Did people literally forgot that John Carmack's Quake was made on a NeXT workstation...
Even more significantly, Tim Berners-Lee made the first web browser and server on a NeXT Computer.
Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
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Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#92If you want more on this, I recommend Steve Jobs and the Next Big Thing by Stross. I’m not sure, but it might be the only extensive book about Next other than this new one. Though it’s essentially a long hit piece. The author really had it out for Jobs. In fact it’s a completely uncharitable book now that I think about it. Hopefully this new book will be a lot less biased.
While maybe biased, also shows a bit about the real Steve Jobs without the distortion field, and why Apple hardware costs what it costs, even when the delivery isn't up to the premium price.
If you want another take from that period the 1997 book "Apple" by Jim Carlton (WSJ reporter) is pretty good. The inside jacket starts "Whatever happened to Apple Computer?" and the forward by Guy Kawasaki frames the book as an after action review of a company that has failed. It has its own problems, but by avoiding the confusion of Apple's later success I think it provides more interesting coverage of some the stuff they did in that middle period while Jobs was out.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#93In many ways modern Apple is largely Next. The Apple that was dying when he returned largely faded away. Folks forget that Apple was literally days away from simply going bust. One of the most amazing comeback stories in the history of business.
Let's not be overly dramatic about that period. Apple was not days away from going bust. They were months away from filing bankruptcy. They were still a multi-billion dollar company even then. They just had very bad supply chain management. A bunch of old Macs sitting in warehouses not selling and too many people on payroll without any clear objectives. As Steve put it, "the ship was sinking and Gil (D'Amelio) was wo…
Their stock price was less than the estimated liquidation value of the company when I bought in ~2000 as dot-com was dot-bombing.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#94If you want more on this, I recommend Steve Jobs and the Next Big Thing by Stross. I’m not sure, but it might be the only extensive book about Next other than this new one. Though it’s essentially a long hit piece. The author really had it out for Jobs. In fact it’s a completely uncharitable book now that I think about it. Hopefully this new book will be a lot less biased.
Steve Jobs & the NeXT Big Thing by Randall E. Stross covers the NeXT years extensively and in period. Highly recommended also to do some “archeological” read/research into what it was like to sell computers in the late 80’s, early 90’s
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
While maybe biased, also shows a bit about the real Steve Jobs without the distortion field, and why Apple hardware costs what it costs, even when the delivery isn't up to the premium price.
>>the real Steve Jobs without the distortion field A lot of things come in full package, same person putting in the same effort(if not better) in a different place/situation doesn't give the same results. I once worked with a senior engineer/leader at a electronics company who delivered great products/results and ran the shop to literal perfection for like a decade. The company got sold, and he moved on. He was just…
Jobs did pretty well with Pixar and Next. So it seems he was able to do things outside of Apple.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#96In many ways modern Apple is largely Next. The Apple that was dying when he returned largely faded away. Folks forget that Apple was literally days away from simply going bust. One of the most amazing comeback stories in the history of business.
Let's not be overly dramatic about that period. Apple was not days away from going bust. They were months away from filing bankruptcy. They were still a multi-billion dollar company even then. They just had very bad supply chain management. A bunch of old Macs sitting in warehouses not selling and too many people on payroll without any clear objectives. As Steve put it, "the ship was sinking and Gil (D'Amelio) was wo…
>Let's not be overly dramatic about that period. Apple was not days away from going bust. They were months away from filing bankruptcy. They were still a multi-billion dollar company even then.
So? No shortage of "multi-billion dollar companies" that became footnotes. Blackberry. Nokia. SGI. ...
Let's be overly dramatic, cause it's more accurate to how bad they had it.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's funny how many people Jobs had to fire during this period, but is still seen as a good guy to many in the tech community. Not that different from when Musk took over Twitter.
If Apple went bankrupt, Everyone would be without a job.
Companies in USA go bankrupt all the time and keep operating.
It's just a legal way to not pay your debts as I understand.
Anyway it happened to me. Basically any stock they gave us was worthless but they kept going and paid salaries.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#98Much respect to Steve and the engineers at Apple. However, I hate using a product from Apple that actually causes me physical pain after using it. The magic mouse. I use that for 10 minutes and my palm and wrist hurt badly. Many have experienced the same symptoms and yet Apple hasn’t changed its design. I get that Apple is creative. Do they change their product design based on feedback from actual users in their crea…
I’ve used the Magic Mouse for years and love it. I have no doubt that it is bad for you, but it’s also fine for many.
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's not be overly dramatic about that period. Apple was not days away from going bust. They were months away from filing bankruptcy. They were still a multi-billion dollar company even then. They just had very bad supply chain management. A bunch of old Macs sitting in warehouses not selling and too many people on payroll without any clear objectives. As Steve put it, "the ship was sinking and Gil (D'Amelio) was wo…
It's funny how many people Jobs had to fire during this period, but is still seen as a good guy to many in the tech community. Not that different from when Musk took over Twitter.
You are implying that firing a lot of people is a bad thing, or at least that firing a lot of Apple or Twitter employees is a bad thing.
I don’t think I’m really that qualified to stand in judgment of the Twitter employees, but after the massive house cleaning, the only major negative changes to the company’s fortunes that I know about is that a lot of liberals decided to flee the platform. But that doesn’t seem connected to the layoffs - that would’ve still happened because of either their policy changes or his overall unpopularity with that crowd. We didn’t see any more notable stability problems with the platform than it had at any point in its long existence. And new features kept being shipped.
In the case of Apple, given that the company was so close to insolvency, I don’t see how anybody could seriously argue that most of management was in severe need of replacement. And when you’ve built an organization to do what turned out to be a lot of the wrong things, it’s likely that a lot of roles really do need to be replaced with different job descriptions.
The only way you can argue mass layoffs are always categorically bad is if we are viewing companies as jobs programs rather than pursuing any other mission (and I’d argue that this holds true even if that mission isn’t to make money).
Re: Steve Jobs in Exile – New book on his years at NeXT Computer
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's not be overly dramatic about that period. Apple was not days away from going bust. They were months away from filing bankruptcy. They were still a multi-billion dollar company even then. They just had very bad supply chain management. A bunch of old Macs sitting in warehouses not selling and too many people on payroll without any clear objectives. As Steve put it, "the ship was sinking and Gil (D'Amelio) was wo…
I bet if they had went the BeOS route instead, wouldn't be talking about Apple today.
I agree. While it's definitely technically possible for Apple to transform BeOS into a more Mac-like experience much like how OPENSTEP was transformed, what saved Apple wasn't Mac OS X alone (which wasn't available for consumers until 2001), but Apple's cleaning up house and then gradually launching a revitalized product line, which brought in many new customers (especially the iMac). These things encouraged software developers to keep targeting the Mac and also bought time as people waited for Mac OS X. Apple also did a good job with Mac OS 8 and 9.
I don't think Apple under Jean-Louis Gassee would have successfully made these steps. Apple probably would have ended up getting purchased by some larger tech company by the end of 1999; Apple almost got purchased by IBM sometime around 1992-1993, and in early 1996 Sun made a serious proposal to buy Apple.