Thanks Steve!
Earlier my work, Swifto, posted a tribute to Steve Jobs, the legendary co-founder of Apple, in the form of our favorite ads. This includes the iPhone 4 FaceTime ad which we unanimously believe is one of the greatest ads we have ever seen.
There is no one speaking, no one touting the speed of the device or how it was superior to it’s rivals. It just shows people using the device to talked to their loved ones. It shows, with no words, why FaceTime, a feature that many phones prior to the iPhone 4 had, would help you stay connected. It is a truly beautiful ad. Those who use the phone don’t care about how fast it is or how it looks. They just care that it is helping them create memories with their loves ones….regardless of distance.
It is an ad that sums up Apple. It is an ad that sums up Steve Jobs.
Today we lost a titan. Today we mourn not just a man. Men die, even great men die, but today a rare man died. A game-changer died. Steve changed lives for the hundreds of millions of people who use his products and for the billions of people who will use his products. There will be those who will grow up enjoying a world that he truly helped shape.
It may seem odd for there to be so much hoopla around one man. It is easy to dismiss him as a figure-head for a computer company. When I found out the news this morning I rushed in to inform my two roommates. They were sad that someone had died but their answer was ‘who?’ and ‘what makes him different from others who have died?’. Whilst their words hold truth, Steve was but a man, he did more to affect modern-day life than almost anyone else in recent memory. He did not have the powers of the President yet his mark will be left on this world. He dared us to be different.
When Steve first demoed the Macintosh in 1984 he did so with a very cheeky grin on his face. He allowed the Macintosh to speak for itself and the Mac stated that you should not trust a computer that you can’t lift. It was this showmanship that helped propel Steve Jobs to the top of the tech world. He was kicked out of his own company and so he simply went on to form another billion dollar company until he was brought back into the fold and made Apple the success story that it is today. It was Apple that helped him change the world. He did not just create beautiful products (looking down at my MacBook Air and iPhone I can attest to their beauty) but rather he refined entire industries. Take the smartphone. RIM, the creator of the Blackberry, was the most popular smartphone makers in 2007. Their smartphones had keyboards and scroll wheels and small screens. Then Apple came along with their now infamous iPhone. Suddenly smartphones had large screens, were touch enabled and could access the Internet like a real computer. It was, in short, a revolution that continues to reverberate around the world today. That was Apple. That was Steve Jobs.
To show how forward thinking Apple was take a look at the new iPhone 4S, unveiled just a few days ago, with an emphasis on a personal assistant called Siri and look at this video that Apple created in the 1980s.
Steve was a perfectionist and that is evident in the products that he created. When Apple first made a foray into phones it partnered with Motorola to create an iTunes phone. You can see when he introduces the phone that he isnot happy with it. It doesn’t ‘just work’ and it does not redefine the industry. So Apple distanced itself from the iTunes phone and hunkered down to create the iPhone. Perfection is often stressed by CEO’s but rarely does a CEO have such an attention to detail as Jobs.
Jobs continued to change the world but it was not until 2005 when he gave a life-altering speech, some consider to be the best commencement speech in history, that the world was confronted with the fact that this man was mortal. We learnt that he was suffering from cancer. He took multiple leaves of absence from his role at Apple until August when he resigned. Whilst we lose Steve today we remember his advise from that famous speech ‘Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish’. It is advise that many of us in the start-up industry take to heart. We live in an age that was shaped by Steve Jobs. Those of us who are lucky to work with computers know that without him they would not be the same. He rescued us from the beige boxes that dominated the 90s. He showed us that form and function could actually were not enemies and could coexist. He showed us that beauty did not have to come at the expense of practicality. The start-up industry would truly not exist if not for him and the devices that he pioneered. We, in start-ups all over the world, mourn Steve’s passing because we know that we are continuing his legacy of changing the world. Some start-ups may succeed and some may fail but no idea is stupid. No idea should ever be mocked because it is the stupid ideas that help change the world. One can imagine how, just a few short years ago, people would think it would be impossible to catalog the world’s information, hold an entire bookshop in your hand or be able to play tens of thousands of songs from a small device in your pocket. Yet that is exactly what Google, Amazon and Apple have done. They have helped change the world. Years ago they were just start-ups…being run by people who thought big. Steve Jobs thought big. I stand in awe of him and his life, which was tragically cut short, encourages me and all of us in the tech industry to continue to think big.
Steve once said that he wanted to make a ‘dent in the universe’. Steve you didn’t dent the universe. You redefined it. You have made it impossible for others to dent the universe because you have now set the bar so incredibly high. We will continue on in life trying to make our own mark but it will be in tribute to you.
We are Hungry. We are foolish. We thank you Steve.
Rest In Peace.
