I originally posted this the night Steve Jobs died, then pulled it down the next morning: I hadn’t changed my mind about its contents, but had thought better of speaking ill of the dead. A number of people saw it in their RSS readers anyway, and enough of them have sent me notes encouraging me to repost it that I decided I would.
I’m sorry the man is dead. I’m sorry when anyone dies. He accomplished a lot; he made my life better.
But Steve Jobs’ life is a tragedy. Read this interview. And this one. Jobs was a man who understood the problems facing our society. But he was also a man who canceled all corporate philanthropy at Apple upon taking control; who cited profitability concerns as the reason, but who didn’t reinstate those programs even after creating the most valuable technology company in the world. He was, it seems to me, a man who wielded incredible power, but who chose to devote himself and that power exclusively to the creation of beautiful, perfect consumer objects. A man who seemed frightened of trying to address real problems directly.
I think he was absolutely nuts.
Bill Gates might be responsible for foisting a worse operating system upon the world, but you can’t deny that he behaves like a conscientious human being.
Sometimes it can be done to even add boat transportation for the experience.
Many Las Vegas hotels and casinos have distinctive architecture, and it’s really interesting to determine
them from the air. s nightclubs where you could just
run right into a celebrity or two.