A normal Wednesday night, I was sipping an Arnold Palmer and working on my English essay.
“Steve Jobs is dead!” cried my mom from the adjacent living room.
Startled, I immediately paused work on my 15-inch MacBook Pro Laptop, and checked my iPhone for further news and details.
The news of Steve Job’s death is almost impossible to put into words. Jobs was worth 7 billion for his innovations in technology, and revolutionized the PC, tablet, phone and music industries.
However, the news did not come without warning. Many speculated the health of the famous innovator when Jobs stepped down as CEO of Apple and handed the position down to then-Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook.
Perhaps the greatest tribute to Jobs’ proliferation and success is that many people, including myself, were informed of his death by his own inventions.
It is hard to pinpoint the exact reason why Steve Jobs will be so missed. Is it his humble and caring personality? His signature blue jeans and black sweater neck attire? His humble Buddhist viewpoints and daily meditation?
Jobs’s ability to know what the public wanted before they knew it themselves was incredible. His insight and oratorical skills were extremely well trained. Jobs seemed like the most influential and knowledgeable CEOs of his generation.
However, Jobs is still human. He was worth 7 billion dollars and had access to the best medical care in the world, and yet he still succumbed to pancreatic cancer.
Jobs’s death means so much to the information age, and the younger generation. This generation, which has begun to consume Apple products voraciously, may grow unsatisfied with the quality of later products. Apple stocks have already started to falter ever since the news of Steve Jobs’s death.
Another factor is how Macs, iPads, iPods and iPhones have become so commonplace in society. Tim Cook does not have the flair and charisma Steve Jobs brought to the table, possibly leaving a spot on the throne for a new visionary and icon to sweep the markets.
Nevertheless, Steve Jobs is a man I’ve never met, but a man that I’ve grown to appreciate, respect and idolize for his ideas and his genius. Few men have done the immensity that he has contributed to the Information Revolution.
mike • Oct 10, 2011 at 1:26 pm
While it is definitely a moving topic, the Steve Jobs’ death should not be overstressed as much as it is. Child Labor was used to create his products in China for extremely cheap prices. All this was going on, with his full knowledge of it, and he did nothing to stop it because he wanted to pay as little as possible for the labor. He had a greedy Corporate mindset too, trying to profit as much as he could without giving back. Unlike Bill Gates or Warren Buffett, he never donated to any charities or gave back. He was a very demeaning person to his workers, yelling at them quite often. I may be wrong, but I do believe that the Ipod wasn’t even his idea, a bunch of apple workers came up with it. He was good at the way he promoted his products though.