- 1. Tom's Hardware and The Legacy Of Critical Thinking
- 2. Your Steve Jobs Syllabus: The Cult of Personality
- 3. Just A Few Videos
- 4. Just A Few Photos
1. Tom's Hardware and The Legacy Of Critical Thinking
No matter how you feel about Jobs, we know that as a reader of this site you have a personal opinion. That's what we love about you. Now, here's what we loved about Jobs.
Dear Tom’s Guide and Tom’s Hardware readers,
I’m writing you a letter because, I think, for a lot of us, the topic of Apple products and Steve Jobs himself is somewhat personal. I feel lucky that I can say this on the Tom’s family of sites in particular, because our readers are such a diverse group of tech-lovers. Honestly, I’ve never been so impressed with our readers.
Just check this out:
Tom’s Hardware is a venerable site with a legacy of readership that has taken very seriously the role of the PC enthusiast and system builder in our society; a readership that wants people to understand the empowerment and satisfaction that comes from controlling as many aspects of a machine’s hardware and software as possible. At times that readership has been one of the loudest voices of criticism lobbed towards Apple and Jobs. Sometimes it feels like an angry mob. Sometimes it feels like a hyper-intellectual beehive of subtle industry analysts. At its best, when you put our readership together, you get a think tank.
At worst, you get loathsome hate. Just look a little deeper into the comments section, and you'll see this:
Tom’s Guide approaches the empowerment and satisfaction of technology from a different angle, of course, and so it has frustrated me occasionally to read the vitriol that Tom’s Hardware readers have left in forums and comments. This article is a shining example. And, yeah, it frustrates me to no end when some of you accuse us of us being paid by Apple to write favorably about its products (for the thousandth time: Apple hardly knows we exist and doesn't have to pay anyone to write favorably about its products)--but I know you don't really mean it.
One of the ways many of you disagreed with Jobs the most was a matter of simple corporate, capitalist philosophy. Jobs believed: "It isn't the consumer's job to know what they want." In so many ways, he was right. Most people love technology but aren't equipped to articulate what they want it to be like. But many of you are. And when Jobs' acted like you didn't have the brains to know better, it pissed you off. But you were in the minority.
While the debate often got nasty (and will probably continue to rage passionately into the future—at least, I hope so!), I woke up this morning and realized something: Steve Jobs thrived on criticism. He needed the debates and analysis and yes—even the anger and frustration—that could be found on our sites and sites like ours. Many vocal tech consumers fawned all over Jobs and his products. They weren’t wrong to do so, but they didn’t necessarily contribute as much towards Apple’s product development direction as the critics probably did. Jobs’ didn’t say it, but I will: Where would Steve Jobs be without those critics? How far would he, and Apple, have come? Everyone—including, and especially great thinkers and visionaries—needs critics, and I’m proud that Tom’s Hardware was part of that legacy in the history of personal computing. May it continue to be so.
There’s a lot on the Web today about Jobs and the impact he made on millions of lives. If reading that sort of tribute is not your kind of thing, bypass it. But at Tom’s Guide, we decided to filter some of that reverie for you, and show you what’s meaningful and interesting to us, as journalists (and tech-loving human beings) who have watched the company closely for many years. As I said earlier, the subject of Apple—no matter how you feel about the company or Jobs himself—has become very personal. The following pages showcase what we personally find most compelling about Apple, Jobs, and the way the world has erupted with reflection at this moment of his loss.
--Rachel Rosmarin, Managing Editor, Tom's Guide
- 1. Tom's Hardware and The Legacy Of Critical Thinking
- 2. Your Steve Jobs Syllabus: The Cult of Personality
- 3. Just A Few Videos
- 4. Just A Few Photos
- 5. Just A Few Memories
- 6. Page 6
The featured picture- he looks a bit like Tom Cruise.
Great article. I enjoyed it very much, i was in need of some back tracking memories of the past. I only hope another visionary like Steve emerges from this some day to take the world by storm with his key notes and just brilliant ways to convince you of such great products. And by all means i am a total complete Microsoft fanboy and i can at least say he will be missed more then most might even realize because he pushed the industry forward like no other.
Agreed!!
Great article. Steve Jobs will certainly be missed.
Page 6?
I have been reading TH for a long time. This is probably one of the only comments I will ever write, even though I love the articles on this website.
I remember using a Mac back in elementary school and I remember my best friend had always had a Mac. My first experience with Windows was Windows 95. Something about it made me not want to go back to Mac ever again, and I never have. I've owned PC's my entire life and grew to hate everything about the Apple culture and the people it's become associated with (at least from the PC camp's point of view).
Something happens, though, when somebody of this magnitude passes on. Prejudice fades and stigmas are forgot. I don't think I will ever again associate Steve Jobs with my own prejudices about the Apple company or what I feel it represents. I think from now on I will only see the real root of what Steve was: an innovator to the core, somebody not afraid to go outside the status quo and usher in a new norm, a charismatic and persuasive leader who helped to shape technology the way we know and are privileged to use it today.
Rest in peace, Steve Jobs. You will be missed, even by people who never had the privilege to meet you, like me.
Its your JOB to think about the page 6
... ironically... the last presentation Steave did waz about iCloud...
Jobs was just a man who happened to be very good at selling tech products. There's no need to worship him or treat him like god, which so many iPeople are doing. So sick of that!
Very sad to see him go, especially at 56. Despite what some might say he definitely moved computing and technology forward as well as the way that we use it. He achieved a lot in his life, RIP Steve.
Apple makes computers? I thought they made Cell phones; oh sorry thats Samsung.
Too bad he didn't take Apple with him, NO lose to the real IT world.
I never associated Steve Jobs with Apple's so-called "innovations", he was primarily a businessman. But I did associate him with Apple's iZombies stubbornness, ignorance and tech illiteracy. Because of this:
I might be in the minority, but it is in my power to protect my less tech-savvy friends and family from the rip-off, useless products and I will keep doing so. Programmers, web designers and tech people in general are always a minority, but it's their work that keeps the world running.
For years and years, Apple has been pushing underpowered, overpriced, unneeded hardware. So far the only impact that Apple made on my life is forcing its competition to create more and more BS devices: tablets, AIOs, show-off underpowered laptops (VAIO); while loading the market with their own disgusting products. All these devices did is create a lot of hype and I feel that we could easily do without them. The only good thing they delivered to the market was a touchscreen phone (though I've heard that some companies released theirs before the iPhone), but the iPhone was just a push for some REALLY good devices. By itself, it was a pathetic toy and nothing more; at the time of the iPhone 1 release, there were tons of T9 smartphones that possessed far superior feature loadout and multimedia capabilities (Nokia N95, for example); and the situation repeated itself with every new iPhone model.
In other words, I refuse to believe in a widespread stereotype which holds Apple as a major innovator and the force that "overturned" the market. Some say that even Windows 7 wouldn't exist without Mac OS, because Microsoft wouldn't go any further after XP due to the lack of competition - this is nonsense; they would still want more money and hence a new OS. Again, all Apple did is create a lot of hype around its allegedly superior/safer OS and products that "just work". Thanks to them, nowadays everyone believes that Android/Windows are so incredibly complicated that it's only up to the geeks to use them, because Apple's products are "simple" and "easy to use".
Call THAT a POEM?!
You restored our sense of childlike wonder.
You enabled us to live in a world where
we always believed that something amazing & magical
was just around the corner
You are confusing childlike wonder with simple technical illiteracy and ignorance. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic; however, anyone who believes that this magic is one of a kind is surely a fool. Especially when such "magic" comes from Apple.
I believe it is. I've met a lot of charismatic people in my life and such influence is indeed possible. But that just gives me more right to blame Jobs for using his gift to delude and cheat weak-minded people. Most of the Apple users are poor, lost souls that will believe anything you tell them, they know nothing, NOTHING about hardware and software they're using and are convinced that overpaying for a MacBook is justified because "it comes with all the software". Open source and free closed source software which would allow you to have any other computer with more/better software for cheaper is brilliantly ignored, of course.
I regret that I never met him personally; it'd be a wonderful exercise to see just how far he would be able to brainwash me before my inner fuse would blow and I'd understand that something is wrong...
Maybe not you (although that obituary proves otherwise), but 95% of all other journalists. Thus all the free iPhone/iPad advertisement on the news sites.
Yes, indeed. Typical iZombie ecstatic state. I personally like many companies, Asus probably being on top of the list, but I would NEVER allow myself to degrade to such primal state of craziness. Jobs did not create the devices which allegedly made their life so much better. He was just the CEO of the company that invented them. Why doesn't Intel CEO get the same admiration? Intel >>>>>>>>>>>> Apple in terms of making lives easier, if you count how many PCs their hardware runs in.
Of course they won't be. Many iZombies will even feel they're compelled to purchase a 4S just because it's a "memory of Steve".
In other words, you waste your time and make a fool of yourself. I prefer to walk in the store, get the device I chose, walk out and get to use it. I don't like to waste time.
And Steve? His death won't change anything. Apple thrives on people's ignorance, illiteracy and stubbornness, as I've already said many times. Steve's death won't magically cure these problems. Rest easy... I hate your company and its fans with a burning passion, but a death of a human being is rarely an event to celebrate. Especially when it changes nothing.
Well, that was my personal opinion. Like it or flame it, I know I'm not alone.
P.S. What a curious coincidence: he died right after iPhone 4S has been revealed. Ashamed much?
I see a lot of ignorant claims bashing the reputation of the recently passed and the credibility and reliability of the hardware produced by said individual. You make bold claims yet you lack any real data, statistics or evidence to support your claims. Thus, with that in mind your arguments are simply formed by whatever or whomever you respect, which just happens to be non-Apple brand enthusiast, which makes you an iZombie just the same.
Here are some facts, Apple would have died as a company without Microsoft in the 90's. I don't keep up with the stock market, but i believe they were, or still are, the most valuable traded company in the world? You don't get that status deceiving the world, look in to how often these tech companies sue one another. You can't look at Win7 or Mac OSX without seeing clearly borrowed or inspired innovations from the opposition. I could go in to detail, but you have claimed superior knowledge so i will not bore you.
You boast about how lame Mac is, so I assume you're a Windows or Linux user. I value Linux for what it is, but I doubt Linux will ever be a relevant OS for the same reasons it is awesome.
If you side on Windows, read that quote from Bill Gates, these men were friends first and competitors second. Show some respect for the loss of a human being. I noticed you didn't mention the iPod, which blew away CD players, disc/walk man, the Zune, it's because you know you lack relevancy, respect, and manners.
I'm sure Gates often sat back in his home loathing the decisions consumers made with Apple products, i hear he does not allow his kids to own apple products (speculation from an article i read) but I seriously doubt Gates sits there typing in forums just to rant about how lame a competitor is. After all, he has a life.
... and i hope you do too.
Apple is Steve Jobs and Steve Jobs is Apple. He made technology accessible even to the technologically averse and therefore universal.
I'm a supporter of Apple because I believe the PC and other mainstream products should have a competing entity no matter what form it is, but ironically, the truth is, I never owned any Apple products.
I believe my comment above is what Steve Jobs stands for.
I know that Apple was saved by MS.
I didn't mention iPod because I'm sick of writing the same thing: there were mp3 players (not CD) long BEFORE the iPod, and all iPod introduced was bigger capacity and Apple hype. I don't see what that has to do with my "manners" or the luck of such
I'm both Windows and Linux user. I don't see how it's relevant to hardware.
So I have no respect for the loss?
Next time read better.
Have a life? Sure. But I don't mind spending 15-30 minutes on the forums. It's a good writing exercise. And maybe if Gates spent some time on the forums, he'd know better what his customers need.
What "facts" do you want me to list? Should I pull up Apple's website Mac configurator again and show its ridiculous prices? Should I compare the iPhone to its competitors again? I'm sick of this. If you don't see the difference yourself, you're blind.
If you believe that you don't get to the top with deceiving the world, grow up.
And I thought I stressed the fact that Jobs did NOT produce that hardware... He was a businessman. Even back in the old Apple days (before he was kicked out) he preferred to manage business and not tech. Check your facts.
Already done with your BS? Well, that was... boring. Pathetic attempt. Next time, troll better
lack. Tom's, why can I edit the comments on tomshardware.com but not on tomsguide.com? It's annoying!
Apple is Steve Jobs and Steve Jobs is Apple. He made technology accessible even to the technologically averse and therefore universal.
These "technologically averse" people are just afraid little children scared to press the wrong button. I'd rather they NOT have any access to technology
he was not a genius
The discussion here is exactly what I'm talking about. I'll admit I used to get upset when readers were so adamantly ANTI-APPLE--it seemed to me a very unsympathetic viewpoint. After all, why be angry that other people are deriving pleasure from technology "in some form"--even if that form is not the form you would choose for yourself?
BUT...I now realize that the world requires your extreme viewpoint so that progress can be made. Speaking subtly about your opinions means they won't be read by as many people. I might not disagree with you--after all, I don't "hate" anything about the tech industry (except perhaps the environmental wastefulness), and I like it when people are excited about gadgets--no matter which ones strike their fancy--but I'm glad you're here contributing to the conversation.
Rachel Rosmarin
Managing Editor, Tom's Guide
Great article Rachel.
I've grown up in a world of both Apple and Microsoft products, and I've learned to appreciate both. I'll admit some of the comments left on Apple articles on Tom's are posted without thought, and I'm sure many were posted for the simple reason of getting as many green up-thumbs as possible.
Even today, I work as a broadcast engineer at an University. Broadcasting is one of those strange industries that rely on both Apple and Microsoft products. We have just as many Mac Pros in our offices as we do Windows 7 machines. Our server room actually has more Xserves than Windows-based servers.
So I see the strength and weaknesses of both Microsoft and Apple products on a daily basis. I, for one, am glad Mr. Jobs came back to save Apple, because if he didn't I am not sure what the broadcasting industry would look like today.
As a side note, all of my desktop machines are self-built Windows machines. All of my laptops are iBooks/PowerBooks/Macbooks/Macbook Pros.