Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it • Hacker News Board

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#91

Post by gnaffle » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:25 PM UTC

recoiledsnake wrote: post #82

gnaffle wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does he, though? He's sort of saying that they evolved the existing system instead of jumping to a new one, but AFAIK OS X was NeXT with a compatibility layer, prettier GUI and some other changes. Saying that anyone upgrading from OS 9 would not see a whole new interface seems wrong to me.

I believe the confusion arises from the use of the term "existing one". That could be construed as referring to NeXT, so it would mean they decided to evolve NeXT by making changes to it over many years, instead of switching to it at once. If you read "existing one" as Mac OS 9, then that sentence would mean a completely different thing.

Well, the text talks about NeXT first, and then suddenly talks about MacOS. When he says that Apple used _some_ of NeXTs software and goes on to talk about the kernel, it seems like he gets it wrong and doesn't really understand what OS X was.

If he had, he would have realized its significance. For instance, I can't recall that he mentions how iOS relates to OSX, and the advantages this brings to Apple. He never mentions that NeXT was compatible with PowerPC and Intel and that Apple would have a working, parallel release running on Intel hardware internally.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#92

Post by SeoxyS » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:25 PM UTC

recoiledsnake wrote: post #78

tghw wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't listened to the podcast, but it sounds like one of the biggest nits they picked was that "Isaacson asserts that Apple did not use NeXT for the basis of OS X". Looking back through the book, I can't find that assertion, but I can find the following, at location 6379 of the Kindle version (the Kindle app tells me it's page 366): "At the January 2000 Macworld in San Francisco, Jobs rolled out the new Macintosh…

>Some critics, including Bill Gates, noted that Apple ended up not adopting the entire NeXT operating system. There’s some truth to that, because Apple decided not to leap into a completely new system but instead to evolve the existing one. Is there somewhere where Bill Gates said "none of the NeXT code made it into OS X". That's the impression I got the other day from this comment: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?i…

> Is there somewhere where Bill Gates said "none of the NeXT code made it into OS X".

You're twisting Isaacson's words. He said:

> noted that Apple ended up not adopting the entire NeXT operating system

This doesn't mean none of NeXT's code made it in, it means not all of it.

But, putting aside the nitpicks, I, as a technical person, do not care much for the technical details. I'm much more interested in Jobs' hippie counter-culture history and his philosophical view than the technical details of which system was the more important precursor to OS X.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#93

Post by shareme » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:33 PM UTC

I think you guys are blowing it.. ISaacson blew it not because he goofed on tech details.. but because he put forth a failed thesis that a human being that fails at enjoying and passing on humanity to others somehow succeeded at device items to change humanity..

In comparison, the founder of Be Inc and MS come closer to matching Isaacson's thesis than Jobs does..

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#94

Post by recoiledsnake » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:35 PM UTC

SeoxyS wrote: post #92

recoiledsnake wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Some critics, including Bill Gates, noted that Apple ended up not adopting the entire NeXT operating system. There’s some truth to that, because Apple decided not to leap into a completely new system but instead to evolve the existing one. Is there somewhere where Bill Gates said "none of the NeXT code made it into OS X". That's the impression I got the other day from this comment: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?i…

> Is there somewhere where Bill Gates said "none of the NeXT code made it into OS X". You're twisting Isaacson's words. He said: > noted that Apple ended up not adopting the entire NeXT operating system This doesn't mean none of NeXT's code made it in, it means not all of it. But, putting aside the nitpicks, I, as a technical person, do not care much for the technical details. I'm much more interested in Jobs' hippie…

I am not the one doing the purported twisting. Read the linked comment in my post above. My impression after reading that comment(written by someone else) was Bill Gates was quoted as saying that somewhere in the book(could be elsewhere for all I know).

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#95

Post by ugh » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:37 PM UTC

jiggy2011 wrote: post #62

ugh wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn’t finish his complaints in one seventy minute podcast. It’s actually a great and hilarious podcast – independently of what you think about Jobs. Siracusa is in his element.

Ah, that's reassuring! I was worried I would be relegated to the HN 'slow readers class' :) I'll try and listen to it later, although I've never read the book. Reading stuff about people usually doesn't interest me, besides the obvious computer stuff is jobs really a particularly interesting guy? I know he did allot of drugs but so have about half the people I know socially.

If you want to listen to the podcast skip to 18:00. That’s when Siracusa starts with the book review. All the other stuff can be safely ignored if you are a first-time listener.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#96

Post by S_A_P » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:37 PM UTC

I finished this bio a few weeks ago, and I remember just a sense of wanting more. There were a few parts I found very painful to get through, and I felt that some of the early apple II/Lisa/Macintosh stuff paraphrased from Folklore.org. I also kind of feel that Isaacson kept his analysis and insight into Steve very superficial. I wanted to know more about how he thinks than was presented. More about his creative process, more about his philosophy on design. While these subjects were addressed to some extent, they were very superficial and high level. I also recognize that I may not be the typical person who reads this, as I have spent time reading folklore.org and other sources. On the whole though, I just feel that it did miss they mark a bit.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#97

Post by deyan » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:37 PM UTC

I read the other comments here and found them lacking significantly. It seems that many folks did not actually listen to the full podcast (available here: http://5by5.tv/hypercritical/42).

Personally, I am usually extremely skeptical of Gruber and about as far from an "Apple fanboy" as you can get. I also approached the show very skeptically. However, the critique in the podcast was very good. The technical and factual errors and the shallowness and the retelling are all things that many others have pointed out and they are all good points. But the critique makes a bigger point:

Namely, that Isaacson did not do his job of actually giving us important new insights into what and how Steve Jobs "ticked." There are some great examples of that point towards the end of the podcast. For instance, the point about the ad hominum fallacy is fantastic and I really wish Steve was called on that and we had a deeper understanding of what he really thought. Or the various examples of Apple building its strategy from the ground up rather than the image that the media likes to paint of Steve Jobs as the all-knowing ship captain who knows and foresees everything.

It's all too bad because I think we as a society and of course Silicon Valley in particular could have benefited tremendously from a deeper exploration of Steve Jobs.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#98

Post by blinkingled » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:38 PM UTC

danthony wrote: post #86

blinkingled wrote: post #5

It sounds like some people were looking for a hagiography. I for one very much liked the biography - the fact that Isaacson made efforts to present all sides of the story is greatly valuable even though it makes the book a bit depressing to read. I think the other issue is that the book being a bit too factual and multifaceted doesn't go well with the opinionated audience.

I don't think anybody was expecting a hagiography; Jobs has too many failures and flaws for any biographer to write that book. But just because Isaacson captured how Steve Jobs could be both terrible and compelling doesn't mean Isaacson succeeded. He didn't. He missed the point entirely about why people want to read about Jobs. We didn't buy the book to learn about Jobs' strained relations with his children or what h…

It is a biography. Not a special book dedicated to helping create Steve Jobs clones. Biography by definition is an account of someone's life written by someone else. So that means it has to include Jobs' relationships along side other things.

And you are asking for too much in the rest of your comment - give me a break. Has anyone ever succeeded in duplicating someone great by copying what the person originally did? Isn't it all about originality, opportunity, luck and other intangible stuff? If I were to ask why did Einstein "get" theory of relativity and not someone else - what would be the answer to that kind of question? How would you even begin to answer it? It's ridiculous - no offense though.

And I guess you forgot that Jobs emphasized "intuition" over rationalism several times in the book. Are you now going to ask Isaacson missed asking him "how to have intuition" or "how to be at the right place at the right time"?

You aren't going to get those sort of answers - if you did, and if that sort of thing was actually useful, everyone would be Steve Jobs and everyone could be Einstein. Life and achievements are not imitable as much as you would like to think so.

For a biography the book does a decent job - if you are asking for something entirely different from a biography it's hardly the author's fault.

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#99

Post by pwthornton » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 10:54 PM UTC

wormwood28 wrote: post #87

pwthornton wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, there is more than that. I don't have the Kindle version, so I can't easily search through the book. But he talks a bit about Avie Tevanian and that essentially that is what NeXT gave Apple. If I get some more time, I'll try to find the exact passage, but it's different from the one you are citing. I'm fine with that one.

this is probably the other quote you're thinking of. it all seems to be from Gates' perspective, however. Isaacson fundamentally did not understand the relationship between nextstep and mac os x, that's for sure. it really is a dreadful book. i think some of these criticism are overblown tho. i doubt Isaacson is using "kernel of the NeXT technology" in the operating system sense, but who knows given how muddled it al…

That's the passage. How could he not challenge Gates on that? Or clarify it. I'm not sure if he gets 100 percent what Gates is saying. This passage is just not accurate.

OS X's importance to Apple can't be understated. Apple, the company that kicked off the personal computer revolution and gave us the GUI, was behind technologically in the mid-1990s. Apple was in such bad shape that they had to buy someone else's OS. Can you imagine the current Apple allowing iOS to get into such bad shape that they have to buy someone else's mobile OS?

There is a big story there, and Isaacson doesn't touch it because he doesn't see the story. And this doesn't have to be a technical story.

It's a story that anyone can understand: Here is a tech company that didn't have good tech anymore. How did this happen and how did Jobs and NeXT save Apple with modern tech?

Re: Steve Jobs biography -- Isaacson blew it

#100

Post by snowwrestler » Tue, Nov 15, 2011, 11:28 PM UTC

pwthornton wrote: post #99

wormwood28 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is probably the other quote you're thinking of. it all seems to be from Gates' perspective, however. Isaacson fundamentally did not understand the relationship between nextstep and mac os x, that's for sure. it really is a dreadful book. i think some of these criticism are overblown tho. i doubt Isaacson is using "kernel of the NeXT technology" in the operating system sense, but who knows given how muddled it al…

That's the passage. How could he not challenge Gates on that? Or clarify it. I'm not sure if he gets 100 percent what Gates is saying. This passage is just not accurate. OS X's importance to Apple can't be understated. Apple, the company that kicked off the personal computer revolution and gave us the GUI, was behind technologically in the mid-1990s. Apple was in such bad shape that they had to buy someone else's OS.…

I haven't read the book, but is the thesis of this discussion that the book is fatally flawed because Isaacson didn't challenge Bill Gates on the details of how NeXTStep evolved into OS X? This doesn't really seem like THE crucial moment in the entire life of Steve Jobs.