Watch this video interview with MS CEO Steve Ballmer and see if you don’t conclude he’s a coke head.
Ballmer sniffs and snorts throughout and he’s constantly rubbing his nose as if he’s dying to take giant snot snorts.
If you were sitting in a bar with him, there’d be no doubt he just did a couple of fat rails.
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander is an expert on:
Apple and Apple history
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Tim Cook and Apple leadership
Apple community
iPhone and iOS
iPad and iPadOS
Mac and macOS
Apple Watch and watchOS
Apple TV and tvOS
AirPods
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
40 responses to “Ballmer — A Coke Head?”
Initially, I misread the title, I thought it said something other than coke. That would be true as well though ;)
Or he’s just got a bad cold.
Hmm.. or it could just be that he has a cold or has allergies. Nah, it must be that he is an addict, yup that’s it!
I would have to say that this is one of the more inflammatory headlines I’ve read on your site and honestly, it’s a pretty cheap shot if you ask me. I’m not one to defend MS or Blabber-Balmer, but to pen an entire post about some foibles in an interview is pretty petty. I would think that there is much more pertinent and interesting content to speak about here, but lately this blog has become rather tripe and uninteresting anyways.
You should always act on your words I say, and in this case I think I will: by unsubscribing to your feed and losing your bookmark.
I’d have to disagree with you on that, I get really bad colds at least twice a year since I was a kid, and from the guy’s voice and even the way he twitches, I can totally tell he has a terrible case of a cold or the flu or whatever, but just like every one of us, he still “has” to go to work, do interviews, get his people to copy Leopard features into the next Windows, etc.
Actually, just hearing the tone of the interview, he’s uncharacteristically mild, he’s even saying Apple did a good job with the iPhone, it’s as if he’s way downbeat or in slow motion, just another symptom of a cold as oppossed to the usual side effects of a Tony Montana fest.
Now, about that time when he reportedly threw his chair in a fit of rage when they lost that China exec to Google, well, that may be a different story…
He looks like Dilbert in that outfit.
Wow. I give him
The DEVELOPERS! video was more proof of coke than this. Looks like he has a cold to me.
Just a cold…
or, you know, he could have just had a runny nose.
More likely he is just a slob with a cold.
Gimme a break! He has a cold.
This post is borderline libel. Like others have said — he more than likely had a cold. Wuh wuh.
You’d think a guy worth $20 billion could afford some decent socks. Who dresses him, Bill Gates’ Mother?
I’ve known coke heads.
I haven’t watched this video yet, but I’m convinced he’s a coke head.
The monkey dance video sealed it for me. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, look it up on youtube.
He and I did rails in a San Fran bathroom one time. Then he touched me improperly, but I didnt mind. He gets the best coke in the biz!
The bare leg is a bit much for me, too. I might do some bumps with ankles like that…
They make socks out of elastic now, right? Jesus – must be his socks are running Vista.
Hehe, nice try. No it’s a bit to obvious that he’s got a cold. But the pic is good. Hehe..
As much as I’m not impressed with MS or Ballmer, this article is discreditable. You should refrain from the lowest common denominator stuff.
Coke head? He’s kind of fat for that. And look at those clothes …just proves you can’t buy style
Wrong. It’s just obvious that coke head without style.