Steve Jobs' thoughts on Android, apps

Shawn Knight

Shawn Knight

Posts: 15,294   +192
Staff member

The authorized biography of Steve Jobs isn’t slated for release until Monday but several news outlets have received advanced copies of Walter Isaacson’s new book and details are beginning to leak out.

The Huffington Post has posted some excerpts from the book, including insight into Jobs’ thoughts on Android. In discussing Google’s rival mobile OS, Isaacson said Jobs was “angrier than I had ever seen him” and accused Android of patent infringement. Jobs believed that Google had ripped off the iPhone and even said he would spend his last dying breath and every penny that Apple had in the bank to make it right. “I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stole product,” said Jobs.

Jobs further slammed Google by saying that "outside of Search, Google's products--Android, Google Docs--are shit." He told Iassacson that Apple’s tight control over the iPhone ecosystem stemmed from a desire to “make great products, not crap like Android.”

Another interesting tidbit has to do with one of Apple’s most successful ideas that almost didn’t come to fruition: apps. Early on, Jobs was against the idea of apps, believing that Apple didn’t have enough manpower and bandwidth to police third-party app developers. Apple board member Art Levinson phoned Jobs “half a dozen times to lobby for the potential of the apps.” The rest, as we know, is history.

The biography was originally planned to go on sale in late November but in light of Jobs' passing earlier this month, publisher Simon & Schuster pushed the publication date up a month sooner. CBS will be airing a "60 Minutes" interview with Isaacson this Sunday at 7pm ET.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/45957-steve-jobs-thoughts-on-android-apps.html

 
I've seen a few other excerpts from this biography and it almost appears that towards the end Mr. Jobs thought that everything that wasn't Apple was stolen.
 
Wow. I mean, DOUBLE-wow. I actually felt bad for the guy until this. I mean, sheesh -- how incredibly lame is that? Calling Android a "stolen" product? If anyone has the right to be angry, I suppose, it could be Linus Torvald. But Steve Jobs getting HIS panties in a twist over it?

Android is Linux. Period. Anyone who disagrees -- well -- look it up is all that I can say about it.
 
Mizzou said:
Mr. Jobs thought that everything that wasn't Apple was stolen.
Click to expand...

*Sigh* yeah. It is sad. It's amazing to see that kind of rancor in a guy who so many people admired and liked.
 
I feel sorry that the guy died and all but man what an *****. Accusing someone of stealing is an absolute joke. Apple accusing someone of stealing? Everything they've ever done was just a slightly altered version of someone else's idea. One could even argue that the iPod, the device that actually got Apple back on the technology scene, is just the idea of a Walkman (Sony) mixed with the technology of .mp3 (invented by several non-Apple engineers). Is that stealing? Of course not. But if it had been another company besides Apple, it would have been steeling.

Like I said, it's a shame he died at such an early age. It really is. But he had an incredible God complex. It's a shame he won't be around to watch Apple once again slowly recess into the shadows.
 
I remember back in the late 80's when I worked for DEC, and the the higher ups in DEC said the Jobs was impossible to deal with. If it wasn't his idea, then is wasn't worth anything.
I guess "genius" has a dark side also.
 
Guest said:
He had an incredible God complex.
Click to expand...

Aye -- THERE's the rub...

The man called Steve Jobs thought that he could live for many years longer than most of us could. He subscribed to the concept of "transhumanism," which is close, in philosophy, to Dianetics and other such cult-like "religions."

It is ironic -- not only how young he was when he died -- but HOW he died. It is exceptionally ironic too, given that according to the excerpts that we read here, he was prepared to spend "every last penny" to fight Google. Heck -- he should have been spending every last penny of his immense fortune to STAY ALIVE.

But some things are beyond wealth. Interestingly, a lot of people in this country believe that they, too, can buy immortality...

(You are also spot-on with your assertions about Apple and "stolen" products. I've mentioned it on these forums before -- Xerox PARC developed the mouse-pointer OS that eventually became the platform for the 1984 Macintosh. Even mouse technology had existed since the late 1960s, at least.)
 
Boo who like if you didn't saw this a WHILE ago, he may had been very smart but has a person he had a very twisted mind.

If not we have a perfect example, remember Geo Hotz? he is very smart in his field, but his face only said i'm an incompetent. He reminded me to that guy on collage that had bipolar problems and hyperactivity.
 
cota said:
Boo who like if you didn't saw this a WHILE ago, he may had been very smart but has a person he had a very twisted mind.

If not we have a perfect example, remember Geo Hotz? he is very smart in his field, but his face only said i'm an incompetent. He reminded me to that guy on collage that had bipolar problems and hyperactivity.
Click to expand...

Well, I always knew that Steve Jobs was a bit of a weirdo. I hadn't paid much attention to him, frankly. So, I guess that I was a bit surprised to hear all of these latest bits of information about him.

Color me unsurprised. What bugs me most, though, is that guys with real skill and vision died who most people couldn't care less about. Bob Moog died in 2007, and barely made headlines -- except among sources frequented by electronic music afficionados, et cetera. Bob Moog revolutionized synthesizer music -- by creating an audio synthesizer. He did it without "stealing" the ideas of major corporations or other inventors, for that matter -- unless you count such innovations as the piano keyboard, the transistor, and the oscillator.

Ken Olsen died in February of this year. Did anyone shed a tear about it? I did, maybe just because my dad used to work at DEC, and because I still belong to the credit union associated with the now-defunct company. Ken was an actual engineer who understood every aspect of the computers that he built. Sure -- he wasn't a marketing GENIUS, but he did manage to stay in-business for over thirty years --

about as long as Steve Jobs managed to stay in the game himself.

So -- the question that we must ask ourselves is this: What is more important to humans in a civilized society? Do we value white teeth over great ideas that are implemented well? Do we prefer CEOs to workers? Do we care more about image, or do we care more about substance?

I have answered those questions for myself. You don't have to guess what my answers are. They are, I'm sure, apparent. I don't have the whitest smile around -- that is for certain...

:)
 
And I love how I just wrote "I was a bit surprised," followed almost immediately by "Color me unsurprised." What is most surprising, really, is how much attention everyone is paying to Apple right now. Let's give it about a week -- and people will start to forget.
 
I guess next Windows 7 was stolen right of the hard drive of apples server. Apple already has windows 8 done, MS is just working on stealing the rest of it right now. /sarcasm
 
I think it was pretty evident to everyone that the guy was a ****, but often times its dicks that get the world moving.

We should appreciate the fact that he was such a **** to be the first one to bring a lot of these electronics to the market first, but he also knew when the technology was ready to do so, other people's technology.

Marketing genius is the best way to describe him, not a technology god, and certainly not a human being that made the world a better place.

He knew when the time was right to convince people to buy a product that didn't exist before. But anything beyond that is just iSheep hagiography.
 
thief who steals from a thief has 100 years of forgiveness....dont you agreed Mrs.Jobs?
 
Steve Jobs is and was never the problem. The problem is a society that is starved for heros and "genuis" and grasps at anything that gives the "cool and classy effect". If you are really honest and objective, you will wonder why this guy was ever put on a pedestal. Some say his "products" were "revolutionary"? Ask yourself was is so unique and revolutionary about the iPhone, iPad, iPod or *****. Apple succeeded in twisting technology and having the "support" of the masses. As long as our lives are empty, as long as we are interested in "being cool" we will find meaning and genuis in the most mundane and ordinary of things and people and companies like Apple will continue to thrive. Anyway, Siri says this comment is getting too long...
 
Wasn't Mac OS X sort of a rip-off as well (from Berkeley Software Distribution)?

Mac software is Unix-based. Nothing original there.
 
"Wasn't Mac OS X sort of a rip-off as well (from Berkeley Software Distribution)?"

Mac software is Unix-based. Nothing original there.

I believe OSX is derived from NextOS which was derived from BSD.
In technology things are built on the previous work of others.
Ritchie got his idea for Unix from working on Multics.
 
Thanks to Steve Jobs, Apple is no longer a record company. It is a media giant.

Thanks to Steve Jobs, we can all place our right hands over our hearts, and sing the national anthem:

"F MAJOR CHORD (But slightly flat)."

Yeah. Anyway, that's all that I'm going to say about it. I'm done. That was a lot of fun beating up on a guy who I never paid much attention to anyway. But I have more important things to do -- like decide whether I'm going with Sandy Bridge, Llano, FX, or Phenom.
 
Every peson has the ability to help or hinder. We make choices, which create experiences which allows us to learn and grow. Steve Jobs did some really good things and some things that were not in the best interest. The fact that he was so controlling may have lead to something he couldn't control, cancer. We all make choices and have to live our life. Maybe we shouldn't judge Steve Jobs but learn from him and make better choices for ourselfs.
 
Steve Jobs will be remembered as the "genius" who "designed" cute little plastic gadgets so that the average computer illiterate iSheep, could sit on the train on a friday afternoon hammering some illegible crap into their <insert popular mainstream social networking/blog>... that's pretty much all he'll be remembered for.
 
Guest said:
This ***** should have died in the 90s.
Click to expand...
This was not needed. Love or hate him, he continued to change industries like the music and tablet markets after the 90s. It's not just the popularization of the PC and Pixar that he accomplished.

I still think that the whole tablet craze is a big fad and going in the wrong direction for a whole lot of reasons but I admit that Jobs was a visionary who drove the field forward. It has been a long time since someone did that for the tech industry. To wish he died sooner is lunacy.
 
To quote the late, great Pablo Picasso:

"Good artists copy, Great artists steal"

I think Jobs misinterpreted that line, and now that Google (among others) has been beating Apple at it's own "game", they are all butt hurt and looking for a way to undermine the competition at the expense of the consumer. No one will take being forced into a product lightly and if Apple continues its erroneous suits, that's exactly what will end up happening. The world does not revolve around Jobs and Apple, although some of the loyalists may think so. Let the consumers choose which companies and their products succeed and which don't.
 
One could blame Steve's thoughts on his illness and pressure from the public and shareholders.We must accept that an idea could spark simultaneously on more then one and those ideas are induced by discoveries or ideas of other people.I do not blame Steve Jobs but admire his implementations.
 
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