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Steve Jobs Biography

“Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson is a certified self-titled biography of the long-lasting parent, commissioned by means of Jobs himself and penned by way of Walter Isaacson. Isaacson, famed for his bestselling biographies of luminaries like Benjamin Franklin and Albert Einstein, become handpicked to chronicle Jobs’ life.

The Silicon Valley odyssey of Steve Jobs stands as a grand creation delusion. It started out with the common-or-garden beginnings of a startup germinating in a modest circle of a relative’s garage, evolving into the juggernaut of a global corporation. While Jobs wasn’t the sole inventor of every element, his prowess lay in his adeptness at orchestrating a harmonious fusion of concepts, artistry, and technologies, birthing a trailblazing imaginative and prescient vision of the future.

Page Contents Toggle Steve Jobs Biography Summary Chapter 1: Childhood Chapter 2: Odd Couple Chapter 3: The Dropout Chapter 4: At Reed College Chapter 5: The Apple I Chapter 6: Chrisann and Lisa Chapter 7: The Lisa Chapter 8: Xerox and Lisa Chapter 9: Going Public Chapter 10: The Mac Is Born Chapter 11: Building the Mac Chapter 12: The Reality Distortion Field Chapter 13: Going Public Chapter 14: The Design Chapter 15: And Then Steve Said, “Let There Be an iPhone” Chapter 16: Round One Chapter 17: Changing the World Chapter 18: Round Two Chapter 19: Pixar’s Friends Chapter 20: The Valley Chapter 21: CNeXT Chapter 22: Return Chapter 23: Apple Industrial Design Lab Chapter 24: Family Man Chapter 25: Design Principles Chapter 26: ICEO Chapter 27: The Apple Stores Chapter 28: Round Three Chapter 29: The iPhone Chapter 30: The iPad Chapter 31: Round Four Chapter 32: Cancer Chapter 33: Legacy Steve Jobs Biography Summary

Chapter 1: Childhood

This chapter delves into the early life of Steve Jobs’ lifestyles, tracing his adoption with the aid of Paul and Clara Jobs, his upbringing in a center-magnificence family, and his early publicity to generation. It explores his curious nature and his father’s affect on his interest in electronics. These early experiences set the level for Jobs’ future endeavours inside the tech industry.

Chapter 2: Odd Couple

“Odd Couple” explores the dynamic partnership between Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, distinct personalities who came together to create the Apple I laptop. It examines Jobs’ vision and his ability to inspire and lead, contrasting with Wozniak’s technical brilliance and engineering information. The bankruptcy highlights how their combined abilties brought about the beginning of Apple and its groundbreaking improvements.

Chapter 3: The Dropout

This bankruptcy delves into a pivotal period in Jobs’ lifestyles whilst he dropped out of Reed College. It captures his look for that means and identification, inclusive of his travels to India and experimentation with psychedelics. It additionally examines how his publicity to calligraphy and design during this time later formed his emphasis on aesthetics and consumer experience in Apple’s products.

Chapter 4: At Reed College

“At Reed College” further explores Jobs’ time on the organization, delving into his fascination with literature, philosophy, and Eastern spirituality. It illustrates how these numerous influences broadened his perspective on creativity and innovation. This bankruptcy additionally foreshadows his destiny integration of technology and the arts in groundbreaking merchandise.

Chapter 5: The Apple I

Focused on the creation of the Apple I computer, this chapter information the technical demanding situations confronted by means of Jobs and Wozniak in bringing their imaginative and prescient to existence. It explores the storage startup way of life that birthed the pc, their efforts to promote it to hobbyists, and the founding of Apple Computer Company. This chapter marks the inception of Jobs’ role as an entrepreneur and his dedication to revolutionize the computing enterprise.

Chapter 6: Chrisann and Lisa

“Chrisann and Lisa” delves into the personal facet of Steve Jobs, exploring his courting with Chrisann Brennan and the impact in their daughter, Lisa, on his life. The bankruptcy portrays Jobs’ struggles with fatherhood and his evolving connection with Lisa over time. It also provides insights into Jobs’ complicated character, losing mild on his emotional journey and his attempts to reconcile his non-public and professional roles.

Chapter 7: The Lisa

Focused at the Apple Lisa laptop, this chapter delves into the demanding situations and innovations that went into its introduction. It discusses the bold aim of developing a device with a graphical user interface and the big engineering and layout efforts required. The bankruptcy additionally delves into the naming of the computer after Lisa Brennan-Jobs, showcasing the personalized touch that regularly observed Jobs’ initiatives.

Chapter 8: Xerox and Lisa

“Xerox and Lisa” explores a pivotal second in the evolution of private computing—the visit to Xerox’s PARC facility. The bankruptcy highlights how Jobs and his crew were inspired via Xerox’s advanced graphical consumer interface concepts, which includes the mouse and desktop metaphor. It info how Jobs saw the ability to include those modern thoughts into his own merchandise, sooner or later leading to the improvement of the Macintosh.

Chapter 9: Going Public

This bankruptcy chronicles Apple’s transformation from a small startup to a publicly traded business enterprise. It captures the exhilaration and demanding situations of going public via an preliminary public presenting (IPO). The chapter discusses the financial implications, the influx of capital, and the developing responsibilities that came with being a publicly owned company. It also highlights how this milestone marked a brand new segment in Apple’s records.

Chapter 10: The Mac Is Born

“The Mac Is Born” focuses on the acute and groundbreaking development of the Macintosh computer. It info the dedication of the Macintosh crew as they labored to create a user-pleasant and innovative non-public computer. The chapter explores the design decisions, technical breakthroughs, and the charismatic management of Steve Jobs that culminated within the launch of the Macintosh, forever changing the landscape of computing.

Chapter 11: Building the Mac

In “Building the Mac,” the focal point is on the development and introduction of the Macintosh laptop. This bankruptcy delves into the collaborative efforts of the Macintosh crew as they work tirelessly to bring Steve Jobs’ imaginative and prescient of a user-friendly and revolutionary personal computer to existence. It explores the demanding situations, breakthroughs, and layout concepts that formed the Macintosh’s iconic design and interface.

Chapter 12: The Reality Distortion Field

“The Reality Distortion Field” examines Steve Jobs’ specific capability to encourage and encourage his crew to gain apparently impossible desires. The chapter explores Jobs’ charismatic leadership style, which regularly led colleagues to trust they may accomplish greater than they idea changed into possible. It delves into how Jobs’ persuasive powers, ardour, and backbone created an surroundings wherein his imaginative and prescient have become a using force at the back of Apple’s innovation and achievement.

Chapter 13: Going Public

This bankruptcy focuses on Apple’s transition from a non-public corporation to a publicly traded one thru an preliminary public imparting (IPO). It examines the financial and operational implications of going public, along with the influx of capital and the elevated scrutiny from buyers. The bankruptcy additionally delves into the leadership challenges Jobs confronted as Apple’s profile grew, and the enterprise started out to navigate the needs of a public marketplace.

Chapter 14: The Design

“The Design” chapter emphasizes Steve Jobs’ unwavering dedication to the aesthetics and person enjoy of Apple’s merchandise. It explores his ardour for stylish and minimalist design, drawing from impacts such as his interest in calligraphy and his appreciation for simplicity. The chapter showcases how design have become a cornerstone of Apple’s brand identification and contributed to the fulfillment of merchandise like the Macintosh and iPod.

Chapter 15: And Then Steve Said, “Let There Be an iPhone”

This bankruptcy marks a pivotal moment in technological history—the revealing of the iPhone. It recounts the lead-as much as the iPhone’s advent, discussing the collaborative efforts of Apple’s groups in hardware, software program, and layout. The bankruptcy captures the exhilaration and anticipation surrounding the iPhone’s announcement, as Steve Jobs introduces a tool that could redefine the telephone industry and pave the way for a new generation of cell computing.

Chapter 16: Round One

“Round One” explores the complex relationship between Steve Jobs and John Sculley, who Jobs recruited to Apple to convey his advertising information to the corporation. The chapter delves into the conflict of personalities, differing management styles, and the eventual energy war that led to Jobs’ departure from Apple. It offers insight into the demanding situations of leadership and choice-making inside the agency.

Chapter 17: Changing the World

This chapter captures the profound impact of Steve Jobs’ go back to Apple after his departure. It outlines his efforts to revitalize the employer and bring it back to innovation and achievement. The chapter discusses pivotal selections such as streamlining Apple’s product lineup, fostering a lifestyle of innovation, and introducing iconic merchandise like the iMac, which played a crucial role in reshaping Apple’s image and influence inside the generation industry.

Chapter 18: Round Two

In “Round Two” the narrative continues with Steve Jobs’ ongoing adventure at Apple. It covers his leadership as the employer ventures into new areas which includes digital tune and online content material distribution. The chapter explores the development of products like iTunes and the iPod, which revolutionized the song enterprise and set the level for Apple’s future dominance in the digital realm.

Chapter 19: Pixar’s Friends

This chapter delves into Steve Jobs’ function because the owner of Pixar Animation Studios. It highlights the collaborative relationships among Pixar and businesses like Disney, as well as the creative and technological improvements that brought about the fulfillment of groundbreaking movies like “Toy Story.” The bankruptcy showcases Jobs’ affect on both the animation and leisure industries and his ability to foster innovative partnerships.

Chapter 20: The Valley

“The Valley” examines the dynamic panorama of Silicon Valley and its position as a hub of innovation and entrepreneurship. The bankruptcy discusses Steve Jobs’ interactions with different tech leaders, his presence inside the tech network, and his effect at the Valley’s subculture. It sheds mild on how Jobs’ vision, leadership, and impact prolonged past Apple and left a long-lasting mark on the era environment.

Chapter 21: CNeXT

The “NeXT” bankruptcy follows Steve Jobs’ journey after leaving Apple and founding NeXT, a pc agency aimed at generating excessive-end workstations. The chapter explores NeXT’s progressive technologies, which includes the NeXT Computer, and Jobs’ persisted awareness on design and aesthetics. It delves into the demanding situations NeXT faced, the corporation’s effect at the technology industry, and Jobs’ evolving position as a visionary entrepreneur.

Chapter 22: Return

“Return” makes a speciality of Steve Jobs’ reentry into Apple after the agency’s acquisition of NeXT. The chapter highlights Jobs’ renewed involvement and his efforts to reshape Apple’s product lineup and regain its revolutionary area. It covers his initial advisory function and eventual ascent to meantime CEO, marking the beginning of his transformative leadership that would reshape Apple’s trajectory.

Chapter 23: Apple Industrial Design Lab

This chapter takes readers inside Apple’s Industrial Design Lab, exploring the organization’s emphasis on growing products with extremely good design and user revel in. It showcases the collaborative efforts of designers, engineers, and Jobs himself in crafting products that have been not only purposeful however also aesthetically beautiful. The bankruptcy presents perception into Apple’s layout philosophy and the way it contributed to the organization’s fulfillment.

Chapter 24: Family Man

“Family Man” delves into Steve Jobs’ personal lifestyles and the complexities of his relationships. It offers glimpses into his interactions together with his circle of relatives, together with his spouse Laurene Powell Jobs and their youngsters. The chapter portrays Jobs’ efforts to stability his demanding expert interests along with his position as a husband and father, dropping mild on the human aspect of his character.

Chapter 25: Design Principles

Focused on Apple’s layout concepts, this chapter explores Steve Jobs’ unwavering dedication to simplicity, beauty, and functionality in product layout. It delves into his perception in creating products that seamlessly integrated generation and aesthetics, regularly drawing inspiration from various assets consisting of calligraphy and art. The bankruptcy emphasizes Jobs’ function in shaping Apple’s iconic layout language.

Chapter 26: ICEO

The “iCEO” bankruptcy chronicles Steve Jobs’ legit return as Apple’s CEO and the pivotal position he played within the employer’s revitalization. It highlights his instant impact on streamlining Apple’s product lineup, revitalizing the Macintosh, and forging partnerships with different tech groups. The chapter showcases Jobs’ visionary leadership and his capacity to rally Apple’s personnel and supporters.

Chapter 27: The Apple Stores

This bankruptcy explores the introduction of Apple’s retail stores, a project driven by means of Jobs’ choice to provide a unique and immersive consumer enjoy. It discusses the challenges of launching a successful retail chain, Apple’s modern keep design, and the organisation’s attention on customer service. The bankruptcy showcases how the Apple Stores became an crucial part of Apple’s logo identification and contributed to its economic success.

Chapter 28: Round Three

“Round Three” covers the 1/3 phase of Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, highlighting his function in remodeling the company all over again. This chapter explores the introduction of latest merchandise and improvements that solidified Apple’s function within the generation industry. It discusses Jobs’ leadership fashion, his cognizance on innovation, and his ability to count on and meet converting purchaser wishes.

Chapter 29: The iPhone

Focused on the modern launch of the iPhone, this bankruptcy marks a defining moment in technological records. It delves into the development of the iPhone’s touch interface, its integration of diverse technologies, and its impact on the cell enterprise. The bankruptcy captures Jobs’ visionary presentation of the iPhone and how it modified the way people interacted with technology.

Chapter 30: The iPad

“The iPad” chapter explores the advent and creation of the iPad, every other groundbreaking product that redefined the tablet market. It discusses the demanding situations of designing a tool that struck a stability among a smartphone and a laptop. The bankruptcy showcases Jobs’ dedication to growing a tool that offered a brand new computing experience and his knack for figuring out untapped market segments.

Chapter 31: Round Four

In this chapter, the narrative keeps with the fourth section of Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple. It covers the employer’s persevered growth, its growth into new markets, and its ongoing consciousness on innovation. The chapter discusses the creation of merchandise like the MacBook Air and the Mac OS X Lion, illustrating Jobs’ ongoing dedication to pushing limitations.

Chapter 32: Cancer

“Cancer” delves into the non-public fitness demanding situations faced through Steve Jobs. The chapter discusses his prognosis of a rare form of pancreatic most cancers and his choice to pursue opportunity treatments to begin with. It covers his scientific journey, his eventual return to Apple after a medical depart, and the public speculation approximately his fitness. The chapter offers insights into the intersection of Jobs’ non-public life and his function at Apple.

Chapter 33: Legacy

The final chapter, “Legacy,” displays on Steve Jobs’ effect on the arena and his enduring affect. It explores his lasting contributions to technology, layout, and innovation. The bankruptcy discusses the outpouring of public tributes after his passing and how his vision and management keep to shape Apple and the era enterprise. It underscores the profound and lasting legacy Jobs left at the back of.

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Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson - Book Summary

This book chronicles the daring and adventurous life of Steve Jobs, an innovative businessman and eccentric founder of Apple. Drawing on Jobs' early experiences with the spirit and aspiration to reach the pinnacle of becoming a worldwide technology icon, Steve Jobs describes his successful business journey as well as his battles. that he had to confront on his journey.

This book is for:  

• Anyone curious about the interesting life of Steve Jobs;
• Anyone curious as to how Apple managed to achieve the enormous success it is now;
• Anyone inspired by the man who made Apple's tech giant today.

About the author:

Walter Isaacson is an American writer and biographer. He was one of the original editors of TIME magazine and is also the president and CEO of the CNN news network. Isaacson has written two best-selling biographies of Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin, and he is also the author of American Sketches (2003) .

What does this book have for you? Find out why Steve Jobs' Apple became an icon of technology around the world.    

There's absolutely no denying the role Steve Jobs played in shaping our tech world today.  

A minded perfectionist, Steve Jobs had a vision of changing the world through technology.

In this best-selling biography, you'll learn that while perfectionism and desire drove Jobs to achieve greatness, it was his personality that was the cause of discord and conflict. In his relationships with employees and co-workers, Jobs' behavior was often viewed as highly offensive, although he frequently argued that he was simply trying to motivate his employees to achieve success. get what's best.

The summary pages that follow detail the enchanting life of one of the most influential tech entrepreneurs of our time, while also telling the delightful story of the childish prank brought partnership that later built one of the most valuable technology companies in the world.

Also in these summary pages you will learn:

• How LSD led to the formation of today's technology;
• Why Woody and Buzz Lightyear wouldn't exist without Steve Jobs;
• Why Jobs believes he can cure his cancer with acupuncture and eating fruit.

A skillful father and a naughty best friend made Jobs bring with him a passion for engineering and design.

On February 24, 1955, a boy was born to Abdulfattah Jandali and Joanne Schieble.

However, they did not raise the child. The reason is because Schieble comes from a very strict Catholic family, they did not accept her having a child with a Muslim man and they were forced to take the child away for adoption.

And so, the child grew up in the arms of Paul and Clara Jobs, a couple living in Silicon Valley. They named the baby Steven.

Paul Jobs was a mechanical engineer specializing in cars and it was he who opened the door that brought Steve into the world of engineering.

From an early age, Paul tried to instill his love of mechanics with Steve. Steve once said that he was impressed by his father's focus on the profession. If the family needed a cabin, Paul could easily make it and he let Steve help with the work.

In addition, the family's smart yet very affordable Eichler home - a modern home with floor-to-ceiling glass walls and expansive floors - ignited Steve's passion for clean design. will and luxury.

Then, in high school, Steve Jobs met Steve Wozniak, the two quickly became close friends.

Wozniak is 5 years older than Jobs and is a genius computer engineer, from which Jobs learned a lot about computers.

In many ways, Jobs and Wozniak were both kids and both loved to be naughty. But they also love the world of electronics and want to be able to create something.

Combining the two personalities, in 1971, they released their first product: the "Blue Box", a device that allowed users to make calls from long distances and completely free.

Wozniak provided the design and Jobs brought it to business, each investing $40 and selling the device for $150.

The pair sold nearly 100 units, showing them what they could do with Wozniak's mechanical engineering and Jobs' vision, and it was also the beginning of the path to creating Apple.

Spirituality, LSD, and the arts shaped Jobs' taste and intense focus.

By the late 1960s, cultural interest and curiosity among computer geeks and "hippie" lifestyles had begun to overlap.

So perhaps, in addition to his fascination with math, science, and electronics, Jobs immersed himself in cross-culturalism and started taking LSD (strong hallucinogens).

Jobs later demonstrated a refined aesthetic sense and intense focus on experiences with hallucinogenic drugs.

In 1972, Jobs enrolled at Reed College, a libertarian private school in Oregon, and since then both thinking and using LSD with friends has become serious.

Jobs felt that taking these drugs reinforced his sense of the important things in life, by showing "there is no flip side of the coin". For Jobs, creating great things was more important than anything else.

Eager to explore the spiritual culture of the East, Jobs even went to India, where he stayed for seven months. Buddhism in particular became an important part of his personality, influencing his minimalist aesthetic and exposing him to the power of intuition.

Both interests - LSD and spirituality - helped develop a steady focus, what has come to be known as Jobs's reality-distorting expertise: What if he had decided what should have happened? , then he made it happen simply by bending reality with his will.

Another factor that shaped Jobs' minimalist aesthetic was his devotion to art. Throughout his career, Jobs emphasized many times that Apple products should be neat and simple.

This idea was formed during my college years. Despite dropping out of his studies, Jobs was allowed to continue taking classes, which he did solely for the purpose of enriching himself. One of them was a calligraphy class, his skill in which later became a key element of the Apple Mac's graphical user interface.  

A visit to the apple farm gave them a name; A reverse vision and hard work made a company.

It seems like a strange combination: a spiritual person, fond of LSD and a background in the computer industry. In the early 1970s, many people began to see computers as symbols of personal expression.

When Jobs was hooked on ecstasy and Zen, he dreamed of starting his own business. And around the same time, his friend Steve Wozniak got the idea for the modern personal computer.

In the early days of Silicon Valley's technological revolution, Steve Wozniak joined the Homebrew computer club, a place where computer geeks meet to exchange ideas and where opposites go Tradition, combined with technology becomes the perfect thing.

It was also here that Steve Wozniak got his idea. Computers at that time needed many separate hardware devices to operate, making management and use extremely complicated. Wozniak envisions a device as a self-contained package with an all-in-one keyboard, computer, and monitor.

At first, Wozniak hesitated to make his design available to everyone for free, which is also a Homebrew tradition. However, Jobs insisted that they should profit from Wozniak's invention.

So in 1976, with just $1,300 starting a business, Jobs and Wozniak founded the Apple computer company.

On the day they came up with the name, Jobs visited an apple farm; and because it's so simple, fun, and relatable – the name Apple was born.

Jobs and Wozniak worked extremely hard for a month to build 100 computers by hand. Half of it was sold to a local computer dealer, and the other half went to friends and other customers.

After just 30 days, Apple's first computer, the Apple I, turned a profit.

Jobs and Wozniak made a very strong team – Wozniak was a tech wizard and Jobs was a visionary who saw the world-changing potential of the personal computer.

Jobs was a controlling and capricious boss, driven by perfection.

Those who know Jobs will agree that he is a dominant and exceptionally capricious personality. If the work does not meet the standards, he will get angry and may scold others.

But why did Jobs have such a bad temper?

In short, he is a very perfectionist. Jobs wanted the Apple II to be the perfect design, fully equipped and integrated with everything. But when the Apple II team made it a success when it was released in 1977, it also drained people of energy and spirit.

If Jobs felt that an employee's job was bad, he would tell them it was a pile of rubbish and that things would become extremely serious if he found even a small mistake.

As Apple grew stronger, Jobs became increasingly erratic. Mike Scott was even appointed as Apple's director, with the main task of curbing that temper of Jobs.

Scott essentially confronts Jobs about issues other employees don't have the energy to do. This often led to disagreements, sometimes even bringing Jobs to tears because he felt that giving up control of Apple was really difficult.

Jobs felt extremely frustrated when Scott tried to put limits on his perfectionism. For his part, Scott didn't want Jobs' perfectionism to rise above pragmatism.

For example, Scott intervened when Jobs thought that none of the nearly 2,000 shades of gray were good enough for the Apple II, and similarly when Jobs spent days just deciding how the computer's corners should be rounded. Anyway, Scott just focused on making and selling them.

However, because the company is still running smoothly, these personalities are still manageable. But as you will see later, this is not the end.

The Macintosh made Jobs a technology icon, but Jobs' temperament brought him down.

The Apple II, with about 6 million copies sold, is seen as the spark that led to the birth of the personal computer industry.

But for Jobs, it was not a complete success because the Apple II was Wozniak's masterpiece, not his.

Jobs wanted to create a machine that could, in his words, “create a pattern in the universe.” Driven by this ambition, Jobs began working on the Macintosh – a successor to the Apple II that would change the look of the personal computer and make him a technology icon.

However, the Macintosh was not Jobs's invention, because Jobs actually stole the Macintosh project from its creator, Jef Raskin, a computer interface expert. Jobs took this idea and built a machine that ran on a microprocessor powerful enough to accommodate sophisticated graphics, and could be controlled with a mouse.

The Macintosh became an unprecedented achievement, thanks in part to a lavish promotional campaign that included a sensational TV commercial – now known as the “1984 commercial” – directed by Mr. Hollywood filmmaker Ridley Scott. Attached to the popularity of commerce, the Macintosh set off a chain reaction in the community with Jobs as well as with the product.

With inherent ingenuity, Jobs succeeded in giving high-profile interviews to a number of prominent magazines, by manipulating journalists into thinking that he was giving them "exclusive" interviews.

His strategy worked, and the Macintosh made Jobs rich and famous. He became such a celebrity that he was able to invite singer Ella Fitzgerald to perform at his splendid 30th birthday party.

However, the same personality that helped Jobs create success for the Macintosh also got him fired.

Jobs' perfectionism and repressive attitude toward Apple employees did not diminish. He would constantly call people "assholes" if they weren't focused on perfection.

Those attitudes and expressions of Jobs drained the patience of the company's leadership. And in 1985, they decided to fire Jobs.

Jobs failed with NeXT and then succeeded with Pixar, an animation company.

After recovering from being fired from Apple, Jobs realized he could be exactly what he wanted—with his good points and bad points.

He first started a company focused on the education market, a computer company called NeXT.

With the NeXT project, Jobs brought his passion to design. He paid $100,000 to design the logo, and insisted that NeXT would be a perfection.

But Jobs' perfectionism made engineering and production extremely difficult. For example, the two sides of the block must be manufactured individually, using molds costing up to $650,000.

Jobs' determination became the death knell for NeXT. The project was almost financially exhausted, the product was delayed for years, and in the end, the machine was too expensive for consumers. And because of its high price tag and small software library, NeXT barely made its mark in the computer industry.

During the same period, Jobs bought a large amount of shares from the company Pixar. As chairman, Jobs invested in a business—a perfect blend of technology and art.

By 1988, Jobs had invested $50 million in Pixar while still losing money on NeXT.

But after years of tough financial times, the studio released Tin Toy , a film that showcased Pixar's unique vision for computer animation. Tin Toy won the Best Animated Feature category at the 1988 Academy Awards.

So Jobs felt that he should shift his focus from hardware and software production, which he lost a lot of money to, to Pixar, an advanced and potential animation company.

And finally, Pixar teamed up with Disney to produce its first movie, Toy Story . Released in 1996, Toy Story reached the top of the highest-grossing films of the year. When Pixar went public, Jobs' shares (80% of the company) were worth 20 times what he had invested: $1.2 billion.

Away from Apple, Jobs improved his personal life, reconnecting with his biological family.  

Besides learning during his 12 years away from Apple, Jobs has also developed his personal life.

In 1986, after the death of his adoptive mother, Jobs was curious about his origins and decided to find his biological mother.

When he found Joanne Schieble, she was very emotional and regretted giving Jobs to someone else to raise.

Jobs was also surprised to learn that he also had a younger sister, Mona Simpson. Both people with strong passion for art and strong will, the two have become close to each other.

In 1996, Simpson published a novel with the title A Regular Guy . The main character is based on Jobs and shares many aspects of Jobs' personality. However, because he didn't want any conflict with his newly found sister, Jobs never read the novel.

Around the same time, Jobs met Laurene Powell. The couple married in 1991, with prayers from Jobs' former patriarch. Powell was previously pregnant with their first child, Reed Paul Jobs. They also had two more children, Erin and Eve.

With encouragement from Powell, Jobs also tried to spend more time with Lisa Brennan, the daughter he had with his first relationship, who had become estranged from him.

Jobs tried to be a better father to Lisa; and eventually, she moved in with him and Powell until she attended Harvard.

Lisa grew up with the same temperament as Jobs and both are not very good at reaching out and correcting, they can be apart for months without saying a word to each other.

In a broader sense, the way he treats people around him is similar to the way he works. Jobs' approach: either very passionate or very cold.

Apple was on the verge of decline, Jobs returned as a child and led the company as CEO.

After years of firing Jobs, Apple gradually went downhill and was in danger of bankruptcy.

To prevent this, Gil Amelio was named CEO in 1996. Amelio knew that to get Apple back on track, it needed to merge with a company with new ideas.

And for that reason, in 1997, Amelio chose NeXT and Jobs became an advisor to Apple.

Once back at Apple, Jobs gathered as much power as he could. He has quietly built a power base by placing his favorite employees at Next in high positions within Apple.

During this period, Apple's management realized that Amelio would not be able to become Apple's savior, but perhaps the company would have a chance again with Jobs.

So the board asked Jobs to return to the position of CEO. However, the unexpected happened, Jobs declined the offer. Instead, Jobs wanted to stay on as an advisor and help find a new CEO.

Jobs as a consultant increased his influence inside Apple. He forced the board to resign—the board that had offered him the CEO position—because he felt they were too slow to change the company.

As a consultant, Jobs also succeeded in partnering with rival Microsoft, prompting them to make a new version of Microsoft Office for Mac, thus ending a decade of competition and dramatically accelerating the pace. sell Apple products.

And finally, after much hesitation, Jobs became CEO and suggested the company make fewer products.  

Jobs terminated the licensing agreements Apple had with a few other manufacturers and decided to focus the company on making just four great computers: A desktop computer and a laptop for both. professional market and consumer market.

In 1997, Apple lost $1.04 billion. But in 1998, Jobs' first year as CEO, the company made $309 million in profits. Jobs really saved Apple.

Bold ideas and forward-thinking designs made the first iMac and Apple Store hugely successful.

When Jobs saw Jony Ive's design talent, he made Ive the second most powerful person in Apple - just behind him. From there began a collaboration that became the most important combination in the design industry of this era.

The first product that Jobs and Ive designed together was the iMac, a desktop computer that cost about $1,200 and was designed for everyone.

With the iMac, Jobs and Ive challenged conventional ideas about what a desktop computer should look like. In choosing a blue, matte frame, the pair reflected their obsession with creating the perfect computer, inside and out. This design also gives the computer a playful look.

Released in May 1998, the iMac became the best-selling product in Apple's history.

However, Jobs began to worry that Apple's unique products would become out of place among the electronics in the vast technology market. His solution was to create an Apple Store as a way for the company to manage the entire retail process.

Gateway Computer Company suffered financial losses after opening retail stores, so management opposed Jobs' idea. However, convinced that they were right, management agreed to test four Apple Store stores.

Jobs started by building a prototype store, equipping it to perfection, and paying attention to every detail of the service and overall aesthetic. He emphasizes minimalism throughout the entire process, from the moment customers enter the store to the moment they leave.

In May 2001, the first Apple Store opened. It was a resounding success, as Jobs' careful design pushed retail and the brand's image to the next level.

In fact, the Manhattan store went on to become the highest-earning of all New York stores, including established brands like Saks Fifth Avenue and Bloomingdale's.

Desperate for total digital control, Jobs created the iPod, iPhone, and iPad.

Following the success of the Apple Store and iMac, Jobs came up with a completely new strategy. His vision is a personal computer at the heart of a new digital lifestyle.

He calls it a digital-centric strategy.

This strategy envisions the personal computer as a control center comprising devices ranging from music players to cameras.

As a first step in shaping this idea, Jobs decided that a music player would be Apple's next product.

In 2001, Apple released the iPod, a streamlined device with the one button that has become famous today, a small screen, and a new hard disk technology.

Critics questioned whether consumers would shell out $399 for a music player, but Apple succeeded, by 2007 sales of iPods accounted for half of Apple's sales. Apple.

The next step was to design a cell phone for Apple, because Jobs had this in mind before, a cell phone with a built-in music player would make the iPod superfluous.

In 2007, Apple released the first generation of iPhone. Two seemingly impossible technologies have been applied: a touch screen, which can run multiple applications at the same time, and a solid glass cover, called Gorilla glass.

Once again, critics cast doubt on Apple's strategy, arguing that no one would shell out $500 for a cell phone — and again Jobs proved them wrong. By the end of 2010, profits from iPhone sales accounted for more than half of all mobile profits worldwide.

The final step in Jobs' strategy was the iPad tablet.

Apple officially started building the iPad in January 2010. However, Jobs revealed the product before it was made public, the press underestimated it when they hadn't tried it yet.  

And when the iPad was officially launched, it became a resounding success. In fact, Apple sold more than a million units in the first month and 15 million in the next nine months.

With the release of the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, it became clear that Jobs' bold ideas succeeded in changing the electronics industry.

Jobs' insistence on perfect and closed systems reflects his obsession with control.

Throughout his career, Jobs maintained that a closed, tightly integrated system would give customers the best experience. This idea reflects Jobs' desire for control, since he launched his system, preventing users from modifying it.

The obsession with control has caused major conflicts – especially with Microsoft and Google.

Bill Gates has many different ideas about business and technology, in which he is always willing to license his company's systems and software to partners. In fact, Bill Gates wrote software for the Macintosh.

However, the friendly business relationship between Jobs and Gates turned into a lifelong rivalry.

When Gates released the Windows operating system, Jobs accused him of copying the Macintosh's interface. In fact, both systems "borrow" ideas from another tech company, called Xerox.

Towards the end of his career, Jobs also attacked Google. In the company's design of the Android system, Jobs argued that Google copied a lot from Apple.

While both Microsoft and Google believed that the expansion of the computer system and natural competition would determine which technology was superior, Jobs maintained that in the end both companies stole the ideas. idea from Apple.

But Jobs' goal wasn't just competition between companies. Jobs also fought relentlessly for perfection within Apple, resulting in employees who didn't resign themselves and were fired. Under Jobs, there was no tolerance for undermining Apple's quality.

Whenever he thinks someone isn't an "A" and doesn't work 90 hours a week, he doesn't remind them to strive. Instead, he fired them immediately.

And when a company had problems getting its chips on time, Jobs became furious and cursed them ferociously. This reaction was a sign of Jobs's terrible perfectionism.

Jobs ignored all treatments for his cancer and died in 2011.

Jobs first found out he had cancer during a checkup in October 2003.

Unfortunately, Jobs tackled cancer the same way he did with his designs: ignoring all the conventional wisdom and deciding to fight his own battles.

He refused an operation for 9 months, instead receiving acupuncture and a vegetarian diet. As time went on, the tumor grew and eventually, Jobs had to undergo surgery so it could be removed.

Then cancer returned in 2008, once again Jobs insisted on eating fruits and vegetables to cure the disease, causing him to lose 40 pounds.

Finally, Jobs was persuaded to have a liver transplant; but after that, his health deteriorated seriously and could not be restored to the original.

Jobs died in 2011. He left behind a legacy of being one of the biggest technology companies in the world.

Everything Jobs did in life was the product of unbelievable strength, and before he died, Jobs said, “I've had a blessed life, a wonderful career. I did everything I could.”

Unlike other individuals, Jobs' personality is fully portrayed in his inventions as all Apple products are a tightly closed system and integrate both hardware and software.

And while Microsoft's expansion strategy – allowing its Windows operating system to be licensed – led them to dominate the operating system industry for years, Jobs' sample proved advantageous in long-term use, as it ensures a seamless user experience from start to finish.

Shortly before his death, Jobs was able to see Apple surpass Microsoft as the most valuable technology company in the world.

The main message of this book is:

Steve Jobs grew up in Silicon Valley at the intersection of art and technology, ecstasy and computer tech enthusiasts. Here, Jobs had a friendship that led to the birth of Apple as well as the change of world technology. During his lifetime, Jobs succeeded in transforming our relationship with technology, inventing digital devices with streamlined designs and user-friendly interfaces.

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Steve Jobs by Walter Issacson | Book Summary

“Steve Jobs,” a biography written by Walter Isaacson, is an in-depth account of Steve Jobs’ life, from his birth and early years to his unparalleled career at Apple Inc . The book paints an intimate picture of Jobs as a complex individual — a charismatic visionary and creative genius who could be callous and even cruel. 

Isaacson’s candid account derives from over forty interviews conducted with Jobs himself and interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues.

Steve Jobs Book Summary

Steve Jobs was born in 1955 to Joanne Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali, who gave him up for adoption due to cultural and family pressures . Paul and Clara Jobs adopted him, raising him in Mountain View, California, which later became known as Silicon Valley . Steve’s early interest in electronics was kindled by his father, who taught him basic mechanics and engineering in their garage. 

Jobs had a rebellious streak as a young ma n, experimenting with psychedelic drugs and dropping out of Reed College to travel through India seeking spiritual enlightenment.

Co-founding Apple

Jobs’ fascination with technology and entrepreneurship led to the co-founding of Apple Computer Inc. in 1976 with Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne. The initial success of the Apple I led to the development of the Apple II , which revolutionized the personal computing world. 

The book describes Jobs’ obsession with creating products that were both functional and beautiful. However, his drive for perfection and uncompromising nature led to increasing clashes within the company.

Exit and NeXT

In 1985, following a power struggle with John Sculley , the CEO Jobs himself had recruited, he was ousted from Apple. This led to the creation of NeXT Inc., a computer platform development company that specialized in the higher education and business markets. 

During this period, Jobs also acquired The Graphics Group (later known as Pixar) from Lucasfilm’s computer graphics division, which marked his first foray into the movie industry.

Pixar and Return to Apple

Jobs’ investment in Pixar turned into a billion-dollar fortune when the studio released “Toy Story,” the first entirely computer-animated feature film, in 1995 . Meanwhile, Apple, struggling without Jobs, acquired NeXT in 1997, which marked Jobs’ return to the company. 

The book details how Jobs revitalized Apple, transforming it into one of the world’s most valuable corporations . Products like the iMac, iTunes, iPod, iPhone, and iPad not only turned around the company’s financial status but also revolutionized the technology industry.

Leadership Style and Personal Life

Isaacson provides insights into Jobs’ management style : he was often ruthless and manipulative, traits that upset many people around him. His reality distortion field, a term coined by his Apple colleagues , encapsulates his charisma and ability to persuade others into believing almost anything he wished. 

The biography also covers his personal life, his relationship with his wife Laurene Powell and his children, his estrangement from his first daughter Lisa for many years, and his acknowledgment and reconciliation later.

Illness and Death

Jobs was diagnosed with a rare form of pancreatic cancer in 2003. For nine months, he resisted his doctors’ recommendations for medical intervention, seeking instead to treat his disease through acupuncture sessions, fruit juice diets , and other treatments he found online. 

When he finally opted for surgery in 2004 , it may have been too late. His health declined over the next seven years , leading to his resignation as Apple’s CEO in August 2011 and death in October of the same year.

What can you learn from the book?

1. embrace your individuality and non-conformity .

Jobs was notorious for going against the grain and rejecting the status quo. He didn’t wear suits, he dropped out of college, and he believed in doing things differently. 

This attitude extended to his approach at Apple. 

Rather than following existing trends in technology, Jobs sought to innovate and create products that were entirely different and better, like the iPod and the iPhone. 

This non-conformity allowed him to revolutionize multiple industries and become a disruptive force . 

Thus, the lesson is to embrace one’s individuality and uniqueness, as it may lead to breakthroughs that conformity never could.

2. Focus on Simplicity and Perfection 

As highlighted throughout the biography, Jobs had an obsessive attention to detail. He believed that every aspect of a product, even those unseen by the consumer, should be meticulously crafted. 

For instance, Jobs spent months deliberating over the design and aesthetics of the Macintosh’s circuit board because he wanted it to be beautiful, even though customers would never see it. 

This unwavering commitment to perfection and simplicity resulted in products that were not just functional, but also works of art. The lesson here is that striving for simplicity and perfection in one’s work can lead to extraordinary outcomes.

3. The Power of Vision and Tenacity 

Even when faced with setbacks and failures, such as being ousted from Apple , the company he co-founded, Jobs never lost sight of his vision. He viewed these experiences as opportunities for learning and growth. 

When he returned to Apple, he used these lessons to reinvigorate the company and launch a string of successful products , like the iMac, iPod, iPhone, and iPad. This resilience underscores the importance of maintaining a strong vision and the tenacity to pursue it, despite the challenges that may arise.

4. Understand the Interplay of Technology and Humanities 

Steve Jobs believed that products should not merely be functional, but also intuitive, elegant, and human-centered . This philosophy resulted in devices like the iPhone, which transformed the technology landscape by combining cutting-edge technology with an intuitive, user-friendly interface. 

Jobs’s emphasis on this intersection demonstrates the value of a holistic approach that integrates different disciplines , leading to more innovative and impactful outcomes. It is a reminder that in a world increasingly dominated by technology , the human element should not be forgotten.

Final Thoughts

“Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson is an impartial biography that doesn’t shy away from highlighting the less appealing traits of Jobs’ personality alongside his genius. It portrays him as a passionate perfectionist, a visionary who revolutionized multiple industries , and a complex, often challenging human being. His innovative products and thought processes have left an indelible imprint on the world, and his life story continues to inspire millions around the globe.

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About The Author

Walter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane and was CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of  Time . He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu.

Product Details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (October 5, 2021)
• Length: 672 pages
• ISBN13: 9781982176860

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Book Summary: Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

Table of Contents

The Book in Three Sentences

This biography focuses on the life of Steve Jobs. From Apple’s humble beginnings to the creation of the iPhone, the iPad, and the Mac, this book follows the life of Steve Jobs from a personal and professional perspective. The book was based on a series of interviews with Jobs over the course of two years.

Steve Jobs Summary

Chapter 1: childhood.

Steve Jobs was born on February 24th, 1955 to a Muslim man named Abdulfattah “John” Jandali and a catholic woman named Joanne Shieble. Her family disapproved of the marriage, especially her father. Steve was put on adoption and was supposed to go to a college-educated family. He ended up with a high school dropout named Paul and a bookkeeper named Clara who promised to fund Steve’s college. Since Joanne’s father was dying, Steve’s biological parents hoped to get the baby back eventually. They eventually got married and had another child, Mona Simpson, who eventually became a novelist. Steve’s adopted parents were honest about where he came from. Jobs would later abandon his own child.

Jobs’ parents adopted another child, Patty, and moved to the San Francisco suburbs. His father was a repo man in Mountain View, near Palo Alto, where he designed things in his house and repaired and resold cars.

At the time, there were many changes taking place in the realm of technology. In 1938, David Packard worked with his friend Bill Hewlett in his garage in Palo Alto. By the 50s, HP was making tech instruments and the industry was growing. In 1965, Moore developed a law that said that the speed of integrated circuits would double every two years.

As Steve grew older, he realized he was smarter than his parents and he felt separate and detached. They also knew this and they were willing to do anything for his education. Jobs was special from an intellectual standpoint and got bored with school easily which got him into trouble. The school suggested he skipped two grades, but his parents decided he’d skip just one. He was socially awkward and had to go to a different school.

Jobs started working for HP after calling Bill Hewlett and asking for spare parts for a project. At age 15 Jobs started smoking marijuana. By senior year he was doing LSD. He also started defying authority.

Chapter Two: Woz

Jobs became friends with Stephen Wozniak who was five years older and more knowledgeable about electronics. Wozniak, or Woz, was more “hardware” than “software”. Both Jobs and Woz bonded over electronics and music (such as Bod Dylan). They also enjoyed pranks, such as the blue box: Jobs and Woz created a device that allowed them to bypass the phone company’s restrictions and make long-distance calls which they used to make pranks. 

Chapter Three: The Dropout

When it was time to choose a college Jobs decided to go to Reed, an art college located in Portland, Oregon He chose Reed because he was into zen, meditation, and Eastern spirituality. He also started experimenting with a variety of diets, including vegetarianism. He quickly got bored of the classes and only took the ones he found interesting, such as calligraphy which combined art and technology.

Chapter Four: Atari and India

After going back home to Los Altos, Jobs found a job at a video game company named Atari. Nolan Bushnell became his boss and role model. At that point, Jobs was a fruit vegetarian, he was hard to deal with at work and he refused to take showers or use deodorants. Due to his confrontational personality and lack of personal hygiene, Jobs was sent to the night shift and continued being rude and disrespectful to others. The people who knew him back then described him as charming yet arrogant. In 1974 Jobs wanted to make money to travel to India to go on a spiritual journey, something that changed his life.

Chapter Five: The Apple I

The first personal computer kit, the Altair, caught the attention of people like Jobs and Gates. It proved people could build their own computers. Wozniak designed his own computer with cheap parts, the machine that was later named the Apple I. Jobs and Woz founded Apple. The company received that name because Jobs was on a vegetarian diet and he had just come back from an apple farm. At the same time, Apple represented both friendliness and simplicity.

Jobs and Woz were different but complemented each other. Jobs was charismatic but cold. Woz, on the other hand, was socially awkward, but childish and sweet. Apart from having different, but complementary personalities, they had a similar relationship when it came to running a company. Jobs was the business driving force and Woz had the technical wizardry to make the actual computers. When the Apple I was finished, Jobs and Woz offered $50 circuit boards and the owner would have to piece together the rest of the computer. They had to assemble computers themselves which would cost $500 per machine. When the Apple I was finally put on sale, it was available for $666.66.

Chapter Six: The Apple II

For the next computer, Jobs wanted the “complete package”: a big case, keyboard, power supply, and software. The case was to have a simple and elegant design and the power supply was to be fanless because Jobs thought fans were distracting. Jobs developed a passion for perfection, even in parts the user couldn’t see.

At the time, Jobs developed the Apple marketing philosophy which had the following maxims:

• Empathy : understand the needs of the consumer
• Focus : eliminate the unimportant
• Impute : people form an opinion about a company based on the signals its products convey.

One of the most important aspects of Apple is that its products, inspired by Japanese Zen Buddhism, had a minimalist design . Jobs thought that “simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”, a quote attributed to Leonardo da Vinci.

Apple soon moved to Cupertino and Jobs became even more temperamental.

Chapter Seven: Crisann and Lisa

Brennan and Jobs were in and out of relationships for five years and she got pregnant in 1977. He ignored the situation by saying he wasn’t the father. He wanted her to get an abortion, but she refused. The baby girl was born on May 17th, 1978” Lisa Nicole Brennan and she didn’t receive his last name. A year later Jobs agreed to have a paternity test. His results said that he had a 94.41% of probability of paternity. He got visitation rights but didn’t use them.

Jobs changed yet again: he stopped using drugs, he wasn’t a strict vegan, spent less time on retreats, got haircuts, bought suits and shirts, and started a relationship with Barbara Jasinski.

Also, he bought a house in Los Gatos. The house had a painting, a coffeemaker, and knives. There were no beds, chairs, or couches. Jobs’ bedroom only consisted of a mattress, pictures of Einstein and Maharaj-Ji, and an Apple of II sitting on the floor.

Chapter Eight: Xerox and Lisa

By 1977 the Apple II sold 2500 units. In 1981, it sold 210,000 units. Jobs was desperate to build a machine of his own, after all, the Apple II was Wozniak’s creation. Jobs shipped the Apple III in May 1980 and it flopped. It displayed 80 characters instead of 40, it had more memory, and it displayed both lower and uppercase letters. Unfortunately, the board had bad connectors that often failed.

Jobs hired two engineers to make a new computer: The Lisa. This was a $2000 machine with a 16-bit processor instead of an 8-bit one like the Apple II. The Lisa team hired Atkinson, a student in neuroscience who created a high-level programming language in six days. Apple was also working on another project, an inexpensive computer for the masses that was a self-contained unit: it featured a keyboard, monitor, and software with its own graphical interface.

Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) approached Jobs. They had two maxims that Jobs quickly adopted himself: “the best way to predict the future is to invent it” and “people serious about software should make their own hardware”. Jobs allowed Xerox to invest in Apple if he was allowed to see the tech they were developing at PARC. They showed him the Smalltalk language which allowed computers to be networked, had object-oriented programming, and had its own graphical interface.

In 1981, the Xerox Star was introduced: it had its own graphical user interface, a mouse, a bitmapped display, windows, and a desktop metaphor. It was clunky and extremely expensive (it cost $16,595) and aimed at the networked office market. It flopped and sold only 30,000 units.

Both Jobs and Atkinson wanted a white background. This was called “what you see is what you get” since what you see on screen is what you’d get printed out. Atkinson also created the illusion of overlapping windows, like papers in an office.

Chapter Nine: Going Public

In 1977, Apple was valued at $5,309. By 1980, it was valued at $1.79 billion. In 1981, the Apple team decided it was time to take the company public. Before the shares went public, Wozniak sold a lot of his shares cheap to mid-level employees so that they’d buy houses. At 26, Jobs was worth $256 million.

The author refers to Jobs as an “antimaterialistic hippie who capitalized on the inventions of a friend who wanted to give them away for free”. Jobs had a love for beautifully designed objects , such as BMW motorcycles, Porsche cars, Henckels knives, Braun appliances, Bosendorfer pianos, and Bang and Olufsen audio equipment. Despite all this, Jobs’ house was simple, he wouldn’t have security protection and he always drove his own car.

Chapter Ten: The Mac Is Born

Jeff Raskin studied computer science and argued that Apple should have graphical rather than text-based interfaces He wrote the manual for the Apple II for $50 and became the manager of Apple’s publications department. He proposed the new project to be called the MacIntosh after his favorite type of Apple. This became the Macintosh and it was a $1000 all-in-one computer with a 5-inch screen and keyboard and a cheap Motorola processor. Jobs wanted a great machine that was going to be transformative. Raskin wanted a cheap machine that was going to be just another computer.

Chapter Eleven: The Reality Distortion Field

The Reality Distortion Field is a Star Trek term. In the presence of Jobs, reality was malleable and he could convince anyone of anything. Jobs felt some people were enlightened, such as Einstein, Gandhi, and himself.

Chapter Twelve: The Design

Jobs always wanted Apple products to be clean and simple . Simple design and simplicity of use. For Jobs, package, and presentation were extremely important even if most people were going to throw away the box as soon as they opened it. He also cared deeply about the components inside, like the board. He said: “A great carpenter isn’t going to use lousy wood for the back of a cabinet, even though nobody’s going to see it.”

The signatures of all members of the team were engraved inside each Macintosh.

Chapter Thirteen: Building the Mac

Jobs wanted a closed system and a controlled experience . You couldn’t open the Mac and play with its insides, therefore, hobbyists and hackers didn’t like it.

The Mac was delayed, shipping 16 months behind schedule. About the delay, Jobs said “Better to miss than to turn out the wrong thing”, “it’s not done until it ships” and “the journey is the reward”. He thought people didn’t know what they wanted and continued thinking about laptops.

Chapter Fourteen: Enter Sculley

John Sculley was president of the Pepsi-Cola division and Apple wanted him. He arrived in California in May 1983.

At this point, Jobs added a Tiffany lamp, an antique dining table, and a laser-disc video with a Sony Trinitron to his house. He refused to get a sofa and chairs though and used foam cushions instead.

Jobs thought he was going to die young so he wanted to accomplish things as quickly as possible. He behaved erratically, had mood swings, and showed signs of bipolarity.

Chapter Fifteen: The Launch

The Mac violated the “hacker’s code”: it was overpriced, it had no slots, special tools were needed to open it and it was a closed and controlled system.

Jobs had $750,000 for a Ridley Scott-directed ad that was going to premiere at the Super Bowl. This became “ 1984 ”, an ad that became viral before viral even existed. 96 million people watched it.

Chapter Sixteen: Gates and Jobs

Gates came from a rich family. He went to a private school, then Harvard. He dropped out to start a computer software company.

Jobs and Gates looked down on each other. Jobs wanted Microsoft to develop software for the Macintosh. For a while, Jobs and Gates made a deal and forged a bond. Microsoft was working on DOS. Jobs thought Gates was ripping Apple off and was furious. Gates demoed Windows to Jobs and the latter thought it was garbage.

Windows 1.0 launched in 1985, It was a shoddy product that received poor reviews from critics and consumers. Microsoft made Windows much better over time. Jobs was still mad about Windows 30 years later.

Chapter Seventeen: Icarus

The Macintosh was an impressive yet slow and underpowered computer. It got hot because it didn’t have any fans. Apple released a new ad that was poorly received.

A few people left Apple, including Wozniak. The Mac kept doing poorly and Jobs kept blaming others for his mistakes. Jobs was asked to step down as head of the Macintosh division. He was offered a new position and toured the world to promote the Apple II.

Chapter Eighteen: NeXT

Jobs became interested in making a machine that could be used for science and the higher education market. He pitched this machine (which he named the Big Mac) but was turned down. Apple removed Jobs as Chairman and he was forced to resign Apple. He created a new company and took a couple of employees with him.

He founded NeXT, their first computer was going to be a cube and so was the logo. The layout of the boards had to be rearranged constantly because Jobs wanted a perfect cube. Jobs custom-designed the computer’s chip and wanted his own factory.

He also struck deals so that the NeXT would have Shakespeare plays, dictionaries, and a thesaurus. This was one of the first examples of ebooks.

Jobs also wanted to lure Gates into making software for the NeXT, but Gates was unimpressed and said the machine was “ridiculous”.

Jobs was was all about hardware and software integration and Gates wanted software that could be used in other’s hardware.

Chapter Nineteen: Pixar

Jobs got a chance to meet Ed Catmull, who was running the computer division of Lucasfilm. At the time, George Lucas was going through a divorce and Jobs wanted Apple to buy Lucasfilm. Apple didn’t want it, so Jobs made an offer himself. After investing, Jobs owned 70% of the new company which they called Pixar after the Pixar Image Computer.

Chapter Twenty: A Regular Guy

Jobs eventually got to know his biological parents and sister Mona. He also started visiting his daughter, but while he was playful with her at times, he was also cold.

He was involved in several romantic relationships. One of them was with Redse who thought Jobs was brilliant but was hurt by how uncaring he was. “Neglect is a form of abuse,” she said.

Chapter Twenty-One: Family Man

Jobs married Laurene Powell in 1991. He bought a two-story house in Palo Alto with no furniture: he only owned a bed, drawers, a card table, and folding chairs. Jobs bought a fancy washing machine from Germany and a painting. He had no security, left the back door unlocked, and had no servants.

Jobs owned a mansion he used for parties which he rented from the Clintons. When the Lewinsky incident happened, Jobs encouraged Bill Clinton to tell the truth.

Jobs had a baby in 1991: Reed Paul Jobs. He had another baby in 1995: Erin Siena Jobs. Finally, Eve was born in 1998.

Jobs learned from Buddhism that “material possessions often cluttered life rather than enriched it.”

Chapter Twenty-Two: Toy Story

Jobs admired Disney’s obsession with detail and design. Toy Story was made because Jobs and Pixar co-founder, John Lasseter believed that products have an essence to them.

Chapter Twenty-Three: The Second Coming

The NeXT was failing, but Apple was interested in buying it for the software. Jobs came back to Apple as an advisor.

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Restoration

Jobs was offered to be CEO of Apple but refused. He was happy being CEO of Pixar, was enjoying life as a family man, and didn’t want to be CEO of two companies. He eventually changed his mind and accepted the temporary title while he helped hire a new CEO.

Jobs thought in binary terms. A product was either “amazing” or “shit” and a person was either a “hero” or a “bozo”.

Apple wanted to reinvent itself like HP. HP started as an instrument company, then made calculators and then developed computers.

Jobs invented keynotes as we know now them.

In 1997, he announced a partnership with Apple. Microsoft would license the Apple GUI for Windows 1.0 and Microsoft would make Excel exclusive for the Mac for two years. In 1988, Microsoft announced Windows 2.0, and Apple sued.

They made a new deal in 1997. Internet Explorer was the default browser on the Mac. Microsoft invested $150 million in Apple. As part of this announcement, Bill Gates appeared on a giant screen which made Jobs and Apple look small in comparison. It all worked out in the end because Apple’s stock skyrocketed.

Chapter Twenty-Five: Think Different

Jobs created the only “lifestyle brand in the tech industry”. Apple users defined themselves as anticorporate, create, and innovative rebels. This happened because of the “Think Different” ad campaign. Jobs soon became permanent CEO and started having health issues due to the demands of being CEO of both Apple and Pixar. He’d go to work at 7 am, get back at 9 pm unable to speak to his family.

For a while, it was debated if Apple should have licensed its OS to other computer manufacturers. Two Mac clones got the OS in 1994: Power Computing and Radius. Motorola was then added to the list. Jobs strongly refused this idea. He believed hardware and software should be integrated. He killed the clones as soon as he rejoined the company.

Jobs knew how to focus. “Deciding what to do is as important as deciding what not to do. That’s true for companies, and it’s true for products.”

He banned PowerPoints. He thought slide presentations replace thinking. Jobs said, “People who know what they are talking about don’t need PowerPoint.” 

Apple was making several products with confusing names. Jobs asked, “Which ones do I tell my friends to buy.” If he got confusing answers, he’d kill the product. He cut 70% of projects, including the Newton which Jobs hated. He also laid off more than 3,000 people.

Jobs wanted to have four products. One for each of the following quadrants:

This translates into:

• Pro: Power Macintosh G3
• Pro Portable: PowerBook G3
• Consumer Desktop: iMac
• Consumer Portable: iBook

The “i” behind some of the names of the products indicated that the devices would seamlessly integrate with the internet.

Chapter Twenty-Six: Design Principles

Jobs didn’t want money, he wanted to design great products. He wanted less but better. He followed Leonardo da Vinci’s maxim that said that “simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: The iMac

The iMac was released in 1998. This was an all-in-one that featured a keyboard, monitor, and computer and was ready to use. It cost $1200 and had no floppy disk which was a bold but ahead-of-its-time move. The machine featured a translucent design that wanted to transmit a connection between the outside and the inside since the circuit boards were visible. When Jobs saw a CD tray instead of a CD slot, he lost his mind.

The iMac went on sale in 1998 for $1299. It sold 800,000 by the end of the year. 32% of sales were from people who were buying their first computer.

Jobs eventually added the CD slot but missed the opportunity to get a drive that would burn and rip CDs instead of just play them.

Chapter Twenty-Eight: CEO

Tim Cook was a supply chain manager at Compaq. He made changes to the production process, making everything faster. Cool left his position at Compaq when he was hired by Jobs

Jobs developed his own signature style by wearing a uniform. He started using black turtlenecks every day. He went from being an interim CEO to a full-time one. In January 2000, Jobs unveiled the OSX operating system which was based on the same OS Apple bought from NeXT.

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Apple Stores

Something Jobs couldn’t control was the experience people had when they bought an Apple product, so he came up with the idea of Apple stores. These stores were designed to have one entryway only and placed in areas with lots of foot traffic, such as malls and main streets. The stores were big because the bigger the store, the bigger the brand. The stores were a success.

Jobs’ passion project, Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue store, opened in 2006. It was a celebration of minimalism and beautiful design. At the time of the writing of the book, the tallest Apple store was located in Tokyo and the biggest in London.

Chapter Thirty: The Digital Hub

Jobs would take his top 100 employees to a retreat. In the end, he would choose ten projects and write them on a whiteboard, he would then cut seven.

As part of a retreat, Jobs came up with an idea: the computer would become a digital hub that would coordinate devices such as cameras, music players, and so on. To do so, he went back to FireWire, a high-speed serial port to transfer digital files. Apple started developing software for specific functions: iDVD for burning video and music to DVDs, iPhoto for managing pictures, Garage Band to create and mix music, iTunes to manage music, the iTunes store for buying music, Final Cut Pro for editing video, and iMovie for editing video too, but the latter was an even simpler version of Final Cut.

Before iTunes, people were downloading music illegally through Napster and burning it into CDs. iTunes allowed users to rip, mix and burn. With the promise of having “a thousand songs in your pocket”, the iPod was born, a device with a click wheel design. The simplistic design prohibited anyone working on the iPod to click more than three times to perform an action. There wasn’t even an on/off switch since the device would go dormant if it wasn’t used. The iPod was unveiled on October 23rd, 2001 and it cost $399.

Chapter Thirty-One: The iTunes Store

When iTunes launched, it sold 6 million songs in 6 days. It was cheap ($0.99 per track), fast (1-minute downloads), easy to use, and legal. iTunes was eventually ported to Windows in 2003. In 2006, Microsoft responded with Zune, a clunky device that failed in just a few years.

The iPod killed the Walkman. At the time, Apple worked cohesively and had synergy. Sony was fragmented into divisions. Sony was afraid to cannibalize itself. They thought that making it easy for people to share songs might hurt record sales.

The iPod was soon revised. In 2004, Apple launched the iPod mini. Jobs soon killed it, since he saw the device as “pay the same for less”. In 2005, Apple released the iPod Shuffle which was small, inexpensive, and let you randomly select songs.

Chapter Thirty-Two Music Man

Jobs liked Bob Dylan, The Stones, The Beatles. He was friends with Bono.

Chapter Thirty-Three: Pixar’s Friends

Disney bought Pixar. The former was making poorly-received animated films and the latter was making hit after hit.

Chapter Twenty-Four: Twenty-First Century Macs

The Power Mac G4 Cube was on display at MoMA in New York City. It was a perfect cube with no power button, fans, or CD slots.

Chapter Thirty-Five: Round One

Jobs was diagnosed with cancer. He thought the disease was caused by running both Pixar and Apple at the same time, though there was never proof that physical exhaustion causes cancer. A tumor was detected in Jobs’ kidney. It could be removed via surgery, but he refused. He tried other treatments instead, such as a vegan diet, acupuncture, and herbal remedies.

Jobs ignored this problem because he didn’t want to deal with it. He eventually underwent surgery. At that point, the tumor had spread and grown. His diet was a problem (he was fasting and purging). Doctors encouraged Jobs to eat more frequently and varied. He wouldn’t do it.

Cook was in charge of Apple while Jobs was absent. Cook was mercurial, a negotiator, he didn’t seek attention, he was steady and soon became COO.

Chapter Thirty-Six: The iPhone

The iPhone was an iPod that made calls. When Apple started developing the iPhone, phones were terrible and Jobs brought several innovations. Jobs thought “As soon as you have a stylus, you’re dead”, so that was out of the question. Other innovations included “swipe to open”, a sensor that knew when you put your phone to your ear, Jobs wanted a tablet with a multi-touch display. In the iPhone, the icons were rounded rectangles just like in the first Macintosh.

The iPod had plastic screens, but for the iPhone, Jobs wanted glass. He researched different types of glass and found out about a chemical exchange process from the 60s that resulted in a kind of glass he called gorilla glass.

For Jobs, “thinner is always better”. He wanted the thinnest phone, laptop, and tablet. The iPhone was available for $500 and was a resounding success.

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Round Two

Jobs’ cancer was spreading. He was also having eating problems and losing weight. He eventually agreed to go on medical leave. Again, Tim Cook took over. Cook said, “We believe in saying no to thousands of projects so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to us”.

Jobs got a liver transplant in Memphis. While recovering, he hallucinated and complained about the poorly designed medical equipment. He refused to eat properly and was always in a bad mood.

Chapter Thirty-Eight: The iPad

The first iPad was unveiled in 2010. The iPad filled the gap between phone and laptop and it was useful for web browsing, email, photos, video, music, games, and ebooks. Apple sold more than 1 million iPads in a month.

Chapter Thirty-Nine: New Battles

iOS and Android were competing operating systems. The former was a closed system and the latter was open. The former was integrated and the latter was fragmented.

Apple eventually got the digital rights to The Beatles.

Chapter Forty: To Infinity

For the iPad 2, Jobs wanted a magnetic cover that would attach to the device without covering the back. It would also “wake it up” when the user opened it. He also wanted Garage Band and iMovie support.

On his iPad, Jobs had three films: Chinatown, The Borne Ultimatum, and Toy Story 3. He only had one book: The Autobiography of a Yogi.

Jobs worked on a new service called iCloud, a way to sync everything the users owned digitally.

Chapter Forty-One: Round Three

Jobs and Obama met for 45 minutes. Jobs criticized America’s education system and the fact that was easier to build factories in China.

His health was deteriorating rapidly. Jobs lost weight, lost his appetite, had mood swings, and became depressed. Bill Gates visited Jobs while he was sick. They talked for three hours.

Jobs wanted a book written about him so that his kids could get to know him.

Chapter Forty-Two: Legacy

Jobs maintained laser focus, created great products, and ignored everything he considered unimportant. Jobs started a company in his parent’s garage. Apple eventually became the world’s most valuable company.

Some of the projects Jobs was involved with include the Apple II, the Macintosh, Toy Story, Apple Stores, the iPod, the iTunes Store, the iPhone, the App Store, the iPad, the iCloud and Apple itself.

Jobs wasn’t exceptionally smart, but he was, in fact, a genius. He prioritized products over profit, he recognized that people don’t know what they want until you show it to them and he strongly believed that hardware and software should be integrated.

Further Reading

If you enjoyed this book summary of Steve Jobs , you might also like:

• The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson
• Ikigai by Hector Garcia and Francesc Miralles

In 1976, Steve Jobs cofounded Apple Computer Inc. with Steve Wozniak. Under Jobs’ guidance, the company pioneered a series of revolutionary technologies, including the iPhone and iPad.

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Quick Facts

Steve jobs’ parents and adoption, early life and education, founding and leaving apple computer inc., creating next, steve jobs and pixar, returning to and reinventing apple, wife and children, pancreatic cancer diagnosis and health challenges, death and last words, movies and book about steve jobs, who was steve jobs.

Steve Jobs was an American inventor, designer, and entrepreneur who was the cofounder, chief executive, and chairman of Apple Inc. Born in 1955 to two University of Wisconsin graduate students who gave him up for adoption, Jobs was smart but directionless, dropping out of college and experimenting with different pursuits before cofounding Apple with Steve Wozniak in 1976. Jobs left the company in 1985, launching Pixar Animation Studios, then returned to Apple more than a decade later. The tech giant’s revolutionary products, which include the iPhone, iPad, and iPod, have dictated the evolution of modern technology. Jobs died in 2011 following a long battle with pancreatic cancer.

FULL NAME: Steven Paul Jobs BORN: February 24, 1955 DIED: October 5, 2011 BIRTHPLACE: San Francisco, California SPOUSE: Laurene Powell (1991-2011) CHILDREN: Lisa, Reed, Erin, and Eve ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces

Steve Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, in San Francisco to Joanne Schieble (later Joanne Simpson) and Abdulfattah “John” Jandali, two University of Wisconsin graduate students. The couple gave up their unnamed son for adoption. As an infant, Jobs was adopted by Clara and Paul Jobs and named Steven Paul Jobs. Clara worked as an accountant, and Paul was a Coast Guard veteran and machinist.

Jobs’ biological father, Jandali, was a Syrian political science professor. His biological mother, Schieble, worked as a speech therapist. Shortly after Jobs was placed for adoption, his biological parents married and had another child, Mona Simpson. It was not until Jobs was 27 that he was able to uncover information on his biological parents.

Jobs lived with his adoptive family in Mountain View, California, within the area that would later become known as Silicon Valley. He was curious from childhood, sometimes to his detriment. According to the BBC’s Science Focus magazine, Jobs was taken to the emergency room twice as a toddler—once after sticking a pin into an electrical socket and burning his hand, and another time because he had ingested poison. His mother Clara had taught him to read by the time he started kindergarten.

As a boy, Jobs and his father worked on electronics in the family garage. Paul showed his son how to take apart and reconstruct electronics, a hobby that instilled confidence, tenacity, and mechanical prowess in young Jobs.

Although Jobs was always an intelligent and innovative thinker, his youth was riddled with frustrations over formal schooling. Jobs was a prankster in elementary school due to boredom, and his fourth-grade teacher needed to bribe him to study. Jobs tested so well, however, that administrators wanted to skip him ahead to high school—a proposal that his parents declined.

While attending Homestead High School, Jobs joined the Explorer’s Club at Hewlett-Packard. It was there that he saw a computer for the first time. He even picked up a summer job with HP after calling company cofounder Bill Hewlett to ask for parts for a frequency counter he was building. It was at HP that a teenaged Jobs met he met his future partner and cofounder of Apple Computer Steve Wozniak , who was attending the University of California, Berkeley.

After high school, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Lacking direction, he withdrew from college after six months and spent the next year and a half dropping in on creative classes at the school. Jobs later recounted how one course in calligraphy developed his love of typography.

In 1974, Jobs took a position as a video game designer with Atari. Several months later, he left the company to find spiritual enlightenment in India, traveling further and experimenting with psychedelic drugs.

In 1976, when Jobs was just 21, he and Wozniak started Apple Computer Inc. in the Jobs’ family garage. Jobs sold his Volkswagen bus and Wozniak his beloved scientific calculator to fund their entrepreneurial venture. Through Apple, the men are credited with revolutionizing the computer industry by democratizing the technology and making machines smaller, cheaper, intuitive, and accessible to everyday consumers.

Wozniak conceived of a series of user-friendly personal computers, and—with Jobs in charge of marketing—Apple initially marketed the computers for $666.66 each. The Apple I earned the corporation around $774,000. Three years after the release of Apple’s second model, the Apple II, the company’s sales increased exponentially to $139 million.

In 1980, Apple Computer became a publicly-traded company, with a market value of $1.2 billion by the end of its first day of trading. However, the next several products from Apple suffered significant design flaws, resulting in recalls and consumer disappointment. IBM suddenly surpassed Apple in sales, and Apple had to compete with an IBM/PC-dominated business world.

Jobs looked to marketing expert John Sculley of Pepsi-Cola to take over the role of CEO for Apple in 1983. The next year, Apple released the Macintosh, marketing the computer as a piece of a counterculture lifestyle: romantic, youthful, creative. But despite positive sales and performance superior to IBM’s PCs, the Macintosh was still not IBM-compatible.

Sculley believed Jobs was hurting Apple, and the company’s executives began to phase him out. Not actually having had an official title with the company he cofounded, Jobs was pushed into a more marginalized position and left Apple in 1985.

After leaving Apple in 1985, Jobs personally invested $12 million to begin a new hardware and software enterprise called NeXT Inc. The company introduced its first computer in 1988, with Jobs hoping it would appeal to universities and researchers. But with a base price of $6,500, the machine was far out of the range of most potential buyers.

The company’s operating system NeXTSTEP fared better, with programmers using it to develop video games like Quake and Doom . Tim Berners-Lee, who created the first web browser, used an NeXT computer. However, the company struggled to appeal to mainstream America, and Apple eventually bought the company in 1996 for $429 million.

In 1986, Jobs purchased an animation company from George Lucas , which later became Pixar Animation Studios. Believing in Pixar’s potential, Jobs initially invested $50 million of his own money in the company.

The studio went on to produce wildly popular movies such as Toy Story (1995), Finding Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), Cars (2006), and Up (2009) . Pixar merged with Disney in 2006, which made Jobs the largest shareholder of Disney. As of June 2022, Pixar films had collectively grossed $14.7 billion at the global box office.

In 1997, Jobs returned to his post as Apple’s CEO. Just as Jobs instigated Apple’s success in the 1970s, he is credited with revitalizing the company in the 1990s.

With a new management team, altered stock options, and a self-imposed annual salary of $1 a year, Jobs put Apple back on track. Jobs’ ingenious products like the iMac, effective branding campaigns, and stylish designs caught the attention of consumers once again.

In the ensuing years, Apple introduced such revolutionary products as the Macbook Air, iPod, and iPhone, all of which dictated the evolution of technology. Almost immediately after Apple released a new product, competitors scrambled to produce comparable technologies. To mark its expanded product offerings, the company officially rebranded as Apple Inc. in 2007.

Apple’s quarterly reports improved significantly that year: Stocks were worth $199.99 a share—a record-breaking number at that time—and the company boasted a staggering $1.58 billion profit, an $18 billion surplus in the bank, and zero debt.

In 2008, fueled by iTunes and iPod sales, Apple became the second-biggest music retailer in America behind Walmart. Apple has also been ranked No. 1 on Fortune ’s list of America’s Most Admired Companies, as well as No. 1 among Fortune 500 companies for returns to shareholders.

Apple has released dozens of versions of the iPhone since its 2007 debut. In February 2023, an unwrapped first generation phone sold at auction for more than $63,000.

According to Forbes , Jobs’ net worth peaked at $8.3 billion shortly before he died in 2011. Celebrity Net Worth estimates it was as high as $10.2 billion.

Apple hit a market capitalization of $3 trillion in January 2022, meaning Jobs’ initial stake in the company from 1980 would have been worth about $330 billion—enough to comfortably make him the richest person in the world over Tesla founder Elon Musk had he been alive. But according to the New York Post , Jobs sold off all but one of his Apple shares when he left the company in 1985.

Most of Jobs’ net worth came from a roughly 8 percent share in Disney he acquired when he sold Pixar in 2006. Based on Disney’s 2022 value, that share—which he passed onto his wife—is worth $22 billion.

Jobs and Laurene Powell married on March 18, 1991. The pair met in the early 1990s at Stanford business school, where Powell was an MBA student. They lived together in Palo Alto with their three children: Reed (born September 22, 1991), Erin (born August 19, 1995), and Eve (born July 9, 1998).

Jobs also fathered a daughter, Lisa Brennan-Jobs, with girlfriend Chrisann Brennan on May 17, 1978, when he was 23. He denied paternity of his daughter in court documents, claiming he was sterile. In her memoir Small Fry , Lisa wrote DNA tests revealed that she and Jobs were a match in 1980, and he was required to begin making paternity payments to her financially struggling mother. Jobs didn’t initiate a relationship with his daughter until she was 7 years old. When she was a teenager, Lisa came to live with her father. In 2011, Jobs said , “I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of, such as getting my girlfriend pregnant when I was 23 and the way I handled that.”

In 2003, Jobs discovered that he had a neuroendocrine tumor, a rare but operable form of pancreatic cancer. Instead of immediately opting for surgery, Jobs chose to alter his pesco-vegetarian diet while weighing Eastern treatment options.

For nine months, Jobs postponed surgery, making Apple’s board of directors nervous. Executives feared that shareholders would pull their stock if word got out that the CEO was ill. But in the end, Jobs’ confidentiality took precedence over shareholder disclosure.

In 2004, Jobs had successful surgery to remove the pancreatic tumor. True to form, Jobs disclosed little about his health in subsequent years.

Early in 2009, reports circulated about Jobs’ weight loss, some predicting his health issues had returned, which included a liver transplant. Jobs responded to these concerns by stating he was dealing with a hormone imbalance. Days later, he went on a six-month leave of absence.

In an email message to employees, Jobs said his “health-related issues are more complex” than he thought, then named Tim Cook , Apple’s then–chief operating officer, as “responsible for Apple’s day-today operations.”

After nearly a year out of the spotlight, Jobs delivered a keynote address at an invite-only Apple event on September 9, 2009. He continued to serve as master of ceremonies, which included the unveiling of the iPad, throughout much of 2010.

In January 2011, Jobs announced he was going on medical leave. In August, he resigned as CEO of Apple, handing the reins to Cook.

Jobs died at age 56 in his home in Palo Alto, California, on October 5, 2011. His official cause of death was listed as respiratory arrest related to his years-long battle with pancreatic cancer.

The New York Times reported that in his final weeks, Jobs had become so weak that he struggled to walk up the stairs in his home. Still, he was able to say goodbye to some of his longtime colleagues, including Disney CEO Bob Iger; speak with his biographer; and offer advice to Apple executives about the unveiling of the iPhone 4S.

In a eulogy for Jobs , sister Mona Simpson wrote that just before dying, Jobs looked for a long time at his sister, Patty, then his wife and children, then past them, and said his last words: “Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow.”

Jobs’ closest family and friends remembered him at a small gathering, then on October 16, a funeral for Jobs was held on the campus of Stanford University. Notable attendees included Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates ; singer Joan Baez , who once dated Jobs; former Vice President Al Gore ; actor Tim Allen; and News Corporation chairman Rupert Murdoch .

Jobs is buried in an unmarked grave at Alta Mesa Memorial Park in Palo Alto. Upon the release of the 2015 film Steve Jobs , fans traveled to the cemetery to find the site. Because the cemetery is not allowed to disclose the grave’s location, many left messages for Jobs in a memorial book instead.

Before his death, Jobs granted author and journalist Walter Isaacson permission to write his official biography. Jobs sat for more than 40 interviews with the Isaacson, who also talked to more than 100 of Jobs’ family, friends, and colleagues. Initially scheduled for a November 2011 release date, Steve Jobs hit shelves on October 24, just 19 days after Jobs died.

Jobs’ life has been the subject of two major films. The first, released in 2013, was simply titled Jobs and starred Ashton Kutcher as Jobs and Josh Gad as Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak. Wozniak told The Verge in 2013 he was approached about working on the film but couldn’t because, “I read a script as far as I could stomach it and felt it was crap.” Although he praised the casting, he told Gizmodo he felt his and Jobs’ personalities were inaccurately portrayed.

Instead, Wozniak worked with Sony Pictures on the second film, Steve Jobs , that was adapted from Isaacson’s biography and released in 2015. It starred Michael Fassbender as Jobs and Seth Rogen as Wozniak. Fassbender was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor, and co-star Kate Winslet was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Apple and NeXT marketing executive Joanna Hoffman.

In 2015, filmmaker Alex Gibney examined Jobs’ life and legacy in the documentary Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine .

• Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water, or do you want a chance to change the world? [Jobs inviting an executive to join Apple]
• It’s better to be a pirate than join the Navy.
• In my perspective... science and computer science is a liberal art. It’s something everyone should know how to use, at least, and harness in their life.
• It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough. It’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities that yields us the result that makes our hearts sing.
• There’s an old Wayne Gretzky quote that I love—‘I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been’—and we’ve always tried to do that at Apple.
• You can’t just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.
• I think humans are basically tool builders, and the computer is the most remarkable tool we’ve ever built.
• You just make the best product you can, and you don’t put it out until you feel it’s right.
• With iPod, listening to music will never be the same again.
• Things don’t have to change the world to be important.
• I would trade all of my technology for an afternoon with Socrates .
• If you want to live your life in a creative way, as an artist, you have to not look back too much. You have to be willing to take whatever you’ve done and whoever you were and throw them away.
• Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful—that’s what matters to me.
• I like to believe there’s an afterlife. I like to believe the accumulated wisdom doesn’t just disappear when you die, but somehow, it endures. But maybe it’s just like an on/off switch and click—and you’re gone. Maybe that’s why I didn’t like putting on/off switches on Apple devices.

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Introduction summary.

Isaacson introduces the book by explaining that Jobs had called him in 2004, asking him to write his biography, a task that felt premature for Isaacson at the time considering his career trajectory and track record of oscillation between success and failure. However, after Jobs became sick with cancer for the second time, Isaacson finally accepted the assignment. Based on more than 40 interviews and conversations over a period of two years, Isaacson hoped to write a book that would capture the essence of Jobs’s life, “filled with lessons about innovation, character, leadership, and values” (xxi).

Chapter 1 Summary

Isaacson contrasts the stories of two sets of parents: Jobs’s birth parents, Joanne Schieble and Abdulfattah Jandali, who gave him up for adoption , and Clara and Paul Jobs , the adoptive parents who raised him. Joanne and Abdulfattah were not married at the time, largely because Joanne’s father strongly disapproved of their relationship. When Joanne became pregnant, the only feasible option was to arrange for a closed adoption, with the caveat that the adoptive parents must be college graduates.

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Home » The Famous Blog » Steve Jobs, The 5 Chapters You Need to Read

Steve Jobs, The 5 Chapters You Need to Read

March 6, 2012 - Last Modified: March 15, 2012 by Jen Brass Jenkins 5,846

• Editor Rating
• Rated 4 Stars stars
• Reviewed by: Jen Brass Jenkins
• Published on: March 6, 2012
• Last modified: March 15, 2012

In October I caught the fever and downloaded Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs. It’s a little long (656 pages), but I thought surely I could read straight through it pretty quickly and join the throngs of bloggers posting reviews . But then it got intense, in the way a story driven by Steve Jobs could, and only now, three months later, have I finally closed the cover on the life of Steve Jobs.

In order to keep this post relevant then, since we have all read the shining reviews that the book received and many of the stories about Jobs’s life included in the book, I’m going to recommend five chapters that really intrigued me as a reader and save you a little time in reviewing the journey that was the life of Steve Jobs .

1 – Chapter 1: Childhood, Abandoned and Chosen

In this first chapter we learn not just where Jobs’s parents both biological and adoptive are from and how/why he was adopted, but also Isaacson explores what some speculated were Jobs’s formative views of himself, abandoned and chosen:

There’s some notion that because I was abandoned, I worked very hard so I could do well and make my parents wish they had me back, or some such nonsense, but that’s ridiculous…Knowing I was adopted may have made me feel more independent, but I never felt abandoned. I’ve always felt special. My parents made me feel special. (p. 5)

Chapter one also includes the inspirations for two of Jobs’s other obsessions: design and craftsmanship (but you will have to read those bits for yourself).

2 – Chapter 3: The Dropout

Jobs’s parents expected him to go to college, and he did—sort-of. The experiences he had and the choices he made during the years of his life covered in this chapter go a long way towards explaining his behavior later on. Jobs was becoming Jobs: fiercely independent, a hippy with an extreme diet, a Zen devotee and a master manipulator.

3 – Chapter 16: Gates and Jobs

For most of us, the technology of our lifetimes has been defined by the companies that Jobs and Gates built. Understanding the quintessential differences between Jobs and Gates leads to an understanding of one of the major issues in technology today: closed vs. open, or, as Jobs liked to say, integrated vs. fragmented. Plus, once you understand the arc of their thirty-year relationship you are able to really appreciate the time they spent together talking before Jobs’s death .

I also have to say here, that once I read about a situation where Jobs’s anger was almost seemingly righteously turned on a competitor, it was a great relief (p. 177). As a friend of mine said, Jobs’s life does tend to read like a soap opera.

4 – Chapter 33: Pixar’s Friends and Foes

Pixar, the-company-I-never-knew-Jobs-was-part-of, was hugely influenced by Jobs. In a previous chapter Isaacson recounts the story of Pixar, how Jobs got involved, how Toy Story was nearly strangled by Disney execs and how it was then reworked into the blockbuster it became.

As fascinating as it is reading about an industry-changing event you remember from your childhood, it is even more engaging to read about the final showdown between Disney and Pixar’s major executive players before Pixar officially became part of Disney in this chapter. We may not remember the names of the big wigs who made the deals, but we definitely remember the films that were created because of them.

5 – Chapter 49: Round Three, The Twilight Struggle

Essentially the last chapter, this one documents Jobs’s final months from when the cancer reappeared to his resignation as Apple’s CEO . It also sums up Jobs’s family relationships as they stood at the end, his joy at seeing his oldest son graduate, his wife’s passion for educational reform and a hint at the way his daughters viewed him. Because of their financial means, the Jobs’ were also able to remain at the front of the fight against cancer, sequencing Jobs’s entire DNA thus allowing Jobs’s doctors to use a molecular targeted therapy that is more effective than the more general chemotherapy.

It’s difficult to stop at just those five chapters, but they really do sum up some lesser known turning points of Jobs’s life journey and give you the sense of what made the man.

And, love him or hate him, Jobs the man has affected all of us in ways we know or don’t. Not bad for a hippy fruitarian from California.

P.S. If you have a little more time check out chapter twelve about Jobs’s design sense, the “Bauhaus aesthetic” or chapter forty about the iCloud and the design of Apple’s new campus. Of course, if you have time, maybe you really should consider reading the whole book. I definitely recommend it.

About Jen Brass Jenkins

Jen Jenkins, founder of the Punctuation and Language Appreciation Society, is currently a freelance content strategist and blogger. With a background in arts production (and a few years dabbling in costume design and construction), Jen is a bibliophile, fashion addict, and twitter aficionado.

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