Cult of Mac’s Remembers Steve Jobs, Remember Him With Us [Open Thread]

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Leander Kahney: Steve Jobs’ death is a horrible shock and very sad — even though we all knew it was going to be sooner than later. Steve had a lot of fans — a strange thing for a mega rich businessman, but he was a singular character, and had a singular influence on all our lives. His products are near universal. It’s a great shame, because I truly believe that he was really just getting started.

John Brownlee: Steve’s mortality has been written upon his gaunt face for years, ever since he was first diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, yet now that he’s gone, it’s so hard for me to process. I always knew this day might come, but in the back of my head, there was always this belief that if any man could indefinitely stave off the cancer that was killing him by the mere strength of his personality and the truth of his soul, it was Steve Jobs.

Even dead, though, he still feels here to me. His spirit is part of the keyboard I type this on, the display that illuminates these words as they come into being, even the black slate in my bag that told me he had died from half a world away. How can Steve Jobs be dead? And, of course, he can’t be, because his life and vision changed our world forever. He is immortal.

Adam Rosen: If I had to name the single person who has had the most impact on both my personal and professional lives it would have to be Steve Jobs. I was wowed by the Macintosh from the first time I saw that 1984 commercial (during the Super Bowl), and became a Mac user soon after. That computer, and the company behind it, saw me through college, a professional career using Macs, then a subsequent career supporting Apple products. That’s astounding – and I am but one of many who feel this way.

Few people directly or indirectly brought more innovation to the world and touched the lives of so many people. Apple has changed the face of personal computing many times over. Today’s a sad day, but the legacy Steve leaves will live on for decades. RIP Steve Jobs – and thanks.

Buster Heine: As a kid I think I had two people in my life I looked up to as heroes – my grandpa, and Steve Jobs. To me, it wasn’t just about how huge of a visionary Steve Jobs was that I admired, but it was how dedicated to his craft he became. Nothing less than perfection was acceptable. Steve pushed not only himself, but the world to become better. I wouldn’t care about trying to achieve perfection in my work if it weren’t for the beautiful Macintosh my dad showed me as a kid. Steve always was concerned about every detail of his products because he loved them so much. I’ll never have his dedication and discipline, but I hope that someday I’ll love something as much as Steve Jobs loved the products that he made at Apple.

Alex HeathSteve Jobs is my hero. He ushered in the age of personal computing and then buried it with the new age of post-PC computing. He will forever live on through Apple and his legacy.

I feel like I lost a friend today. I never met Jobs, but I’ve heard countless stories about those that have been fortunate to come into contact with him over the years. He has definitely left a ding in the universe.

David Martin: I don’t know where to start since there are so many things to say, but to put it bluntly — Steve Jobs was one of my heroes. He helped create a number of products that helped make me creative and I know they’ve made many of you creative too.

It was Apple products, particularly the iPhone, that brought me back to my writing career. A career I left in 1991 and found again in 2008. If it wasn’t for Steve’s passion that drove me to be just as passionate about what I was doing with Apple products I don’t know where I would be now.

Thank you Steve Jobs. Rest in Peace.

Pete Mortensen: Steve Jobs is the person outside of my family who had the greatest impact on my life. It’s fairly safe to say I would never have become a journalist if not for the hope that I might one day get to cover Apple, it’s likely that I would never have developed a lifelong passion for technology and design, and I know I would not have had the drive to fight my way into working in design and innovation in the Bay Area he made his home despite a shaky sketching hand and a total lack of patience with the kind of rigor required to be an engineer.

Ultimately, he showed that business and technology can be an art worthy of a life’s ambition just as much as literature, music, or fine art. He showed the vital role that a humanist can have in making our tools more human, more relevant, more revolutionary, and more significant. I will miss getting to see him introduce big ideas for the rest of my life.

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