Here are some quick thoughts about Steve Jobs’ resignation…
Steve’s stepping down has been some time coming, but it’s still a shock. We all knew he would be standing down eventually, but that was at some point in the future. Maybe next year, or the year after. It was a shock to hear he’s stepping down. And obviously, it doesn’t bode well for his health.
The way he announced his resignation was pretty brutal. Perhaps he should have called a press conference, or announced it at one of his special product events. Instead, he sent out a short, cryptic press release. It explains little, and leaves a lot to the imagination. Of course he’s too sick to continue working. That’s all he does — work. If he’s stepping down, his fragile health must be declining. It’s a sad day. The press release is totally in character, of course, but still a bit brutal and impersonal. Especially for his fans.
Apple’s stock is going to take a big hit following his resignation. It will eventually recover. Smart investors will remain long. But us fans don’t care about that. It’s Steve’s vision and creativity we care about.
He’s had a huge, direct influence on so many of the gadgets we use on a daily basis — our computers, our phones, our music players. And the people under him, like Jony Ive, have doubtless been propelled to greater heights through his leadership.
Apart from the stock hit, Steve’s resignation will have no effect on Apple in the short term. There’re a couple of years of products already in the pipe. On the one hand, he’s obviously irreplaceable. But he’s also molded Apple in his image. His DNA is so firmly embedded in the company, it will run like clockwork without him. I could be wrong. We’ll see.
It’s a nasty shock and a sad day. He’s had a huge influence on our culture. His products are almost as universal as the phone or automobile, and have had as big an impact.
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.
17 responses to “It Was Inevitable, But I’m Still Shocked And Saddened By Steve’s Resignation [Opinion]”
I remember hearing someone on a Tech podcast saying “Steve will have to be knocking on death’s door before he releases his grip on the helm of Apple.”
That quote is freaking me out now.
I just paíd $20.82 for an íPad 2.64GB and my boyfriend loves his Panasoníc Lumíx GF 1 Cámera that we got for $38.79 there arriving tomorrow by UP S.I will never pay such expensive retail príces in stores again. Especially when I also sold a 40 inch LCD T V to my boss for $657 which only cost me $62.81 to buy.
Here is the website we use to get it all from, http://BídsFírst.Com
Is the guy not entitled to retire? He has set down a great foundation, and has created the “apple culture”. Even Bill Gates has pretty much retired. Let him enjoy life now. I’m sure he will still have a lot of control over the company. But in all honesty I think him getting sick just opened his eyes on how short life is. And how he can’t work it all away. Time to relax. Take care Steve. I hope we can still see you announce new products :( won’t be the same without steve on stage.
lol! He’d retired, get over it! Now he’s the chairman of two major companies (Apple & Disney/Pixar). Steve is smart to go out on top! Everyone that works at Apple was hand picked by Steve personally. He doesn’t design, code or program anything at Apple, so it’s easy to see why they’ll be OK. Steve is the driving force behind the company, but Tim Cook is the “genius” behind Apple’s dominance in supply, retail, components & manufacturing. They’ve obviously been set-up for the next few years (possibly a decade), with new products to keep them going for a long-time. To make things even better, Apple’s competitors are doing their best to fumble & screw-up every product they release. Apple doesn’t even need to focus on them. These companies seem to have incorporated a “new” business-model, in which they ONLY react (copy) to every one of Apple’s product releases (iPod, iPhone, iPad or Mac’s). Meaning, they have NO real plans until Apple announces, then releases the product to the masses (e.g. Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 was pulled, re-built & changed “drastically” after the iPad2 was announced & released to the public). The deals Tim Cook has made personally in the last 5 years alone have made Apple the dominant player in the mobile-component business. The competition has NO chance! They’ll never be able to compete, no matter what type of product they put out. Their product could be successful & it wouldn’t matter because they’d never be able to manufacture products in numbers, buy enough “proper” components, or flood the supply-channels. Apple wins again! This is obviously why they chose to make this change at this time. One thing about this company that makes them “light-years” ahead of the rest is that they do serious strategic-planning before they make any type of moves. These are some “serious” chess-players we’re dealing with here!
I think that could be one of many of Apple’s “master-plans”. Announce now, let everyone freak-out, then when it’s all settled, announce iOS 5’s release date + the iPod-back-to-school event! Then announce the iPhone 5. Then, surprise! Steve shows up at the keynote to intro the new devices, like last time & maybe the iPhone 5 at the end. It would make the web go crazy! Plus, it would have the bloggers & analyst questioning themselves for at least another year. lol
> The press release is totally in character, of course, but still a bit brutal and impersonal.
Brutal? Damn, I’m saddened by this news like any other longtime Mac user, but in the end… Steve Jobs didn’t actually CARE about me personally and I’ve never had any illusions in that regard. I’m more worried for you than for the fate of Apple. Dude, get some perspective… it’s a CEO retiring from a computer company (that also doesn’t care about you personally).
It’ll be ok! Go hug a loved one who really does care about you. :D
I think you’re right. Theres no way Steve would leave the control room of this coming centurys greatest company without a really good reason. I believe Steve knows he is going to meet his maker soon. He’s trying to soften the blow to Apple by stepping down first.
No matter what you think of Steve Jobs, this is indeed a sad day.
Nice one on Radio 4 this morning BTW Leander.
When I heard the report on the Today Programme on Radio 4 I almost fell out of bed because I was waiting to hear it finish the sentence with ‘died’ or ‘dead’ – thankfully it was ‘resigned’. I’ve never been happier to hear the word ‘resigned’ in my entire life.
I think Apple will be fine. We all know that nobody is superman. Steve’s human. There’s only so much you can do when health issues get in the way. He’s taking a back seat (which is great) and the top table at Apple has never had such a focussed bunch of people in place. Tim Cook will be a good man at the helm and I don’t doubt that there will be others that join Apple in the coming years that will bring fresh ideas and new insights and innovations to Apple. The culture at Apple has been built up over the years and if there is one company who collectively know who they are, it’s probably Apple. This self awareness is a powerful thing and whilst Steve, through a power of will made most of it occur, Apple is now bigger than one single man’s vision. Apple IS Apple.
As for the resignation letter. Come on, this is Jobs. I wouldn’t have expected him to do it in any other way. In fact it’s a bit rambling, I would have thought it should have gone like this…
‘Resigned CEO, future very bright, just watch.’
sent from my Iphone
But the board probably made him write a few more words just so they had something to fill the news page.
Steve,
Thanks for letting me be part of the journey! Almost 30 years starting with the 128K Mac, PowerBooks, Newton, Laserwriters and DTP, user groups, the 20th Anniversary Mac, the bondi iMac, the Cube, the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad, the MacBook Air, all those Macworld Expo keynotes, and just never ever having to deal with the DOS and Windows worlds. Thank you and wishing you the best!