Leander Kahney - page 15

LAS VEGAS — We’ve heard the same story for years: the revolution in home automation is just around the corner! And yet, despite the hype, it still hasn’t arrived. But talk to vendors at CES, and they say it finally is just around the corner — thanks to the iPhone.

The iPhone finally gives ordinary consumers a bunch of good reasons to automate their homes, beyond the geeky thrill of turning on the sprinklers from the couch. For example, it can alleviate the universal anxiety of worrying about the stove when away on vacation. Paired with a connected-range (there are several on show here at CES), your iPhone can you tell you if the oven is on, and then let you switch it off.

The best evidence that home automation has arrived is that the nation’s home builders are finally including home automation technology in many new homes as standard. Lennar Homes, the third biggest home builder in the US, is making home automation standard in more than 20,0000 new homes this year, said Matt McGroven, marketing leader of Nexia, a San Francisco-based home automation company.

Nexia makes an app that works in conjunction with a Home Bridge ($60 on Amazon) and service ($9 a month). With 70% of users on iOS, Nexia controls a wide range of automated products, from nannycams to lighting, locks, thermostats, and dozens of others.

“You can do a bunch of cool and genuinely useful things,” he said.

LAS VEGAS — The simplest solution is always the best. Take external battery packs for your iPhone, which are sometimes hard to use when you’re actually talking on the phone. Either you have to remove your case to snap in a battery case, or you have a long cord dangling to an external pack in your pocket.

MyCharge’s clever Talk & Charge ($100) is a slim external battery pack that works with any and every iPhone case on the market because it doesn’t physically attach to your iPhone; you just hold it against the back of your iPhone while talking, like an electronics sandwich. Simple.

It’s almost the same size and shape as an iPhone 5s or 5c. It boasts a 3000mAh battery (good for more than two full iPhone 5 charges) and a Lightning cable built right in, so you’ll never forget your charging cable again. It’s a nice touch.

In fact, I think all of MyCharge’s wares are thoughtfully designed. The tech is pretty good too. According to the company, they are the fastest chargers on the market. Check out their well-designed charging bricks:

LAS VEGAS, CES 2014 – At the big “CES Unveiled” press event on Sunday night, one of the biggest draws was the TrewGrip keyboard; a funky Bluetooth keyboard for smartphones and tablets with the keys on the back of the device.

The company’s reps were mobbed by curious journalists, jockeying each other to get a better a look at the keyboard that claims to be “the evolution of typing.”

Designed for typists on the go, like healthcare professionals making hospital rounds, the TrewGrip is a unique reverse keyboard with a full set of QWERTY keys on the back.

Using it requires retraining and takes a week or more to master, but at the booth, company reps were tapping out 60-80 words a minute. Not as fast as many touch-typists on a regular keyboard, but a lot faster than pecking away on a glass screen.

A few years ago I bought a cycle computer to help me train for the Death Ride, a single-day, 130-mile bicycle ride through California’s Sierra Nevada mountains. It was a top-of-the-line GPS-equipped device from Garmin. It had digital maps and turn-by-turn directions and every feature under the sun. It measured speed and performance, including things like cadence (pedaling speed) and climbing rate.

I bought it mostly to use with a heart-rate monitor, which fellow riders advised me to use to modulate my effort. If you keep your heart below a certain threshold, you can pretty much ride all day. All the other members on the team (The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training program. Fantastic, btw) had the same high-end models. We all had different bikes, but the same Garmin computer.

At first I didn’t much care for most of the measurements it took. But as I got fitter, I got faster, and I started to look at my average speed over those long-distance training rides, which were often 100 miles or more. Every week the average speed crept up, even though the rides got longer and harder.

Oddly, because I wasn’t expecting it, that one simple number proved to be a huge motivator. Every weekend I’d look forward to a 120-mile ride through the hills of the Bay Area just so I could add 1 or 2 MPH to my average speed.

Proselytizers of digital fitness gadgets pitch the “quantified self” as the best way to take control of your health; know thyself through your data.

I’m not an A-Type personality by any means, someone who sets goals and measures my performance. I’m the opposite, in fact. I mostly avoid all the numbers in my life — my bank balance, the traffic to the Cult of Mac website, sales of my books. Because if the numbers aren’t good, I get depressed and I can’t function for a day or two. Better to avoid the numbers altogether.

I’ve suffered from depression since I was a kid. It’s not a big deal, but once a month or so I need to withdraw for a couple of days. It’s a physical thing, regular as clockwork. As I’ve grown older, a couple of days can sometimes stretch into several days, and sometimes, very rarely, into weeks.

For me, the best cure for depression is exercise. It doesn’t actually cure depression, because I can’t exercise when I’m into the deep blue. I can’t force myself to do it. But it does keep it at bay. If I exercise regularly, it don’t get depressed as often. Trouble is, work and life too often get in the way.

More recently, I’ve started wearing a Jawbone Up wristband, which I bought mostly out of curiosity. I had the idea I’d use it to get fit, but I really didn’t like it at first. I was exercising only sporadically, and the graphs just showed how sedentary I was. They were clear, graphic representations of chronic inactivity. I was flatlining. Again, instead of motivating me to get off the couch, I simply stopped looking at it.

Then I started running regularly at the gym. I uploaded the Jawbone once a week or so, but didn’t pay it much mind. But again, as I slowly got faster and better at running, I started to pay more attention to the data. The graphs would show a huge spike of activity in the day when I exercised, making me feel slightly guilty, even anxious, on the days that I didn’t.

The feedback started to become a motivator. It wasn’t the main motivator — that was the running itself. I started to look forward to the run. The graph at the end of the day was just the icing on the cake.

After 22 years at the Wall Street Journal reviewing technology, columnist Walt Mossberg is moving on. In his final column, Mossberg picks the 12 devices that had the most impact over the years.

“I chose these 12 because each changed the course of digital history by influencing the products and services that followed, or by changing the way people lived and worked,” Mossberg writes.

One company completely dominates the list. Guess which one it is (and what devices he chose)?

UPDATE: There’s no glass on the front of the Stonestown store. Earlier reports indicated the store was fronted by glass, but it’s actually wide open. It has a big metal gate that is closed at night. “Comes right out of the walls. Pretty nifty,” says one shopper who visited the store.

Apple just reopened its retail store at San Francisco’s Stonestown mall, and just check it out. It’s one long piece of curved glass. spectacular!

Here’s another shot:

While accepting a lifetime achievement award from Auburn University, his alma mater, Apple CEO Tim Cook told of how The Ku Klux Klan, Martin Luther King and Senator Robert Kennedy shaped his passion for human rights and equality. “Growing up in Alabama in the 1960s, I saw the devastating impacts of discrimination,” Cook said in New York on December 10th. “Remarkable people were denied opportunities and treated without basic human dignity solely because of the color of their skin.”

He recalled childhood memories of watching crosses burn on neighbors’ lawns in Alabama. “This image was permanently imprinted in my brain and it would change my life forever,” Cook said. “For me the cross burning was a symbol of ignorance, of hatred, and a fear of anyone different than the majority. I could never understand it, and I knew then that America’s and Alabama’s history would always be scarred by the hatred that it represented.”

You can watch the full speech below the fold:

Ever wanted to take a tour of Apple’s secret Industrial Design studio in Cupertino? Now you can — a virtual one, anyway — just for writing a review of my new book about Jony Ive. It doesn’t even have to be a good review!

Located on the ground floor of Infinite Loop II behind frosted glass windows, the industrial design studio is where Ive and his team of design elves cook up Apple’s awesome products.

Few have been inside — even some of Apple’s own executives haven’t seen it. Rumor has it that the former head of iOS, Scott Forstall, wasn’t allowed inside, even when he was developing the iPhone’s operating system. Only one published photograph has ever been taken inside the studio. And no, Blue Peter and the Objectified documentary weren’t filmed there, contrary to popular opinion.

Now you can take a tour. I had a 3-D model of the studio created, based on detailed descriptions and diagrams by former designers who worked inside. I used it to create a video tour of the studio, showing the layout and explaining how everything works. I think the video turned out great, and here’s how you get a sneak peek.

The worst gift I ever gave was the time that I presented my father with a doormat for Christmas.

In my defense, he was impossible to buy for and I had already tried everything. Robes. Records. Books. In total desperation on Christmas Eve, I noticed that his doormat was all frayed and coming apart.  This struck me as a genius idea. Practical. Useful. Not one more piece of junk cluttering up his life. It seems to me that gift giving is too often about buying more stuff for people who don’t need it; here was an opportunity to give him something he would use every day and actually needed.

It seemed like an inspired purchase until he opened it up. There was the family reunited on Christmas morning, staring at a crappy doormat. Dad was unimpressed. Then my brothers started cracking up. It quickly became a family joke: my gift to him was the worst Christmas gift of all time. It was too late to resurrect my reputation for that year and many years after, despite all my thoughtful presents.

I didn’t start out as a bad gift giver. When we were kids, my brothers and I used to spend a lot of time making stuff for our parents. We went through an Origami phase that folded in the thoughtful with the handmade:  I remember laboring over a box for my mom to keep her jewelry in, for example. And of course, my parents would make a big fuss over our handiwork, like parents do.  Then, as you grow up, you end up being lazier about choosing presents. You lose touch with your parents and sometimes the other people in your life. You don’t know what they’re interested in or really need.

Gift giving can become a meaningless routine — the worst gifts to my mind are the really generic ones. Like a tie rack or electric wine bottle opener. You know, basically anything for sale in the SkyMall designed to placate that loved one you forgot about while traveling. These are the inexcusable gadgets that don’t work better than the no-tech versions, plus the batteries die, they require space on the counter, etc. And, let’s face it: you cannot really improve on a corkscrew. (How many wine bottles do you open on a daily basis, anyway?) That’s the kind of  default gift you fall back on because it costs a little more, it’s designed as a “gift item,” and when you don’t know what else to get someone, you buy it.

Enter the 2013 Cult of Mac Gift Guide. We’ve picked out the stuff that is genuinely useful, that will add some value to your iDevices and those of your loved ones. Charlie Sorrel, our reviews editor, is captaining the effort. All year round, he wades through thousands of press releases and has a great eye for striking gadget paydirt with things you really want and need to own. Plus you can bet that he’s seen every iPhone handlebar accessory and pedalled them all out, too, with an eye to keeping your wallet half full, which never hurts.

What’s on my list? This year, my mom got her very first iPhone. (A gold one!) So I’ll be looking out for something useful for her; she’s a typical retiree who takes a lot of pictures but is used to be taking them with a regular camera.

Spoiler alert: she definitely won’t receiving an iDoormat.

When I moved to the States 20 years ago from the UK, I had two suitcases. One contained my clothes and other worldly possessions. The other case was filled with my crappy old Macintosh.

The Mac was obsolete even then, but leaving it behind was unthinkable. I held on to it for decades, hauling it across the country and multiple house moves. I’d still have it now, if I hadn’t cooked it showing my kids the joys of OS 6. Moronically, I blocked the top vents with a box and the explosive pop of overheated circuits nearly gave me a heart attack.

The busted Mac was just one of a garage-full of creaky old Apple technology I chucked out recently in a major de-cluttering (mandated, btw, by the wife). The list is too heartbreaking to mention in full, but included dozens of desktops and laptops, as well as boxfuls of obsolete iPods, mice, keyboards, modems, printers, monitors and cables.

Other things that I threw out and probably shouldn’t have? I also disposed of boxes of Apple press passes and press kits, including one for the special-edition U2 iPod that included a nifty poster. I kept one “Think Different” poster (featuring Gandhi) but recycled a bunch of others.

Why did I hoard all this stuff? Mostly laziness. eWaste is a headache. It’s easier to just hold onto it. But part of it was because a lot of this stuff still worked! I might have gotten a new, bigger monitor, but there was nothing wrong with the old one. Sure, it’s VGA resolution, but it still functions!

And then, I always felt there would be a time when I needed that FireWire extension cord, or a serial-to-USB adapter. Right? I’d kick myself if I had one once but threw it out when I needed it. But mostly it was sentimentality. Each item had a specific memory, triggered by softly stroking its chunky beige keys.

SAN FRANCISCO — Apple is blocking the donation of 30-year-old documents to a museum, claiming they contain valuable trade secrets.

“It’s silly,” said Hartmut Esslinger, the design guru recruited to help Apple become a leader in design in the early 1980s.

Speaking at a Jony Ive book launch party on Thursday night, Esslinger explained that Apple has prevented him from donating some historical old documents to a museum.

Esslinger’s design firm, Frog Design, was hired by Steve Jobs to bring world-class design to Apple. Esslinger’s “Snow White” design language, characterized by elegant off-white plastic cases, influenced the entire computer industry for more than a decade.

The first time I met Jony Ive, he carried my backpack around all night.

Our paths crossed at an early-evening party at Macworld Expo in 2003. As a journeyman reporter hustling for Wired.com, I knew exactly who he was: Jonathan Paul Ive was on the cusp of becoming the world’s most famous designer.

I was surprised he was willing to chat with me.

We discovered a shared love of beer and a sense of culture shock, too, both of us being ex-pat Brits living in San Francisco. Together with Jony’s wife Heather, we reminisced about British pubs, the great newspapers and how much we missed British music (electronic house music in particular). After a few pints, though, I leapt up, realizing I was late for an appointment. I hurried off, leaving without my laptop bag.

Sir Jonathan Ive is extremely self-effacing. The only time he says “I” is when he’s talking about the iPhone or iPad. Talking about his work, he replaces “I” with “we.” It’s always about his team, his collaborators, and Apple, the company he works for. For Jony, it’s all about the work.

As senior vice president of industrial design at Apple, the world’s most valuable company, he’s been the world’s leading technology innovator for more than two decades. He’s led the design of a string of iconic products: the iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad, plus a score of other innovations in between. He’s won every design award under the sun. He’s even been knighted.

In 2011, Sir Jonathan Ive was promoted to Apple’s overall design guru, in charge of both hardware and software. It was a position formerly held by Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. Jony provides direction and leadership for industrial design, the group primarily responsible for hardware, as well as the human interface software teams. Hardware and software have traditionally been run as separate divisions at Apple. Only one man straddled both groups — Steve Jobs. Jony has stepped into the role that Jobs left with his passing. Tim Cook is CEO, but Jony is Apple’s creative driving force. He’s Apple’s MVP.

You wouldn’t know it if you met him. Born in Chingford, Essex, the 43-year-old Brit is quiet, even shy. He’s super friendly and soft spoken. He is extremely private. Even Apple says it doesn’t know his precise date of birth. He dresses in jeans and T-shirts and always seems to be carrying something in a plastic bag. He speaks softly but he doesn’t look like a wallflower: he’s big and muscular, a legacy of a lifetime working out. He has close-cropped hair, which might make him look menacing if he wasn’t so obviously a nice guy.

Jony is the most celebrated designer of his generation. In 2002, he was named the first Designer of the Year by the Design Museum, which he won again in 2003. That year he was inducted as a member of the Royal Designers for Industry (extremely prestigious). The following year he was given the Royal Society of the Art’s Benjamin Franklin Medal and the BBC named him the “Most Influential Person on British Culture,” beating out JK Rowling and Ricky Gervais.

In 2005, Jony was presented with three Silver Pencils from the British Design & Art Direction (D&AD) association, some of the most prestigious awards in the industry. In 2006, he got a fourth, the most Silver Pencils ever awarded to an individual. One Silver Pencil is a career maker; four the mark of an off-the-charts genius. He subsequently got six Black Pencils, more than anyone else, ever. Jony has a record number of D&AD awards; and he got them in a stretch of just 10 years. In 2006, he was made a Commander of the British Empire; and in 2010 he was knighted by Princess Anne at Buckingham Palace. By March 2013, he was named in more than 600 design and utility patents.

In 2011, D&AD bestowed another giant award on Jony: it named Apple’s design team the best design studio of the last 50 years. It was one of the first public recognitions for the group as a whole, and Apple felt the award was important enough to fly the normally reclusive, ultra secretive group en masse to London to receive it — the first time ever.

While racking up awards, he’s helped push Apple’s sales off the charts. In the nearly two decades that Jony has been at Apple, the company has pulled back from the brink of bankruptcy and is now one of the world’s most valuable companies. In 1992, the year he joined Apple as a designer, the company made $530 million profit selling beige computers. In 2012, Apple’s made $41.7 billion profit on $156.5 billion revenue. Yeah, billion!

The company makes gorgeous products that compel customers to camp out overnight and sometimes even riot. AAPL, as it is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, currently has a market cap of about $475 billion, making it the biggest company on the planet after the oil giant Exxon.

A lot of this had to do with Steve Jobs of course, the genius who toiled for three decades to bring personal computers to the masses. Jobs always had an eye for talent, launching Apple in 1977 with the hardware genius Steve Wozniak. For the last dozen years, his chief creative partner at Apple was Jony Ive. Jony is a genuinely original thinker. His products are not just the same old things repackaged to look new; they are new. They are products no one could have imagined a few years ago.

Steve Jobs was a genius — no doubt about that. Apple was six months from bankruptcy when he took over as CEO in 1997. Under his leadership, Apple became one of the world’s most powerful companies, the most trusted brand, and disrupted entire industries. He didn’t have an easy career. He spent many years in the wilderness, and even when Apple was bouncing back, he didn’t get the credit he deserved. It was only late in his career, after the iPhone became a smash hit, that he started to be lionized as a business genius. And after his death, he was deified.

But was it all Steve Jobs? Is the company doomed without him? What happens when one man gets all the credit? The truth is more complex. Apple wouldn’t be Apple without Steve Jobs, but it wasn’t just him. Jobs didn’t design anything, and he didn’t write any code. The creative work was done by others, though he had a hand in guiding it.

I’ve been to Apple’s current campus a few times, mostly for product presentations at a modest theater Apple calls the Town Hall.

When I went down to see the introduction of the iPod Hi-Fi, Apple’s attempt at a boombox, Steve Jobs had had a warren of nearby offices transformed into an Ideal Home exhibition.

It was February 2006, a couple of years after Jobs’ first treatment for cancer but before his liver transplant. He tried his best to get through the presentation with his characteristic charisma and energy, but he seemed to tire quickly and towards the end he obviously just wanted to get it over.

However, after introducing the iPod Hi-Fi and some other products, everyone was herded across the hall. Jobs wanted to showcase the iPod Hi-Fi in its “natural” surroundings and some offices had been dressed up to look like your typical living room, bedroom and den.

The iPod Hi-Fi was a $350 white plastic boombox — Apple’s attempt at replacing customer’s home stereos. During his presentation, Jobs said he’d spent small fortunes over the years on audiophile gear, but the iPod Hi-Fi sounded so good, he was now he was replacing his home stereo with one.

As we trooped from one room to the next, I found myself beside him. Ever the intrepid reporter, I introduced myself, thrust out my hand and asked him if really had replaced his Marantz stereo with a boombox? As he towered over me, he just looked down contemptuously at my outstretched hand, and said one word: “Yes!”

Of course, there was no way to use this in my story. But I was impressed with his antisocial nerve. Many people buckle in the face of social niceties like shaking hands: not Jobs.

Apple’s HQ isn’t exactly Grand Central Station, open to all. I’ve never eaten at Caffè Macs or played foosball on the grass in the middle of campus. I did get a walkthrough once, when I visited someone’s office, but was told to keep looking straight ahead and not snoop into anything.

You can drive around the campus on Infinite Loop, the ring road surrounding the nerve center of Apple operations, but the only place for the public to visit is the Company Store in the first building: One Infinite Loop.

Here you can pick up Apple-branded pens, mouse pads and T-Shirts. I bought a shirt that said, “I visited the Mothership.” Apparently, the most popular shirt says “I visited the Apple campus. But that’s all I’m allowed to say.”

It’s unclear what public access anyone will have to the new spaceship Apple Campus 2. The theater, where Tim Cook will presumably preside over future product presentations, is outside the main donut (and underground to boot!).

Let’s hope there are opportunities to visit, even if it’s only to shop at a small company store.

Before he died, Steve Jobs said architecture students would be able to marvel at the huge headquarters, which he envisioned as the best in the world.

Let’s hope Apple honors this, and doesn’t close off access to outsiders like a glass prison you can’t break into. We all deserve to spend some time in the fantastic space that Jobs envisioned.

Leander’s new book about Jony Ive and the Apple design studio is out in November. Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products is available for pre-order on Amazon.

I had a jokey book trailer made to promote my new book about Jony Ive, Apple’s head designer. And Apple’s had it pulled off YouTube!

The video wasn’t even public. It was unlisted. I offered a sneak peek to readers who pre-ordered the book, which is being released next Thursday November 14.

The video pokes fun at Jony Ive, Apple and myself. But last night I got an email from Google saying that it had been disabled because of a copyright claim from Apple.

I had hoped that the video was protected by fair use. The rules of fair use are ambiguous, but in general, you are allowed to remix and re-use previous material, as long as the resulting work is “transformative.” If it adds “new expression or meaning” to the original, then it’s fair use. I think the book trailer did. It’s a classic remix of several previous Apple product videos. A parody. And parody is a form of expression generally protected from copyright claims.

SAN FRANCISCO — Apple went from being chump of the tech world to champ, and what was the product that turned it all around?

That was the question posed to a panel of ex-Apple designers at a special event here in the city.

The answers might surprise you.

I’m pleased to formally introduce my new book on Apple’s head designer, Sir Jonathan Ive — Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products.

Published by Penguin Portfolio on November 14, it’s the first full-length biography of the worlds’ most-celebrated designer.

I’m super psyched about it. It turned out great. I managed to talk to a bunch of inside sources, who reveal some of Apple’s most guarded secrets about how the company really works.

I picked up one of Apple’s new iPad Airs on Friday. I didn’t think I’d be impressed — but I am. It’s light, fast, and beautifully constructed. Is it the perfect tablet? It’s pretty close. Here’s all you need to know:

• It’s amazingly light. It almost feels hollow. It’s much lighter than you expect. Which means that it’s effortless to hold for reading and carrying around. It’s a big and important difference. It’s super portable.
• It’s plenty fast. Annoying little lags on previous iPads — like slow rendering Web pages with multiple tabs — are gone. It’s much more useable than my iPad 3.
• Battery life is great — more than 10 hours of continuous use.

And there you have it. It’s almost as light as the iPad mini with the speed and big, beautiful screen of a full-size tablet. Go get one. It’s great.

When we were kids, my brothers and I drew all the time. We drew monsters, cartoon people, and faces. Tons of faces: goofy ones, serious ones, ugly ones, and beautiful ones.

We were fanatics. We thought we had talent. We’d take anyone aside every artist we met and beg them for tips and tricks any chance we got. Our granddad, an artist by profession, was our greatest source of inspiration. Our parents proudly hung every scribble on the walls.

I wanted to go to art school, but was persuaded to go to university instead. Academia instead of art. In college, I roomed with a gal who did charcoal figure studies. Our shitty apartment in Brighton, Sussex, was covered with the black dust as she churned out image after image of human figures in various states of undress. I, of course, recalled my artsy leanings from my youth, and headed to the art store to buy pastels, charcoal sticks and reams of thick, heavy, expensive paper.

I spent tons of money that I should have used to pay rent to buy watercolor paints, brushes and paper. I found a cheap easel for sale on a student bulletin board and spent many afternoons up on the roof, smoking hash, painting sheets of rain marching slowly over the South Downs.

Then I grew up. I got a job, a wife, kids. Painting? Drawing? Who has time for that anymore? Who has the money to do it, right? The space to store all the material needed to pursue such a dream, let alone the room to actually engage in artistic endeavors.

Luckily, I have an iPad. And judging by the amazing artwork out there, and indeed in this very issue, I might very well have all I need to rekindle my early love of artistic expression.

There are apps for painting, drawing, illustrating, photo re-touching, and the like. Tons of them in every category. There are styluses and capacitive brushes that rival the analog materials you’d end up paying a fortune for in an art store, and these can be used in the comfort of your very own touchscreen.

No wonder why Roz Hall, the iPad artist we talk to in this issue says, “I turned my back on the canvas and fell in love with the pixel.”

Honestly, why didn’t I think of this before? Who needs a room full of dusty, messy crap to just produce more work that end up in the basement? Not me – I’ve got an iPad and a few inexpensive apps.

Here I come, art world…

The term “planned obsolescence” has achieved negative connotations, but it originally referred to a long-standing tradition of changing designs to sell more products.

It was coined by the car industry in the 1930s to refer to annual model updates. Over the years, however, the term has taken on a darker meaning. But planned obsolescence is a good thing. It’s the driving force behind much innovation.

This morning, New York Times reporter Catherine Rampell accused Apple of breaking her old iPhone 4 with the iOS7 update, which made it unbearably slow. “It seemed like Apple was sending me a not-so-subtle message to upgrade,” she wrote in a piece entitled, Why Apple Wants to Bust Your iPhone.

According to Rampell, Apple is feeling the heat from Samsung, HTC and others, and is resorting to sabotaging older iPhones with a software update and force users to upgrade their hardware.

This is bullshit from every angle. The iOS7 upgrade isn’t obligatory, it’s voluntary, and pissing off customers isn’t a good way to keep them as customers. There’s no mention that Apple sold a record-smashing 33.8 million iPhones last quarter.

Truth is, Apple’s products are so far ahead of the curve, it’s a constant criticism leveled at the company: that it is a willing practitioner of planned obsolescence.

In the early 90s, I drove across the States in a clapped-out Mustang, from the East Coast to California. It was a leisurely drive. I was in my mid-20s and drifting.

I stayed for a stretch in a seedy motel on the Las Vegas strip, at one point sleeping one week for free in exchange for building a wall by the front entrance. I don’t know why the motel owner agreed to this. My roommate – a hitchhiker I’d picked up — and I had never built a wall before. We stretched the work out for a week. But as it grew higher, it became more unstable and we were evicted when it fell over in a shower of bricks.

The night before I’d met a French guy. He claimed to be ex-Foreign Legion. Short but muscular, he radiated fitness and strength. He told me about the running of the bulls in Pamplona, Spain. Most of the injuries, he said, occurred in the week before the actual running of the bulls. People gather in the streets to drink all night and brave young men climb the lampposts to jump off, trusting the crowd will catch them. Sometimes they plunge right through the upstretched arms.

My roommate and I split up and I drove with the French guy to Death Valley. He claimed to know a remote cabin in the mountains above the Valley floor. It was a three-hour, 13-mile hike, he told me, but the cabin was full of food and we could stay as long as we liked.

Although it sounded a little fantastical, I parked the car off the highway. He advised me to hide it as best as possible – we didn’t want anyone breaking in.

As we hiked across the valley floor toward the distant mountains, he told me how he’d nearly been executed in South America. He was travelling alone in the jungle and was sleeping in the trees to stay safe from jaguars. One morning he woke to find himself covered in blood. There was sticky blood all over his body, from head to toe. At first he suspected that something had been killed in the tree above him, but then he realized it was his own blood. He had been attacked by vampire bats in the middle of the night and they’d drooled his own blood onto his skin.

Afraid of a rabies infection, he headed for the nearest settlement. But he crossed the border into a neighboring country and was locked up by the army, which was battling local rebels. In the cell, he started to exhibit the first symptoms of rabies. But he had more pressing troubles. The army accused him of being a rebel spy and threatened to execute him. They didn’t believe his cockamamie story of solo jungle hikes and vampire bats. It took days of beatings and interrogations – plus his advancing rabies — to convince them of his innocence.

We crossed the Valley floor and started to climb upwards, following a rocky dry river bed full of huge boulders. I was getting more and more nervous. The French guy was crazy! There was no cabin here. Free food and board? In Death Valley? What was I thinking? He was luring me off the road to kill me. He’d take my Mustang keys and disappear. No one knew where I was. Not a soul. The name of the place began to gnaw at me, ringing in my head like a crazy mantra: Death Valley, Death Valley, Death Valley!

When I was a kid, my friends and I hitchhiked everywhere. We hitchhiked to school most days. We hitchhiked all across the country for camping holidays. We’d just take sleeping bags – no tent – and bed down in open fields. This was Britain in the 1980s, which didn’t seem particularly dangerous. But like the US, the UK is high up on UNICEF’s ranking of countries for child abuse.

I have my own kids now, and the thought of them hitchhiking wherever they please seems crazy. I’d never allow it. But they take buses all over San Francisco, and I have no problem with them hailing a car using Uber or Lyft. Because they are using an app, they’re not getting into a car with a stranger.

Likewise, we’ve swapped our house with strangers several times (AirBnB – read on for my wife Traci’s account) and I regularly buy used goods from Craigslist and eBay.

These apps affirm my deeply held belief that most people are fundamentally decent.

I digress: back to Death Valley. I kept trying to get behind the French guy so that I could pick up a boulder and smash his skull in. But he took my falling back as a sign of tiredness and he’d wait up to help me.

I was getting desperate. Death Valley! Death Valley! And then there was the cabin. Sitting on flat near the river bed, just shy of the lip of the mountain. An old miner’s cabin built around the turn of the century. It had four cots and, as promised, it was full of dry and canned food left by previous visitors. Over the years, it had accumulated into quite a hoard. We stayed for a few days, exploring the abandoned mine and mountaintop, which had unbelievable views across Death Valley in one direction, and across the Nevada desert in another.

When we hiked back down to the car, it was just as we left it, except someone had used their finger to write a message in the dust on the back windshield: “Clean Me.”

Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook bought four properties surrounding his house in Palo Alto, California. He reportedly spent a cool $30 million buying four properties surrounding his house, and is leasing them back to their former owners. Irony of ironies, he did it to protect his privacy.

Nothing wrong with that, of course, except Zuckerberg presides over the greatest intentional invasion of our privacy ever devised.

Actually, maybe that’s the NSA, but nonetheless, Facebook is built on the idea that our digital lives should be public. Facebook’s default mode is to expose as much information about you as possible. All your pictures, vacation plans, school graduation ceremonies and what products and services you “like,” which are mined by commercial interests to sell products and services back to you.

I discovered the dangers of unfettered social sharing while researching my upcoming book on Jonathan Ive and Apple’s industrial design department. Digging around in Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, I found a LOT of personal information about Apple’s designers. Stuff they no doubt want to keep on the down low. These are people who are intensely private. They have very low public profiles. They intentionally keep their identities and jobs out of the public eye.

This is partly because of Apple’s draconian secrecy policies and partly to shield them from headhunters. But there’s also a large measure of just keeping their lives private. Apple’s twenty or so industrial designers are somewhat public figures, thanks to their amazing success as Apple’s primary innovators and the growing international fame of their boss. They don’t want their lives examined by a nosey snoop like me.

Some keep their Instagram feeds private, but a surprising number don’t. Some of the designers have registered Facebook and Instagram accounts under nicknames or pseudonyms. They weren’t too hard to find with a bit old-fashioned, shoe-leather reporting.

Looking through their pictures — cyberstalking them — you can see their vacations, their houses, their cars and kids and spouses. You see weddings and nights out at clubs. Skiing adventures by helicopter and surfing excursions. Trips to London or Italy’s Amalfi coast. It’s all very enviable. In fact, the pictures look just like the staged photos Apple uses on the computers at the Apple Stores. They are the real version of the picture-perfect California life.

I won’t reveal the pictures or the Instagram feeds. Although their pictures and feeds are very much out there in public, the designers are entitled to their privacy. They’ve made attempts to keep them private — or semiprivate — and I won’t violate that. There’s no reason they should be forced to hide their feeds. There’s little harm in exposing your pictures to the public. It’s easy for friends and family — or the public even — to get a glimpse of your life and activities. There’s nothing very serious that’s exposed. I could figure out exactly where they live, I suppose, but there are probably easier ways.

But it shows that we should all be aware of what we’re exposing online. My kids are quite savvy about privacy. They are careful about what they post to Facebook and tend to keep pictures with their faces offline.

In 2011, even Zuckerberg’s puppy got into the act. Beast, a white mop of a sheepdog, has his own page on Facebook. He can be seen waiting patiently for steak bits, blending in with a shaggy rug and rushing about the yard. His “mom”  (Zuck’s wife Priscilla) is often incidentally pictured – maybe over a morning cuddle or carrying him down the stairs. Since August, though, the four-legged wonder has not posted a single status update. And can you blame him? Even a dog with 1.6 million likes needs a little privacy once in awhile.

I came home from work to find my sons and their friends killing a prostitute with a baseball bat.

I was horrified. They were laughing their heads off.

But they were right and I was wrong. It was funny. They were just having some taboo fun. Their reaction was super healthy, and I’m not at all worried about what they were doing.

They weren’t supposed to get hold of my copy of Grand Theft Auto. I’d hidden it away; but not very well. They’re in their early teens, and too young, I felt, for the adult pleasures of the GTA franchise.

Not only are there prostitutes in the game. You can kill them. And killing them, for a kid, is a source of amazed amusement that you can do such things. It’s like finding dad’s Playboy’s under the bed, only worse. It’s naughty. Transgressive. I still kinda regret that they played it, but I am relieved by their reaction to it.

The fact that they were squealing with delight and laughing their heads off at the ability to do something so outrageous was a very clear and gratifying affirmation of their emerging humanity. I’d have been worried if they had been silently and grimly killing off the other characters.

Oddly, it’s the non-violent games that turn them into little monsters. They got Rock Band for Christmas, and they were soon attacking each other with the plastic instruments. One of my boys smashed his brother over the head with a guitar in frustration. Wii tennis has resulted in several controllers thrown against the wall. Candy Crush induces epic rages fits. My wife and I concluded that it’s true what say: video games make kids violent.

But it’s not the content of the games that morphs them into little rage monsters. It’s the mechanics of the game. They get frustrated when a sibling screws up a song, or they are killed before the end of a level.

It’s not blasting zombies’ heads off that makes them violent. It’s frustration with the game itself, the inability to complete a task or challenge.

They encounter these same frustrations in every aspect of their lives: with homework and classmates, playing soccer or being told to brush their teeth. Frustration and rage are a normal part of our makeup. I’m consumed by it whenever I drive to Safeway.

I believe that games are an important learning environment. Better that my kids try to deal with their rage while mashing buttons now than behind the wheel of a car in a few years.

As Rob Lefebvre reports in this week’s issue, there’s a new generation of games called “empathy games” designed to help us understand other people better and hopefully make us nicer to be around.

In a roundabout way, I think GTA has a similar effect. GTA’s not Shakespeare, but it incorporates elements of good literature and cinema – complex story-lines, character development, moral choices, atmosphere, and sometimes jaw-dropping beauty.

The moral choices are gleefully the wrong moral choices, but choices they are. My daughter, the eldest of the lot, is a great example of this. When she plays GTA, she drives within the lines and stops for red lights. She gets pleasure from following the rules, not breaking them.

GTA has much more to contribute than the gleeful killing of streetwalkers. It’s a sly and fascinating satire of America, courtesy of its Scottish developers, who are obviously both amused and appalled by this country. My kids are fans of Colbert and Breaking Bad, too. They get it.

This story first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine.

Although he was a billionaire and a legendary jerk, Steve Jobs could be surprisingly accessible and even friendly.

He might take your family photo, dress up like Frankenstein for a haunted house or tell a group of interns that he spends his free time bonking his wife.

Here are some of my favorite stories and anecdotes about everyday encounters with Jobs.

After leaving my job at Apple, I dropped in for lunch one day. I was exiting the main building, Infinite Loop One, and just ahead of me was Steve Jobs, walking with the usual spring in his step that never seemed to go away even as he started looking more frail. Bumping into Steve was a surprisingly common occurrence for such a large company as Apple. Steve was heading towards a car parked next to the curb with its door open, waiting for him. If you want to see where Steve Jobs’s tombstone rests, take a look at this piece on steve jobs tombstone.

A family was standing near the Apple sign outside the building, a common site for people to take photos on their pilgrimages to Apple. The father turned to Steve as he passed close by and asked, “Excuse me, sir, would you mind taking our photo?”

Steve paused for a moment as an iPhone was extended to him, realizing that they didn’t seem to know who he was. With a hint of enthusiasm, he said “Sure!” as he took the iPhone into his hands.

Steve took a great deal of care composing the photo, backing up a few steps several times, tapping the iPhone screen to lock focus, then said “Smile!” as he snapped the photo, grinning a little bit himself to encourage the family to follow suit.

He handed back the iPhone and they said “Thank you, sir” as Steve stepped into his car, closed the door and was driven away. The family looked at the photo that Steve had taken and all agreed that it looked great. Then the iPhone was pocketed and they were on their way.

And that was the last time I saw Steve Jobs.

Chris Hynes, Oct 7, 2011

Before I met the wife I had a girlfriend named Rebecca. Rebecca had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. It was a rough time in her life and she was very depressed by it, even though chemotherapy was healing her over time.Rebecca was a big fan of Pixar films.[…]

I sent a letter to Steve Jobs telling him about Rebecca and her situation. I asked for an autograph for her, hoping that could be something positive for her and encourage some positivity. I never thought I would get a reply, but i thought it was worth a try.

A week later I receive a package in the mail. In this thick envelope was a letter from Steve Jobs speaking of his cancer fight and how he wished Rebecca a quick recovery.

Also in this envelope was six Pixar prints signed by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, Mike Doctor, and Joe Ranft (a fellow cancer sufferer). Each of these men had written a letter to Rebecca wishing her well.

Jobs did not have to go to this kind of trouble, but he did anyway. Steve Jobs was not a man known for his public charity and many people think he was driven by selfishness and greed. But this act goes against that idea for me. This was most certainly a positive, selfless, and charitable act.

Kristopher Wright, Quora, Oct 6, 2011

One of my friends did an internship at Apple. Apparently Apple has a day where the interns get to meet Steve Jobs (this was obviously a few years back) and ask him questions.

Two questions that were asked stuck in her mind:

1.“What do you wish for the most?”Steve Jobs:“I wish people would stop asking me stupid questions.”

2.“What do you do in your free time?”

Steve Jobs:“I f*** my wife.”

Dan Zhang, Quora, Dec 29, 2011

Prior to his return to Apple, it was obvious that the company was in trouble. […] I wrote an impassioned email to Steve at Pixar, pleading with him to find something else to do with his time. “Please,” I implored him, “don’t come back to Apple, you’ll ruin it.”

At the time, I really thought Steve and Larry were just twisting the knife into an already struggling company. As I made my living on Macs, I wanted the company to survive and not be distracted by Steve and Larry’s games.

Shortly thereafter, Steve emailed me. He explained what he was trying to do, and that he was trying to save Apple.

And then he wrote the words I’ll never forget: “You may be right. But if I succeed, remember to look in the mirror and call yourself an asshole for me.”

Consider it done, Steve. I could not have been more mistaken.

Michell Smith, Quora, Oct 24, 2012

In 1988, I was self-employed as a recruiter and had referred a number of candidates to Steve at NeXT Computer, which he subsequently hired. I had also worked at Sun Microsystems as a contract recruiter. In September of that year, Steve invited me to his offices on Deer Creek Road in Palo Alto for an informal interview. He was 45 minutes late. As soon as Steve led me into his office and closed the door, he turned and said, “You recruited for Sun and Sun hires shitty people.”

“Well,” I retorted, “You hired the ones Sun didn’t want.”

At that point, Steve cracked a big smile and exclaimed, “Touche!”

After that, we had a nice chat for about twenty minutes. During this time, a crowd of NeXT employees gathered and paced outside. When Steve opened the door to escort me out, he was mobbed like a celebrity, while I was shoved aside.

As I was about to exit the lobby, I heard Steve call out my name. I turned and saw Steve bending down and waving to me, childlike. I walked away thinking to myself, “That guy can be a real jerk, but he sure is charming.”

Bill Lee, Quora, Dec 10, 2012

Growing up I was a huge Apple fan-boy (fine, still am.) The first NY Apple store in Soho opening was probably the coolest thing that happened to me between the ages 6 and 12. For a while I would spend almost every weekend there.

Every year for halloween I was a Mac, and I made a habit of shaving the Apple logo into my head to celebrate every OS launch.

My neighbor Brooke mentioned that Steve Jobs, busy as he is, always reads email sent to his public address.

I think I was around 10 or 12, and I sent a very enthusiastic and grammatically incorrect message including a picture of my shaved head [with an Apple logo in the back].

Apparently he forwarded it to the head of Public Relations, Katie [Cotton], and I got invited to the opening of the 5th Avenue Cube. I can never thank them enough. This was probably the high point of my childhood.

Allen Paltrow, Oct 6, 2011

[…] He almost ran me over. As I walked back from the campus fitness center, a silver Mercedes S-Class launched a wheel onto the sidewalk and nearly took me out. I whipped around and threw a dirty look at the driver. The door opened, and the driver spat an expletive at the curb as he exited.

I recognized the face immediately. It’s him, I thought. Oh God, he’s pissed. […] I kept walking. DO NOT ENGAGE, I thought. DO NOT MAKE EYE CONTACT. But I couldn’t help myself. He kept walking briskly behind me, staring at the ground, visibly irritated about his car and whatever made him come into the office.

After I looked back for the third or fourth time, he cracked a smile that said, This kid doesn’t even have the balls to talk to me. It was a week before Macworld New York. I took a deep breath and spoke.”Ready for the show?”

He looked up and smiled for real. “Yeah, we’ve got a lot of great stuff. It’s going to be fun.”

“Well, I grew up in New York. Say hi for me.”

Another smile. “OK.”

He walked past me and held the IL1 lobby door open. Steve Jobs. Holding the door for me. What?

That moment changed my life, and other former and current employees surely have moments like it. Whatever Steve was upset about that day was almost certainly more serious than anything I have faced in my career. Yet he still had the good sense to give me a smile and an act of courtesy. It taught me to never lose perspective and never forget who you’re dealing with, no matter what else is going on.

Matt Drance, Oct 7, 2011

I was an intern and one day the head of the intern program gathered the almost 100 interns into the Town Hall auditorium in Infinite Loop 4 for a “surprise guest speaker” that wasn’t really much of a surprise: Steve Jobs.

The meeting had no agenda but I had a hunch that when Steve (everyone who has ever worked at Apple just calls him “Steve”) ended his remarks there would be a Q&A session.

[…] Steve got to about his 4th question from the audience and by this point almost every single intern had their hand up. [Steve pointed to me] I was nervous. “Steve, many years ago you left Apple to start NeXT. But recently you returned to Apple. Why did you come back to Apple?” […]

“When I was trying to decide whether to come back to Apple or not I struggled. I talked to a lot of people and got a lot of opinions. And then there I was, late one night, struggling with this and I called up a friend of mine at 2 a.m. I said, ‘should I come back, should I not?’ and the friend replied, ‘Steve, look. I don’t give a fuck about Apple. Just make up your mind’ and hung up. And it was in that moment that I realized I truly cared about Apple.”

[The friend Steve called was Andy Grove, the former Intel CEO]

Jonathan Berger, Aug 25, 2011

As the conversation went: “I hear you’re not really one to give autographs, but I just gotta ask….will you sign my iPod? It’s fine if you don’t want to. I’m not normally one to even ask for autographs.”

Steve: *chuckling* “It’s quite alright. You heard that about me?? Well, I wouldn’t say that I don’t like giving autographs, I guess I was never comfortable with the idea solely taking credit for something, which is to me what an autograph might imply. To be honest, I think I’m the last person who should sign something. A writer signing a book I can understand, but I think if anybody within our company should sign something, it should be members from our R&D team and all the others responsible for product innovation. It’s unfortunate that they all can’t receive the same level recognition. But I suppose it’s easier this way though?… you would need a pretty big iPod to fit all those signatures”.

eBay listing, Dec 29, 2011

I wanted to share with you a memory of my friend Steve Jobs, a memory that in the days since his passing has come to represent how great of a guy he was, and how good he was to me.

I first met Steve in 2003, over the phone, when I cold-called him to tell him I was a devout fan of all things Apple and would love to be involved in whatever way I could with the company. I remember the call extremely well; me on my hotel room bed, fidgeting and doodling and circuitously explaining that all I could really explain was that I wanted to have a relationship. I got nervous at one point and started second guessing myself and my intentions for calling, to which Steve replied “don’t worry, I have a very good bullshit detector.” I found it very comfortable to be myself around him from that moment on.

The bullshit detector must have stayed silent because In the following months and years I was invited to help introduce products and software at several Macworld keynote addresses in San Francisco. I got to know him a bit in our time together on and off the stage. I remember Steve as being almost iridescent; one second he would be talking to you about “architecture” as it related to digital data flow, and then in a microsecond turn his head a different way and mention Bob Dylan or a killer sushi place and just be the biggest rock star on the planet.

in Spring of 2008, RIM (makers of the Blackberry) approached me about sponsoring my upcoming summer tour, and as I got closer to accepting the offer I knew I had to call Steve to give him the heads up. I explained to him that the money they offered would allow for a better stage design and an all around higher level of production. I also told him that the contract with Blackberry would mean using their products exclusively. He thanked me for calling him, praised the people at Blackberry and told me he would send me an iPhone to at least play with on the bus.

I accepted the offer with Blackberry, and in the months leading up to the July 29th release date, the iPhone became the most desired item on the planet. Everybody wanted one, and nobody had yet to see one in person. It was mythical. That day I was playing an ampitheatre in Indianapolis, and sometime in the afternoon the production office got a call over the radio that a sales associate from the local Apple Store was standing at the outermost gate of the venue with something addressed to me. A few minutes later someone knocked on my dressing room door and handed me an Apple Store bag. Inside was an iPhone, and taped to it was a card; it belonged to Steve Jobs, CEO, 1 Inifinite Loop, Cupertino, California. Handwritten on the backside of the card was one word: “Enjoy!”

Just the greatest thing.

I used to think that when you died, everything you ever learned and amassed along the way in your life just stopped existing, all of it returned into the universe and repurposed for something else completely. Steve’s passing made me realize that can’t be true, because every bit of energy and intellect he spent his life to collect is still here with us, as vital as it was when it was with him. I can’t think of a better way to measure a life well lived.

John Mayer’s Tumblr, Oct 20, 2011

I once forwarded an email from Steve Jobs to a friend, adding a snarky comment. Steve’s reply informed me that I’d replied, not forwarded. Steve was extremely cool about it. He said he’d been emailed FAR worse things accidentally. And many not so accidentally…

Pixar director Lee Unkrich, @leeunkrich, Twitter, Oct 11, 2011

Here in Palo Alto, Steve Jobs isn’t just an icon, he’s also the guy who lives down the street.

I first met Steve years ago at a backyard pool party. I was so flummoxed by the off chance I was breathing in his DNA, I could barely say a word. I am sure I made a winning first impression as I stumbled over my own name when we were introduced.

I watched as he swam in the pool with his son. He seemed like a regular guy, a good dad having fun with his kids.

The next time I met him was when our children attended school together. He sat in on back-to-school night listening to the teacher drone on about the value of education (wait, isn’t he one of those high-tech gods who didn’t even graduate from college?) while the rest of us sat around pretending having Steve Jobs in the room was totally normal.[…]

It was at Halloween not long after when I realized he actually knew my name (yes, my name!). He and his wife put on a darn scary haunted house […]. He was sitting on the walkway, dressed like Frankenstein. As I walked by with my son, Steve smiled and said, “Hi Lisen.” My son thought I was the coolest mom in town when he realized The Steve Jobs knew me. Thanks for the coolness points, Steve.

From then on, when I saw him holding his executive meetings in our neighborhood, I didn’t hesitate to smile and say hi. Steve always returned the favor, proving he may be a genius, but he is also a good neighbor.

In time, things changed. The walks were less frequent, the gait slower, the smile not so ready. Earlier this year when I saw Steve and his wife walking down our street holding hands, I knew something was different. Now, so does the rest of the world.

While Newsweek and the Wall Street Journal and CNET continue to drone on about the impact of the Steve Jobs era, I won’t be pondering the MacBook Air I write on or the iPhone I talk on. I will think of the day I saw him at his son’s high school graduation. There Steve stood, tears streaming down his cheeks, his smile wide and proud, as his son received his diploma and walked on into his own bright future leaving behind a good man and a good father who can be sure of the rightness of this, perhaps his most important legacy of all.

Lisen Stromberg, Aug 29, 2011

I remember being at a talk he gave shortly after returning in 1997 as Interim CEO. A bunch of us employees (I was at ATG at the time) were in Town Hall in Building 4 at Infinite Loop to hear him, and he was fired up. Talked a lot about how Apple was going to completely turn things around and become great.

It was a tough time at Apple — we were trading below book value on the market — our enterprise value was actually less than our cash on hand. And the rumors were everywhere that we were going to be acquired by Sun. Someone in the audience asked him about Michael Dell’s suggestion in the press a few days previous that Apple should just shut down and return the cash to shareholders, and as I recall, Steve’s response was: “Fuck Michael Dell.” Good god, what a message from a CEO!

He followed it up by admitting that the stock price was terrible (it was under $10, I think — pretty sure it was under $2 split-adjusted), and that what they were going to do was reissue everyone’s options on the low price, but with a new 3 year vest.

He said, explicitly: “If you want to make Apple great again, let’s get going. If not, get the hell out.” I think it’s not an overstatement to say that just about everyone in the room loved him at that point, would have followed him off a cliff if that’s where he led.

John Lilly, Oct 9, 2011

I was at a Bjork concert at Shoreline back in 2007 when I met an engineer at Apple called Skip Haughay. We stayed in touch and I visited him a few weeks later at the Apple campus, the day before iPhone launched. There was an incredible buzz around Campus and we saw Jobs walking tall with his iPhone. Skip ushered me out to the parking lot, said “I could be fired for this” and showed me the iPhone the day before it launched.

That evening, Skip calls me to say that “My date has cancelled, do you want to join me at the iPhone launch party?” It still ranks as maybe the dumbest question anyone has asked me in my life… and this was only a few weeks after we met. I raced to get ready and joined him at the exploratorium in San Francisco.

The big surprise was that Apple was so secretive, that most employees hadn’t seen or touched an iPhone themselves (Skip was one of the few entrusted with one). Since I’d bought an iPhone earlier in the day, many of the employees wanted to touch and play with mine. So I spent much of the evening giving iPhone demonstrations to other Apple employees!

Then there was Steve Jobs on the stage. The only private speech I’ve ever seen him give. He thanked all the Apple employees and particularly the partners and families of all the people working at Apple. He was gracious to a fault… it sounded like he’d matured a great deal from when I’d read Insanely Great. He was mesmerizing and quite clearly he cared, not just about the product but also the people.
I saw Jony Ive and spoke with him briefly. Then I also saw Steve Jobs. Skip was hesitant to say hello, so I just went up to him myself. Steve responded with a “I’ll talk to you in a moment” and then shortly thereafter walked off. It might’ve been a casual brush off but honestly I wasn’t bothered at all. Skip just laughed at the whole thing. It was one of the most amazing evenings of my life.

I’ll never forget the passion, ingenuity and spirit of the group that evening. All of which was so wonderfully embodied in Skip. The two of us stayed friends for many years afterwards. Just recently, my girlfriend and I visited him in Morgan Hill on his farm. Skip said it was “The Farm that Jobs built.” He was in his element with nature and the farm animals. I was delighted to see him so happy.

Skip passed away himself only a month ago (https://www.mercurynews.com/crime…). So for it to be followed by Steve Jobs just compounded the tragedy. While Steve Jobs was an icon, I will most remember Skip as my friend.

Bruno Bowden, Quora, Oct 11, 2011

My wife and me were walking in downtown Palo Alto one afternoon when I notice a man walking towards us. I immediately recognized Jobs and nudged my wife. Nobody noticed him as we walked down the pavement The year must have been 2003 and I had just ordered a pair of Keen sandals off the Keen website. Back then Keen was not well known and you hardly saw anybody wearing Keens.

As Jobs got closer, there was moment when he looked at my feet and noticed the Keens I was wearing. He was wearing an identical pair. He looked up at me and gave me a smile and a nod. He then walked passed us and stopped to take a look at the Apple store from the other side of the street. A minute later he turned and continued on his way.

Not much of a story at all…..but something I will never forget.

Nikhil Sohoni, Quora, June 5, 2013

I had left a company called Taligent with a few other folks in the mid-90s and we had been cooped up in a small office in a strip mall in Los Altos working on the idea we thought was pretty cool.

The product was a browser with built-in multimedia/animation support so you could build the sort of full-screen animated experiences you had on CD-ROMs (except with markup) and transmit it across the web. This was in the days when HTML barely had support for gifs and way before Flash, so we thought it could open up a lot of new possibilities.

Once we had a decent running demo I started showing it around. At some point I had the notion that I’d like to get feedback from Jobs. I had been a big fan — one of my first applications in college was on an Apple IIe and my first consulting job ever was working on the C++ compiler at Apple in the 80’s.

He was at NeXT by this time. So I wrote him there and mentioned what we’d been working on and asked for advice. To my surprise I got a note back from his secretary saying Steve wanted to meet.

I showed up at the NeXT offices a week later and was shown to a meeting room down the hall from his office. I set up my demo and waited. And waited. He walked in 1/2 hour late, put his feet up on the table and asked me what I had. I introduced myself and mentioned that a couple of the engineers were ex-Apple people. Then I ran through the demo, stopped, and asked him what he thought.

For the next half an hour he went on to rant pretty much non-stop… about the arrogance of Apple (!!!), the quality of their products, and anything unsavory you could think of. There were a lot of ‘you Apple people’ in there. I tried to break in and mention that we weren’t really related to Apple (except the demo was running on a Mac Powerbook) but there was no stopping him.

“Boy, what a dick,” I remember thinking. It went on and on.

At some point a secretary stuck her head in and said he had a call. So I figured that was that. Instead he asked if I could stick around. I remember hesitating for a second, thinking if I really wanted to hear more of that abuse. But for some reason I said yes. He walked out and I sat there. And sat. And sat. For a good 30-45 minutes, I sat there and got more and more steamed about this predicament. Do I pack up and walk out or do I wait and hear more about how Apple sucks?

Then he comes back in. I was sitting down. He gets in front of the whiteboard and starts drawing notes. For the next I-don’t-know-how-long he mapped out precisely how the product could be rolled out, the strategy for taking it to market, how it should be positioned, what other parts would be needed to fill in the gaps, all the way down to the features that should be taken out or added. It was the most amazing, useful, spot-on, and entertaining display of product management erudition I’d ever seen. He completely understood the product, the space, and what it could be used for.

I remember asking him if he wanted a job :-)

We both laughed at that. I remember him saying some nice things about the idea and the product itself. There was no trace of the nasty anti-Apple bile left. I thanked him profusely and he asked me to stay in touch. I walked out with my head still buzzing in the clouds.

As it happened it turned out my ex-Apple cohorts weren’t too happy with my having gone over to see him either. There were choice words about Jobs, so the feelings seemed to be mutual.

A few months later word came that Apple was acquiring NeXT and the rest is history.

My cohorts went on to out-vote me and eventually the company got sold to Microsoft. The product was never released publicly and they all went to work up at Redmond.

I still remember that meeting with Jobs to this day.

A few years ago I was working on another software product that I thought could benefit from his advice. By then he had been back at Apple and the iPhone was a huge hit. I kept holding off until the product was a bit more solid before sending him a note. Then I read that he was sick and a little while later he passed away.

I really wished I could have shown him the new product. I imagine he would have made me wait around for a long while then taken me on a rant on how great Apple products are :-)

And then he would have no doubt gotten up and shown, once again, exactly how he would have done it.

Ramin Firoozye, Quora, July 17, 2013

Prior to his return to Apple, it was obvious that the company was in trouble. Larry Ellison had floated the idea of a hostile takeover of the company, but it seemed to some of us Apple watchers that then-CEO Gil Amelio’s turnaround plan might work.

I wrote an impassioned email to Steve at Pixar, pleading with him to find something else to do with his time. “Please,” I implored him, “don’t come back to Apple, you’ll ruin it.”

At the time, I really thought Steve and Larry were just twisting the knife into an already struggling company. As I made my living on Macs, I wanted the company to survive and not be distracted by Steve and Larry’s games.

Shortly thereafter, Steve emailed me. He explained what he was trying to do, and that he was trying to save Apple.

And then he wrote the words I’ll never forget:

“You may be right. But if I succeed, remember to look in the mirror and call yourself an asshole for me.”

Consider it done, Steve. I could not have been more mistaken.

Michell Smith, Quora, Oct 23, 2012

This was in June ’10 just a few days before Apple’s WWDC. I was working late out of a cafe and was testing one of my apps on the iPad. This was in India and at that time the iPad hadn’t been officially launched here, so was something that would definitely catch someone’s eye.

There was this girl sitting on the next table and was pretty curious about this new thing, moments later she stopped by and we had a nice chat about how cool the iPad is, and was pretty impressed that I could actually write an app that could run on it.

I went home and before going to bed wrote a short email to Steve about how an iPad got a girl interested in me and almost forgot about it until…. Days later, it was his WWDC keynote and I was following a few live blogs that night as I always do (I was GMT +5:30), then suddenly I saw something that was very familiar, it was my email that Steve displayed on the huge screen behind him. He said “It is magical, I know it because I got this email: I was sitting in a cafe with my iPad, and it got a girl interested in me!.” “So there’s proof.”

Chaitanya Pandit, Quora, Oct 27, 2012

About five years ago, one evening, just as I had sat down with my wife and daughter at Saravana Bhavan, a South Indian vegetarian restaurant in Sunnyvale, in walked Steve Jobs with his wife and son. They sat down on the table behind us. It was a busy school night and the place was packed with loud kids and hungry Indians vying for attention of the woefully inadequate staff. Like the clientele at this hangout – mostly Indian techies looking for cheap but authentic food – the staff is also authentic Indian: many speak limited English only and are not aware of the rich and famous of the Silicon Valley.

So, it was with great amusement, we watched Steve raise his hand several times to attract the attention of the waiter, who summarily ignored him. As the only white guy in the restaurant, we thought he would be instantly recognized and served with special attention. Instead, he had the worst table in the house. A bored waiter passed plastic menu cards at his family without giving a second glance. Eventually, he did get served with the mass efficiency of an overworked staff. And, no one bothered him during his dinner either.

My wife and I observed in awe as Steve and his family enjoyed a quiet meal in the riotous, inexpensive place in the heart of Silicon Valley. It dawned on us that no one in the restaurant had recognized Steve in his low-key attire and stubble. At the end, when no one came to his table to present the check, Steve rose up, dropped a few cash notes on the table and walked out, as the server wiped his table.

Just then, the manager walked by, and I asked him, “Did you know that was Steve Jobs?” He smiled and gave me the Indian head shake – a cross between yes and no. To this day, I don’t know what he meant.

Anurag Wadehra, Quora, Oct 27, 2012

I was an intern at Apple in 2004. I saw Steve Jobs in IL3, on the second level. He was just walking away from a couch. I said hello, folded my hands and told him how much I admired him. I then told him how much I learn at Apple, and how I would love to learn from him. I said to him – “Teach me, teach me.”

He fired me on the spot.

Anonymous, Quora, Oct. 25, 2012

At a recent Self-Realization Fellowship Sunday morning service, Brother Bhumananda, a Self Realization Fellowship minister, said that a few years back the phone rang up at Self Realization headquarters (in Los Angeles).

The caller said, “This is Steve Jobs.” The person answering initially thought it was a prank call, but it really was Steve Jobs calling personally to say, “I want to get permission to put ‘Autobiography of a Yogi’ on iTunes. It’s my favorite book!”

Steve Jobs said that he had read ‘Autobiography of a Yogi’ over 30 times. It was the first audiobook to become available on iTunes.

Milton Drepaul, Quora, May 1, 2012

A bunch of us were in the old screening room in Point Richmond with Steve early the morning of the Pixar IPO. We were watching the financial news for that PIXR ticker to go by. So we witnessed the moment that Steve became a billionaire. Quite the payoff for $50 million and almost a decade of hanging in there.

He didn’t say anything. No fist pumps or whoops. But I’ve never seen him happier. That was one beaming smile.

Craig Good, Quora, Oct. 11, 2011

I met Steve Jobs randomly while working as an intern at Apple in the summer of 2010. I had stepped into an elevator on the main Apple campus when, just as the door was closing, Steve Jobs strolled in. He saw that I had an intern badge on, and asked me what I was working on over the summer.

When he asked me this question, I wasn’t sure what to say. Should I tell him what I was working on, and risk getting in trouble for disclosing what I was working on (as we had been instructed not to do during orientation), or should I just tell him that I wasn’t allowed to tell him?

I went with the latter, telling him, “Sorry, but I’m not supposed to tell you.” Steve flashed a smile, chuckled a little, and stepped out of the elevator.

Michael Chang, Quora, Oct. 16, 2012

This story was told to me by the not too bright guy who used to run the Palo Alto retail store at Helio (Helio wireless carrier), a now-extinct Korean smartphone company that combined a music player with a phone. This was in 2007, right when the first iPhone came out. Given that their store had opened directly across the street from the existing Palo Alto Apple Store on University Avenue, a lot of people were curious as to what Helio did and how their product compared to the iPhone. One day the manager noticed a guy wearing a black turtleneck, blue jeans, and glasses staring at the “Helio: don’t call it a phone” window display outside the store for quite some time. When the manager came out to ask if he could help him or give him a demo of the product inside, the guy in the black turtleneck stuck his head in and peered into the store, but deliberately did not set his foot inside. It took some time, but finally he responded to the manager by shaking his head and saying the words “You guys just don’t get it, do you…” and continued walking down the street. The manager had no idea who this guy was and thought nothing of it.

Two weeks later, the same manager was inside the store giving a demo of the amazing Helio smartphone to some prospective customers when he was interrupted by someone at the door. It was the same guy in the black turtleneck and blue jeans. “You guys STILL just don’t get it, do you???” the guy said in an elevated voice from the entrance of the store. Then before the manager could respond, the guy was gone again.

The manager was visibly annoyed and said to his customers “Who is this guy and who the hell does he think he is???”

“That’s the founder of Apple,” replied the customers.

Suffice to say, Helio moved out of the retail store only a year later, replaced by a much more popular Lululemon store.

Mark Young, Quora, Nov 1, 2012

It was hard not to run into Steve Jobs if you spent anytime in downtown Palo Alto. While I never had a conversation with him, my chance encounters reminded me just how human this innovator was.

Once, I drove up behind his car on the way to Whole Foods. (pretty easy to spot his car, especially with his “license plate.”) As I drove up behind him, I could see the gas cap dangling from the side of his car. I tried to grab my phone to snap a picture before deciding that stalking him as he went into Whole Foods would be bad. Chalked it up to a mad genius sometimes forgetting the small stuff.

A month later, driving by his house, glanced to see his car parked out front and the GAS CAP DANGLING AGAIN.

Loved it. Not because it had some profound effect on me, but just because it showed me we’re all human. Even the brightest of us all.

Mark Hull, Quora, Oct 23, 2012

About ’82 or ’83, I and 5 others, including Steve, had dinner together in NYC. The now legendary, late Jay Chiat, then CEO of Chiat-Day Advertising, invited his client Steve, and his other client, Pioneer Electronics CEO Jack Doyle and his wife Ann, Pioneer’s ad manger, and me, Pioneer Senior VP Marketing and Product Development, to dinner.

Never mind the fact that much older Jay and Jack had accomplished so much more at that point than had Steve, he dominated the conversation, brusquely brushing aside anything he didn’t agree with, which, as I recall, was most everything said by the rest of us.

Dinner was over and while we waited for desert, Ann lit up a cigarette (remember this was the early ’80’s in NYC), holding it away and blowing smoke away from the rest of us at the table. Steve, who was seated next to Ann, gave no indication that this bothered him. He simply went on talking animatedly as he had all dinner.

At one point Ann put her lit cigarette in an ashtray the opposite side of Steve. He never looked at it but must have seen her put it down because without so much as a glance toward her or the cigarette, without breaking from whatever topic he was currently holding forth on at that moment, he reached across her, picked the cigarette up from the ashtray, and dropped it in her half full water glass.

I can still see the stunned looks on everyone’s face except Steve who continued to educate the rest of us on . . . I have no idea.

No doubt Steve was a genius given all he and Apple, under his direction, later accomplished. However based on what I’ve heard about him personally, and witnessed that night, he’s not a person I would care to spend time with. One dinner was more than enough.

William Matthies, Quora, June 28, 2013

I bumped into Steve at the Palo Alto Whole Foods near both of our homes. He was in front of me in line paying for his groceries. It was the express checkout and he was wearing his traditional black turtle-neck. This was back in the early 2000s.

Here was a very wealthy, smart guy arguing with the cashier about what the correct change was for his purchase. He was demanding that he got another quarter ($0.25) for his change. This discussion went on for several minutes and held up the line so much that everyone behind him (including us) were getting annoyed.I guess Steve had to be right. The cashier gave him a quarter and he walked away.

Roy Pereira, Quora, Oct. 24, 2012

In the early 1980s, Steve used to eat lunch at “The Good Earth,” the now-defunct Cupertino restaurant where I waitressed when I was sixteen.

I remember this nerdy young guy who always ordered the Good Earth tostada, served in a whole-wheat tortilla and topped with sprouts. He smiled shyly at me when he asked for more Good Earth tea and drank gallons of the stuff.

Steve always sat alone, devouring books and manuals way beyond my limited teenage understanding along with his food. […]

I called my mom the moment I heard Steve Jobs had died. She was sitting in front of her iMac, from which she has a view of the Cupertino Valley, The Apple headquarters nestled in the middle like a brilliant white palace. She was crying.”There was a rainbow one day,” she sobbed, “that ended right on top of Apple.”

My mom snapped a photograph. “I wanted to send it to him!” she added. “I meant to send it to him. And now,” she stopped suddenly, struggling for control. “Now, he’s dead.”

Suzanne Rico, Oct. 7, 2011