Steven Paul Jobs (/ ˈ dʒ ɒ b z / ; February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) [5] [6] was an American entrepreneur [7] and inventor, [8] best known as the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc. Through Apple, he was widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution [9] [10] and for his influential career in the computer and consumer electronics fields, transforming "one industry after another, from computers and smartphones to music and movies..." [11] Jobs also co-founded and served as chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios ; he became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, when Disney acquired Pixar. In the late 1970s, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak engineered one of the first commercially successful lines of personal computers, the Apple II series . Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of Xerox PARC 's mouse -driven graphical user interface , which led to the creation of the Apple Lisa and, one year later, the Macintosh . He also played a role in introducing the LaserWriter , one of the first widely available laser printers, to the market. [12] After a power struggle with the board of directors in 1985, Jobs left Apple and founded NeXT , a computer platform development company specializing in the higher-education and business markets. In 1986, he acquired the computer graphics division ofLucasfilm , which was spun off as Pixar . [13] He was credited in Toy Story (1995) as an executive producer. He served as CEO and majority shareholder until Disney 's purchase of Pixar in 2006. [14] In 1996, after Apple had failed to deliver its operating system,Copland , Gil Amelio turned to NeXT Computer, and the NeXTSTEP platform became the foundation for the Mac OS X . [15] Jobs returned to Apple as an advisor, and took control of the company as an interim CEO. Jobs brought Apple from near bankruptcy to profitability by 1998. [16] [17] As the new CEO of the company, Jobs oversaw the development of the iMac , iTunes , iPod , iPhone , and iPad , and on the services side, the company's Apple Retail Stores , iTunes Store and the App Store . [18] The success of these products and services provided several years of stable financial returns, and propelled Apple to become the world's most valuable publicly traded company in 2011. [19] The reinvigoration of the company is regarded by many commentators as one of the greatest turnarounds in business history. [20] [21] [22] In 2003, Jobs was diagnosed with a pancreas neuroendocrine tumor . Though it was initially treated, he reported a hormone imbalance, underwent a liver transplant in 2009, and appeared progressively thinner as his health declined. [23] On medical leave for most of 2011, Jobs resigned in August that year, and was elected Chairman of the Board. He died of respiratory arrest related to his metastatic tumor on October 5, 2011. Jobs received a number of honors and public recognition for his influence in the technology and music industries. He has been referred to as "legendary", a "futurist" or simply "visionary", [24] [25] [26] [27] and has been described as the "Father of the Digital Revolution", [28] a "master of innovation", [29] [30] and a "design perfectionist". [31] [32]
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Steven Paul Jobs (/ ̍ dʒ ɒ b z / ; February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011)[5][6] was an
American entrepreneur [7] and inventor,[8] best known as the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple
Inc. Through Apple, he was widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer
revolution [9] [10] and for his influential career in the computer and consumer electronics fields,
transforming "one industry after another, from computers and smartphones to music and
movies..."[11] Jobs also co-founded and served as chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios; he
became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, when Disney
acquired Pixar.
In the late 1970s, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak engineered one of the first commercially
successful lines of personal computers, the Apple II series. Jobs was among the first to see the
commercial potential of Xerox PARC's mouse-driven graphical user interface, which led to the
creation of the Apple Lisa and, one year later, the Macintosh. He also played a role in introducing
the LaserWriter, one of the first widely available laser printers, to the market.[12]
After a power struggle with the board of directors in 1985, Jobs left Apple and founded NeXT,
a computer platform development company specializing in the higher-education and business
markets. In 1986, he acquired the computer graphics division ofLucasfilm, which was spun off
as Pixar.[13] He was credited in Toy Story (1995) as an executive producer. He served as CEO and
majority shareholder until Disney's purchase of Pixar in 2006.[14] In 1996, after Apple had failed to
deliver its operating system,Copland, Gil Amelio turned to NeXT Computer, and
the NeXTSTEP platform became the foundation for the Mac OS X.[15] Jobs returned to Apple as an
advisor, and took control of the company as an interim CEO. Jobs brought Apple from near
bankruptcy to profitability by 1998.[16][17]
As the new CEO of the company, Jobs oversaw the development of the iMac, iTunes, iPod, iPhone,
and iPad, and on the services side, the company's Apple Retail Stores, iTunes Store and the App
Store.[18] The success of these products and services provided several years of stable financial
returns, and propelled Apple to become the world's most valuable publicly traded company in 2011.[19] The reinvigoration of the company is regarded by many commentators as one of the greatest
turnarounds in business history.[20][21][22]
In 2003, Jobs was diagnosed with a pancreas neuroendocrine tumor. Though it was initially treated,
he reported a hormone imbalance, underwent a liver transplant in 2009, and appeared progressively
thinner as his health declined.[23] On medical leave for most of 2011, Jobs resigned in August that
year, and was elected Chairman of the Board. He died of respiratory arrest related to his metastatic
tumor on October 5, 2011.
Jobs received a number of honors and public recognition for his influence in the technology and music
industries. He has been referred to as "legendary", a "futurist" or simply "visionary",[24][25][26][27] and has
been described as the "Father of the Digital Revolution",[28] a "master of innovation",[29][30] and a
he skip two grades on account of his test scores, his parents elected for him only to skip one grade.[38]
[41]
Jobs then attended Cupertino Junior High and Homestead High School in Cupertino, California.[2] At
Homestead, Jobs became friends with Bill Fernandez, a neighbor who shared the same interests in
electronics. Fernandez introduced Jobs to another, older computer whiz kid, Steve Wozniak (also
known as "Woz"). In 1969 Woz started building a little computer board with Fernandez that they
named "The Cream Soda Computer", which they showed to Jobs; he seemed really interested.[42]
Following high school graduation in 1972, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Reed
was an expensive college which Paul and Clara could ill afford. They were spending much of their life
savings on their son's higher education.[42] Jobs dropped out of college after six months and spent the
next 18 months dropping in on creative classes, including a course on calligraphy.[43] He
continued auditing classes at Reed while sleeping on the floor in friends' dorm rooms, returning Coke
bottles for food money, and getting weekly free meals at the local Hare Krishna temple.[44] Jobs later
said, "If I had never dropped in on that single calligraphy course in college, the Mac would have never
had multipletypefaces or proportionally spaced fonts."[44]
Early career
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Wikipedia's layout guidelines. Please help by editing the article to make
improvements to the overall structure. (March 2012)
Homebrew Computer Club Newsletter, September 1976
In 1974, Jobs took a job as a technician at Atari, Inc. in Los Gatos, California.[45] He traveled to India in
mid-1974[46] to visit Neem Karoli Baba [47] at his Kainchi Ashram with a Reed College friend (and, later,
an early Apple employee), Daniel Kottke, in search of spiritual enlightenment. When they got to the
Neem Karoli ashram, it was almost deserted as Neem Karoli Baba had died in September 1973.[45] Then they made a long trek up a dry riverbed to an ashram of Hariakhan Baba. In India, they spent
a lot of time on bus rides from Delhi to Uttar Pradesh and back, then up toHimachal Pradesh and
back.[45]
After staying for seven months, Jobs left India[48] and returned to the US ahead of Daniel Kottke.[45] Jobs had changed his appearance; his head was shaved and he wore traditional Indian clothing.[49]
[50] During this time, Jobs experimented with psychedelics, later calling his LSDexperiences "one of the
two or three most important things [he had] done in [his] life".[51][52] He also became a serious
practitioner of Zen Buddhism , engaged in lengthy meditation retreats at the Tassajara Zen Mountain
A NeXTstation with the original keyboard, mouse and the NeXT MegaPixel monitor
After leaving Apple, Jobs founded NeXT Computer in 1985, with $7 million. A year later, Jobs was
running out of money, and with no product on the horizon, he appealed for venture capital. Eventually,
he attracted the attention of billionaire Ross Perot who invested heavily in the company.[74] NeXT
workstations were first released in 1990, priced at $9,999. Like the Apple Lisa, the NeXT workstation
was technologically advanced, but was largely dismissed as cost-prohibitive by the educational sector
for which it was designed.[75] The NeXT workstation was known for its technical strengths, chief
among them its object-oriented software development system. Jobs marketed NeXT products to the
financial, scientific, and academic community, highlighting its innovative, experimental new
technologies, such as the Mach kernel, the digital signal processor chip, and the built-
in Ethernet port. Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Webon a NeXT computer at CERN.[76]
The revised, second-generation NeXTcube was released in 1990, also. Jobs touted it as the first
"interpersonal" computer that would replace the personal computer. With its
innovative NeXTMail multimedia email system, NeXTcube could share voice, image, graphics, and
video in email for the first time. "Interpersonal computing is going to revolutionize human
communications and groupwork", Jobs told reporters.[77] Jobs ran NeXT with an obsession for
aesthetic perfection, as evidenced by the development of and attention to NeXTcube's magnesium
case.[78] This put considerable strain on NeXT's hardware division, and in 1993, after having sold only
50,000 machines, NeXT transitioned fully to software development with the release
of NeXTSTEP/Intel.[79] The company reported its first profit of $1.03 million in 1994.[74] In 1996, NeXT
Software, Inc. released WebObjects, a framework for Web application development. After NeXT was
acquired by Apple Inc. in 1997, WebObjects was used to build and run the Apple Store,[79] MobileMe services, and the iTunes Store.
Pixar and Disney
In 1986, Jobs bought The Graphics Group (later renamed Pixar) from Lucasfilm's computer graphics
division for the price of $10 million, $5 million of which was given to the company as capital.[80]
The first film produced by the partnership, Toy Story (1995), with Jobs credited as executive producer,[81] brought fame and critical acclaim to the studio when it was released. Over the next 15 years, under
Pixar's creative chief John Lasseter, the company produced box-office hits A Bug's Life (1998); Toy
Story 2 (1999); Monsters, Inc. (2001); Finding Nemo(2003); The
Incredibles (2004); Cars (2006); Ratatouille (2007); WALL-E (2008); Up (2009); and Toy Story
3 (2010). Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, WALL-E, Up andToy Story 3 each received
the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, an award introduced in 2001.[82]
terminated a number of projects, such as Newton, Cyberdog, and OpenDoc. In the coming months,
many employees developed a fear of encountering Jobs while riding in the elevator, "afraid that they
might not have a job when the doors opened. The reality was that Jobs's summary executions were
rare, but a handful of victims was enough to terrorize a whole company."[91] Jobs also changed the
licensing program for Macintosh clones, making it too costly for the manufacturers to continue making
machines.
With the purchase of NeXT, much of the company's technology found its way into Apple products,
most notably NeXTSTEP, which evolved into Mac OS X. Under Jobs's guidance, the company
increased sales significantly with the introduction of the iMac and other new products; since then,
appealing designs and powerful branding have worked well for Apple. At the 2000 Macworld Expo,
Jobs officially dropped the "interim" modifier from his title at Apple and became permanent CEO.[92] Jobs quipped at the time that he would be using the title "iCEO".[93]
Jobs on stage at Macworld Conference & Expo, San Francisco, January 11, 2005
The company subsequently branched out, introducing and improving upon other digital appliances.
With the introduction of the iPod portable music player, iTunes digital music software, and the iTunes
Store, the company made forays into consumer electronics and music distribution. On June 29, 2007,
Apple entered the cellular phone business with the introduction of the iPhone, a multi-touch display
cell phone, which also included the features of an iPod and, with its own mobile browser,
revolutionized the mobile browsing scene. While stimulating innovation, Jobs also reminded his
employees that "real artists ship".[94]
Jobs was both admired and criticized for his consummate skill at persuasion and salesmanship, which
has been dubbed the "reality distortion field" and was particularly evident during his keynote speeches
(colloquially known as "Stevenotes") at Macworld Expos and at Apple Worldwide Developers
Conferences. In 2005, Jobs responded to criticism of Apple's poor recycling programs for e-waste in
the US by lashing out at environmental and other advocates at Apple's Annual Meeting in Cupertino in
April. A few weeks later, Apple announced it would take back iPods for free at its retail stores.
The Computer TakeBack Campaign responded by flying a banner from a plane over the Stanford
University graduation at which Jobs was the commencement speaker.[44] The banner read "Steve,
voice control, a better camera, and a faster processor was introduced by Phil Schiller.[150] iPhone
4 was thinner than previous models, had a five megapixel camera which can record videos in
720p HD, and added a secondary front facing camera for video calls.[151] A major feature of
the iPhone 4S, introduced in October 2011, was Siri, which is a virtual assistant that is capable of
voice recognition.[148]
Philanthropy
Arik Hesseldahl of BusinessWeek magazine stated that "Jobs isn't widely known for his
association with philanthropic causes", compared to Bill Gates's efforts.[152] In contrast to Gates,
Jobs did not sign the Giving Pledge of Warren Buffett which challenged the world's richest
billionaires to give at least half their wealth to charity.[153] In an interview withPlayboy in 1985, Jobs
said in respect to money that "the challenges are to figure out how to live with it and to reinvest it
back into the world which means either giving it away or using it to express your concerns or
values."[154] Jobs also added that when he has some time we would start a public foundation but
for now he does charitable acts privately.[155]
After resuming control of Apple in 1997, Jobs eliminated all corporate philanthropy programs
initially.[156] Jobs's friends told The New York Times that he felt that expanding Apple would have
done more good than giving money to charity.[157] Later, under Jobs, Apple signed to participate
in Product Red program, producing red versions of devices to give profits from sales to charity.
Apple has gone on to become the largest contributor to the charity since its initial involvement
with it. The chief of the Product Red project, singer Bono cited Jobs saying there was "nothing
better than the chance to save lives", when he initially approached Apple with the invitation to
participate in the program.[158] Through its sales, Apple has been the largest contributor to Product
Red's gift to the Global Fund, which fights AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, according to Bono.[159]
[160]
Personal life
Jobs's birth parents met at the University of Wisconsin. Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, from Syria,[161] taught there. Joanne Carole Schieble was his student; they were the same age because
Jandali had "gotten his PhD really young." [162][163][164] Schieble had a career as a speech language
pathologist. Jandali taught political science at the University of Nevada in the 1960s, and then
made his career in the food and beverage industry, and since 2006, has been a vice president at
a casino in Reno, Nevada.[165][166] In December 1955, ten months after giving up their baby boy,
Schieble and Jandali married. In 1957 they had a daughter, Mona. They divorced in 1962, and
Jandali lost touch with his daughter.[167] Her mother remarried and had Mona take the surname of
her stepfather, so she became known as Mona Simpson.[163]
In the 1980s, Jobs found his birth mother, Joanne Schieble Simpson, who told him he had a
biological sister, Mona Simpson. They met for the first time in 1985[167] and became close friends.
The siblings kept their relationship secret until 1986, when Mona introduced him at a party for her
first book.[37]
After deciding to search for their father, Simpson found Jandali managing a coffee shop. Without
knowing who his son had become, Jandali told Mona that he had previously managed a popular
restaurant in the Silicon Valley where "Even Steve Jobs used to eat there. Yeah, he was a great
tipper." In a taped interview with his biographer Walter Isaacson, aired on 60 Minutes,[168] Jobs
said: "When I was looking for my biological mother, obviously, you know, I was looking for my
biological father at the same time, and I learned a little bit about him and I didn't like what I
learned. I asked her to not tell him that we ever met...not tell him anything about me."[169] Jobs
Valley reporter Dan Gillmor stated that under Jobs, Apple had taken stances that in his
view were "outright hostile to the practice of journalism" [277] - these included suing three
"small fry" bloggers who reported tips about the company and its unreleased products
including attempts to use the courts to force them to reveal their sources, suing
teenager Nicholas Ciarelli, who wrote enthusiastic speculation about Apple products
beginning at age 13[277] (Rainey wrote that Apple wanted to kill his 'ThinkSecret' blog as
"It thought any leaks, even favorable ones, diluted the punch of its highly choreographed
product launches with Jobs, in his iconic jeans and mock turtleneck outfit, as the
star."[277]).
Some have compared Steve Jobs and Dennis Ritchie who died a week later, and the
respective media coverage of their deaths.[280]
Honors and public recognition
Steve Jobs with the first generation iPad tablet
After Apple's founding, Jobs became a symbol of his company and industry.
When Time named the computer as the 1982 "Machine of the Year", the magazine
published a long profile of Jobs as "the most famous maestro of the micro".[281][282]
Jobs was awarded the National Medal of Technology by President Ronald Reagan in
1985, with Steve Wozniak (among the first people to ever receive the honor),[283] and
a Jefferson Award for Public Service in the category "Greatest Public Service by an
Individual 35 Years or Under" (also known as the Samuel S. Beard Award) in 1987.[284] On November 27, 2007, Jobs was named the most powerful person in business
by Fortune magazine.[285]On December 5, 2007, California Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver inducted Jobs into the California Hall of
Fame, located at The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts.[286]
In August 2009, Jobs was selected as the most admired entrepreneur among teenagers
in a survey by Junior Achievement,[287] having previously been named Entrepreneur of
the Decade 20 years earlier in 1989, by Inc. magazine.[288] On November 5, 2009, Jobs
was named the CEO of the decade by Fortune magazine.[269]
In November 2010, Jobs was ranked No.17 on Forbes: The World's Most Powerful
People.[289] In December 2010, the Financial Times named Jobs its person of the year for
2010, ending its essay[290] by stating, "In his autobiography, John Sculley, the former
PepsiCo executive who once ran Apple, said this of the ambitions of the man he had
pushed out: 'Apple was supposed to become a wonderful consumer products company.