Steve Jobs – the man, the legend, the genius

Steve Jobs died earlier this month on the 5th of October, leaving behind an unrivalled technological legacy of not only Apple, but also CGI giant, Pixar. Jobs’ ability to forecast the future of consumer technology and meet this future halfway is partially the reason for Apple’s success, the other being his amazing marketing ability.

Jobs founded Apple in a garage in 1976 with the aim of making a usable computer – one you didn’t need to be in Mensa to operate – that could be used in every home. This mindset saw the creation of the reasonably successful Apple II computer in the same year. However, it was not to be until 1984 that Jobs’ vision was truly realised with the first Macintosh (Mac) computer. Jobs used Xerox technology to create the first mouse-driven computer which changed the face of modern computing. Amazingly Jobs was then ousted from Apple after an epic power struggle between himself and the new CEO John Scully which led him to then found NeXT, a computer development company for business and education, and purchase a part of LucasFilm that would later become Pixar in 1986.

It was the purchase of NeXT by Apple in 1996 that saw Jobs’ return to the flagging company he first created. Jobs was given the position of interim CEO in 1997 before becoming the full CEO in 2000 after the coming of the device that was to change music forever – the iPod. The iPod was envisioned by Jobs who told his engineers he wanted ‘a small box that would fit in your pocket with easy navigation and that would hold over 1000 songs’.

However Jobs did much to turn the fate of the company around before this: in his first few years at Apple, Jobs, known for his aggressive management style, terminated a number of projects to focus on creating profits. He also changed the licensing programme on Macintosh clones and prevented others from making copied machines. Jobs then used the basis of his former company NeXT to aid the creation of the new MacOS X software and introduced the iMac to the market with its unique design style.

Jobs added iTunes on the back of the huge iPod sales and then created the iTunes store for distribution of music. This foray into music distribution paid off and was a step into a future Jobs saw as far back as 1996 – the iTunes software were all manufactured off a NeXT framework called WebObjects. In 2007 Apple changed everything again by introducing the iPhone. Just like the iPod, the iPhone was not the first smart phone on the market, however it was the one that did everything near flawlessly and left others in its wake. The competition flailed for three years, until the threat of Android became evident in late 2010.

The iPad, which came about in 2010, was Jobs’ final new device. This tablet computer’s ability to be of no use but many uses showed Jobs’ genius in the marketing arena – creating something that created a need rather than fulfilled a need. Jobs had an incredibly broad creative mind – at the time of his death he is reported to have owned 342 US patents from objects as well known as iPods to the stairs in the Apple Store. The iPhone 4S was announced just before Jobs passed away, and if his track record is anything to go by, this latest devise looks set to continue the legacy of the man, the legend, and as many would agree, the genius…

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