My homage to Steve Jobs

[mtbdudex]

My homage to Steve Jobs. I took this self-portrait in Fall 1984 with my 1st computer, Apple Mac 128k, the original!
RIP Steve, I've NEVER owned a WinTel computer.

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[bystander]

Steve Jobs: How to live before you die

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something -- your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking. Don’t settle.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Steve Jobs (1955-2011)
Stanford Commencement 2005

[mtbdudex]

I was an active member of AnnArbor MacTechnics from 1986 - 1995, did anyone here ever join those mtgs?
For a few years I ran the SIG's, Basics and Beginners.
Also I was a semi-active member of MacGroup Detroit (Terry White).

Ha, I spent $6k on the MacPortable when it came out in 1989 because I hated DOS machines, very proudly can say I never learned DOS.
Plus, spent $1k for a 4MB static RAM module.

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Sure, I could program in Basic, Pascal, Fortran, Assembly,etc, and did.
But refused to learn DOS, or WordPerfect, etc.

other from memory lane:
I have the premier edition that came with my 128k Mac:

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and of course this one....

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and who does not remember upon getting your first Mac/MacWrite/Imagewriter doing this, printing to show everyone how cool the Mac was

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[rstevenson]

Just a few weeks ago I finally sold my second Mac, a 2300c portable, with its peculiar base station that sucked in the portable when it docked and spat it out to undock it. A collector in town wanted it and it's time for me to divest myself of stuff. My first Mac -- a 512Ke purchased as a straight 512 in Aug. '85 and upgraded several months later to the 'e' designation (for extended) remains here in its carrying case, and I still have a Test Drive a Mac tag attached to its carrying strap. I too have never owned a Wintel machine, though I was occasionally forced by economic necessity to use one at work. I've owned a bunch of Macs over the years and am writing this on my iMac, with an iPad sitting next to it.

The loss of Steve Jobs is a sad thing, yes, but he did far more in his too short life to make a positive difference in the world than most people can manage. Inspiring the design, production and sale of computers that are not only useful but yes, fun to use was an extraordinary accomplishment in its time. I remember all too clearly the mindset in the early 80s, of deadly seriousness and earnestness in typing out DOS commands which could go terribly wrong. I remember computer sales people saying, when you asked about their computers, "What do you want to do with it?" as if they would have specialty machines for particular purposes. And their confusion (or derision) when you replied "Everything." I remember the immense negativity of IT personnel and their occasional lying about the Mac to avoid having anyone requisition one for work use; and then my dismay when I learned that a particular IT manager, after years of public Mac-hating at work, spent his own money on, naturally, a Mac for home use.

The above is to remind us, if we need reminding, that the success of Apple and the Mac was never a foregone conclusion. It required the genius of Steve Jobs and a large bunch of other geniuses to make it happen and thereby improve the lot of all computer users, even those who persisted using Wintel machines all those years. They too have much to thank Steve Jobs for.

Steve will be missed.

Rob

[Ann]

I've never owned a Mac thing in my life, but I agree with everybody that Steve Jobs was one of those remarkable, one-of-a-kind geniuses who make things happen so that they change the world. Literally.

Like others have said, Steve Jobs will be missed.

Ann

[Orca]

*Admin, please remove post.*

[owlice]

Steve Jobs changed my life; I contemplated changing my major in college (though in my senior year) because the Apple II I worked on in my lab job -- the company used it to track histology and cytology specimens -- came with beautifully written guides. I sat at the Apple II while on my dinner hour all summer going through those manuals, and came away with an appreciation and affection for computers and programming I could never have anticipated. Too late to switch majors without delaying my graduation still further, I fit in what few compsci classes I could, graduated, took my eight (!) credits of computer science and immediately got a job as a programmer.

I definitely did NOT like computers/computer science before that summer, though I had a group of friends who were compsci majors.

I still have my original Apple II+.

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[owlice]

Where is the praise for Denis Richie?

Don't know, but I do know better than to look for it on a thread titled "My homage to Steve Jobs."

neufer, what IS that dress made out of??

[Orca]

Where is the praise for Denis Richie?

Don't know, but I do know better than to look for it on a thread titled "My homage to Steve Jobs."

My point is that there are many folks who've contributed more yet are relatively unknown.

[owlice]

My point is that your question doesn't belong on a thread titled "My homage to Steve Jobs." Your post strikes me as churlish.

[Orca]

My point is that your question doesn't belong on a thread titled "My homage to Steve Jobs." Your post strikes me as churlish.

I apologize. I was thinking out loud; callousness or churlishness was not my intent.

[geckzilla]

And the difference is all in the knowing of a person. It's kind of like consoling someone whose grandma just died by telling them that people in third world countries die of starvation every minute. Monkeysphere!

[owlice]

My point is that your question doesn't belong on a thread titled "My homage to Steve Jobs." Your post strikes me as churlish.

I apologize. I was thinking out loud; callousness or churlishness was not my intent.

Thanks. I didn't think you set out to be churlish -- that would be unlike you, certainly!