Thursday, October 06, 2011

My Tribute to Steve Jobs

Image link to EveryBodySucksButUs
The news this morning that Steve Jobs has died from cancer is not unexpected - but very sad nonetheless. I, like a lot of people, admired him for many years. His name, with probably only Bill Gates, was part of computer technology vocabulary - in the 1980s and 1990s he was held in the highest regard long before the iPod, iPhone, and iPad arrived.

A young Steve Jobs with the original Apple Mac.
Photo link from thenextweb.com.
When I first used the Apple Mac, exactly like the one in the photo of a young Jobs to the right, I had no idea that this was just the beginning of many years of innovation in technology. There was nothing else like it - by the time the Apple Mac was launched in 1984 I had not used a PC and the Apple II computer in the Zoology Dept in Trinity stood unused by all - all my computer use was on the DEC 20 mainframe in an old building in Pearse Street. Apple, and Jobs, has a strong influence on me in the mid-80s, but after I was finished in Trinity I have never used a Mac for anything (other than clicking on a few icons in a computer shop).

I don't know when I bought my first iPod - my daughters had them long before me. Right beside me now in my kitchen I can see my iPhone, my wife's iPad and iPod Mini, and my daughter's iPod. Each of the five of us in our family has an iPhone - we joke that we should change our name from O'Loughlin to iLoughlin.

I know that Apple is a huge organization that is bigger than one man, but it is a tribute to him that Jobs is seen as Mr Apple and that the company might not be the same again. It won't be, but it will continue to innovate and produce wonderful services and products.

May he rest in peace in iHeaven.

1 comment:

  1. With the purchase of NeXT, much of the company's technology found its way into Apple products, most notably NeXTSTEP, which evolved into Mac OS X. Under Jobs's guidance, the company increased sales significantly with the introduction of the iMac and other new products; since then, appealing designs and powerful branding have worked well for Apple. At the 2000 Macworld Expo, Jobs officially dropped the "interim" modifier from his title at Apple and became permanent CEO. Jobs quipped at the time that he would be using the title "iCEO".

    Thanks :)
    Michael

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