different to every other large corporation. Excluding obviously the hardware design and critical features. But everything else was par for the course. EVERY large company has politics and empire building. Especially when you are a multinational and have a driven workforce.
Think back to May 2007. Remember some of the iPhone mockups people were throwing around? Aside from being largely impractical and stupid, there was clearly no "right" way to do it that was obvious to everyone, as the mocks were so incredibly varied. At some point, you have to make a bet on what the best way to proceed is and go with it, or else you'll spend all day debating and not actually get anything done. That's far easier in small, "secretive" groups.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you should have said, "Apple is people working hard, iterating and delivering." Many of those hard working folks are still at Apple. If Jobs was Apple, there should still be some skunkworks projects left behind to ship and the numbers are still favorable to Apple.
Yes, but as the OP describes, the process involved much iteration and constant feedback and energy from Jobs, not just a memo of what he wanted to see on launch day
Perhaps Jobs started that process, but I'm sure it still exists with him gone.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm pretty sure that at that time I had tons of music (using winamp) and photos on my computer (scanning was the way at that time).
You must've been somewhere nice that had fast internet. I think most people back then had dialup, and downloading a single song would take at least 20 minutes on their 28.8k modem.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
You should look back through the history of http://minimsft.blogspot.com Microsoft is worse than most because its ranking system actually encourages you to compete within your team not just outside.
In theory that is false, in practice it is less clear (at least to me). The ranking (and subsequent curve fitting known formally as calibration) is done across a level-band (bascially 'job title') across a much wider scope than a single team (i.e. across a division). The idea that your co-workers are actively plotting to somehow take some reward from you come review time is a poor caricature of reality. Does it happe…
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#39Did I miss something here...? "In 1991, I started work at NeXT, as Product Manager for Interpersonal Computing. It was the internet, before there was much of an internet. We called it Interpersonal Computing, but nobody paid attention until 5 years later when the WWW was born." The web existed in 1991, and Mosaic was launched in 1993. I first saw it in 1993, and it was a pretty big deal at the time. Have I misunderst…
1996 wasn't when the Web was born, but it is a lot closer to the point in time when the Web and the Internet went mainstream. IIRC 1994 is often given as that year, and even by 1995 it (famously http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_Ahead_(Bill_Gates_book... ) wasn't obvious to everyone that they were now at the centre of computing.
Re: What it's Really Like Working with Steve Jobs
#40So Apple basically was Steve Jobs. Time to ditch some stock.