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Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

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Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#41

Post by [deleted] »

shinratdr wrote: post #35
cperciva wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I acknowledge the impact Apple has had on computing. But they've done that primarily by being very good at marketing, not by being technically innovative.

Once again, complete bullshit. iOS is extremely innovative, iPods changed the portable player landscape and challenging Microsoft for a real place in the desktop OS market isn't exactly easy. They are also great marketers, but to deny that Apple has brought no technical innovations to the table is just ridiculous and you know it. Or at least I hope you know it.

[deleted]

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#42

Post by tptacek »

cperciva wrote: post #14

I'll say what nobody else seems willing to say: I don't think he deserves it. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum and all that, but let's face it: Steve Jobs was a skilled salesman, nothing more. Let's keep the black bar for people who have actually made a contribution to computing. Edit: 2 minutes and already voted down to -4. Oh well, I knew this would be an unpopular opinion...

The black bar isn't there as a trophy for the person who died. It's there to provide a comfort to the people who are grieving as a result of what happened.

I don't know Steve Jobs. He was given an amazing life; a more than ample measure of the best things the world has for us; an eminently square deal. I am, I suppose, sad in the abstract for his family. Who Jobs carefully made sure I knew almost nothing about.

But Jobs made things happen, had an impact on my life, set a standard, for things I care about, and then personified --- animated --- that standard. He was relevant to me. And I am tired of cancer fucking things up that are relevant to me.

So, it's messing with me, a little, and I'm glad the silly black bar is there so at least I don't feel like I'm crazy to feel that way.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#43

Post by cperciva »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #37
cperciva wrote: post #14

I'll say what nobody else seems willing to say: I don't think he deserves it. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum and all that, but let's face it: Steve Jobs was a skilled salesman, nothing more. Let's keep the black bar for people who have actually made a contribution to computing. Edit: 2 minutes and already voted down to -4. Oh well, I knew this would be an unpopular opinion...

I don't see why this is being downvoted. Is it because people disagree? Because that isn't a reason to downvote. It seems accurate to say that Jobs was a salesman. He didn't design or write any software or hardware that I know of.

Some people disagreed with me; I think most just felt I was being disrespectful.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#44

Post by tptacek »

cperciva wrote: post #25
shinratdr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't even acknowledge the contribution and impact Apple has made on computing in general right now, then you are significantly more far-gone than anyone you have ever accused of being a fanboy. That's just a ridiculous statement. Steve Jobs made no contribution to computing? Complete bullshit.

Oh, I acknowledge the impact Apple has had on computing. But they've done that primarily by being very good at marketing, not by being technically innovative.

Colin, this is just not a good time for this.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#45

Post by donw »

cperciva wrote: post #25
shinratdr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't even acknowledge the contribution and impact Apple has made on computing in general right now, then you are significantly more far-gone than anyone you have ever accused of being a fanboy. That's just a ridiculous statement. Steve Jobs made no contribution to computing? Complete bullshit.

Oh, I acknowledge the impact Apple has had on computing. But they've done that primarily by being very good at marketing, not by being technically innovative.

I'm amazed that you can make such an ignorant statement.

The first commercially viable GUI on commodity hardware sounds pretty innovative to me, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

For me, though the biggest 'technical' innovation that Apple has consistently delivered on is in making technology usable in everyday life.

Sure, it's not hard-core cryptography or massively parallel search-algorithms. But making devices and interfaces that are beautiful and enjoyable to use on a daily basis is incredibly difficult, and ranks just as high on my list as PageRank or Cassandra.

Thanks to Apple (and Jobs), I've got technology from Star Trek sitting in my pocket -- an iPhone. It wasn't the first smartphone by a mile, but it was the first that was genuinely useful to everybody, which is why every other phone on the market has followed Apple's lead in interface design.

Call that 'marketing' if you will, but all of that 'marketing' has made the world a better place for a very large number of people in a direct and measurable way.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#46

Post by sgentle »

cperciva wrote: post #14

I'll say what nobody else seems willing to say: I don't think he deserves it. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum and all that, but let's face it: Steve Jobs was a skilled salesman, nothing more. Let's keep the black bar for people who have actually made a contribution to computing. Edit: 2 minutes and already voted down to -4. Oh well, I knew this would be an unpopular opinion...

I'm no friend of sacred cows, and frankly I'm going to save my mourning for people I actually know, but I think you're wrong about Steve Jobs being nothing more than a skilled salesman.

More than any other company, Jobs' Apple has been relentlessly visionary. Many tech companies did (and still do) write software. Apple, on the other hand, designs and builds products - software is an implementation detail. Apple's core is software as an end, not as a means.

Fifty years from now, I believe that programmer will be one of those hilarious dated occupations like typist or milkman. Asking if someone has wifi will be like asking if they're on the grid, and computers (and computing) will be so ubiquitous that they become invisible.

I don't think Steve Jobs contributed to computing any more than Martin Luther King contributed to literature. His legacy isn't in his tools, it's in how he used those tools to shape the world as he wanted.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#47

Post by wheels »

cperciva wrote: post #25
shinratdr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't even acknowledge the contribution and impact Apple has made on computing in general right now, then you are significantly more far-gone than anyone you have ever accused of being a fanboy. That's just a ridiculous statement. Steve Jobs made no contribution to computing? Complete bullshit.

Oh, I acknowledge the impact Apple has had on computing. But they've done that primarily by being very good at marketing, not by being technically innovative.

Aside from the fact that I believe your statement to be false, do you really believe that someone being among the very best at what they do in the industry that you are a part of not worthy of honor?

And may I suggest that, as a startup founder, it is a point worthy of introspection since it betrays contempt for one of the most important functions of a company?

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#48

Post by [deleted] »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #37
cperciva wrote: post #14

I'll say what nobody else seems willing to say: I don't think he deserves it. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum and all that, but let's face it: Steve Jobs was a skilled salesman, nothing more. Let's keep the black bar for people who have actually made a contribution to computing. Edit: 2 minutes and already voted down to -4. Oh well, I knew this would be an unpopular opinion...

I don't see why this is being downvoted. Is it because people disagree? Because that isn't a reason to downvote. It seems accurate to say that Jobs was a salesman. He didn't design or write any software or hardware that I know of.

[deleted]

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#49

Post by prodigal_erik »

spydum wrote: post #22
cperciva wrote: post #14

I'll say what nobody else seems willing to say: I don't think he deserves it. De mortuis nihil nisi bonum and all that, but let's face it: Steve Jobs was a skilled salesman, nothing more. Let's keep the black bar for people who have actually made a contribution to computing. Edit: 2 minutes and already voted down to -4. Oh well, I knew this would be an unpopular opinion...

I think no one is willing to say it, because no one else was thinking it..

I was thinking it, but to my surprise I find myself disagreeing. I watch with growing dismay as crippled appliances and learned helplessness sweep the industry, but they are in fact what the market currently wants, and with long practice Jobs developed exceptional and laudable skill at not only identifying what the market wants but making a corporate behemoth deliver it in a very focused form.

Re: Request PG: Could we please have the black bar out for Steve Jobs?

#50

Post by sunchild »

cperciva wrote: post #25
shinratdr wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't even acknowledge the contribution and impact Apple has made on computing in general right now, then you are significantly more far-gone than anyone you have ever accused of being a fanboy. That's just a ridiculous statement. Steve Jobs made no contribution to computing? Complete bullshit.

Oh, I acknowledge the impact Apple has had on computing. But they've done that primarily by being very good at marketing, not by being technically innovative.

You realize how poorly your comments reflect on your product, right? I'll certainly never support Tarsnap after reading this garbage.
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