Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by RobAtticus on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:46PM
(#2925753)
I was really expecting there to be a twist like the "friend" was actually Bill Gates. Imagining that, it made the "friend's" response even more humorous.
"Q: Another person who has a certain mythology about him is your friend Steve Jobs. Everybody seems to believe they know the book on Jobs: heis brilliant but hard-driving, overly sensitive. Do you and he ever talk about that?
A: We almost decided to wear T-shirts: 'The Mercurial Steve Jobs' and 'The Arrogant Larry Ellison.'
Steve Jobs is my best friend, and I love him dearly, and heis one of the most remarkable people on this planet. You watch him create Apple, then in one of the worst human-resources mistakes in the history of Silicon Valley -- the only thing worse was when the French fired Napoleon -- they fire Steve Jobs and Apple almost completely disintegrates. Then he comes back and he saves a company that was on life support.
I never see this quoted about Steve, but they once asked Andy Grove who he most admired in the PC industry, and he said, "One guy: Steve Jobs. He invented the PC industry."
You know, we live in a very egalitarian world. We donit like heroes. And Steve is one of these heroic guys whose accomplishments are of such epic proportions, and it gnaws away at our egalitarian sense of the world."
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by kleiba on Thursday August 25, 2011 @10:12PM
(#2927093)
The more posts like this I read, the more they sound like obituaries. The man might be sick, but he's not dead! He just stepped down from being CEO, that's all.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by lostbit on Thursday August 25, 2011 @10:00PM
(#2927072)
I remember watching "Pirates of the Silicon Valley" some time ago. It was nice to see the battles between Gates and Jobs in the beginning of the PC era. That movie ended even before Apple's re-birth.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by cbs on Thursday August 25, 2011 @12:50PM
(#2925528)
"Is Apple ever going to go after the enterprise market?" (Steve's response, a refreshing "If you're interested in that, you're probably at the wrong company.")
You like our software enough to want to use it at work and/or want others to get to use it? Yeah, fuck that.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by boredguy8 on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:06PM
(#2925591)
...what?
The 'cost', to Apple, of going to Enterprise is pretty large. Enterprises need things like stable patch schedules, forward-looking roadmaps, and integrated control structure. The toughest, culturally, on that list, is the forward-looking roadmaps. As one of many examples: Apple's switch from PPC chips to Intel chips was done with no warning & negatively impacted order fulfillment. (I was working at a university at the time, and lab computers ordered well in advance of the change were delayed 2 weeks -- other schools who ordered later were waiting months.)
Compare & contrast Microsoft's "patch Tuesday" with Apples "patch whenever". There's a cost to 'going enterprise' that goes far beyond "we don't want you to use this at work".
And that's not even touching the issue other's have pointed out regarding 'image' and 'branding' and emotional associations with the system you're using at the job you hate.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by mgkimsal on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:02PM
(#2925568)
I thought that at first too, but I think it could be interpreted a couple other ways too.
What we've seen over the last 10 years or so is the increased consumerization of the enterprise. Essentially, large IT depts have been forced to accommodate iPhones and iPads, due to large numbers of people buying them then saying "I want to use this at work", rather than Apple having to accomodate "enterprise" needs (and thereby perpetuating often antiquated or just poor ways of doing things).
I'm generalizing here a bit, but that's another way I'd read it. It probably would have been difficult for people in the late 90s to foresee how much consumerization of IT we'd see 10-15 years in the future
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by tommi on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:08PM
(#2925605)
Also the needs of consumer and a enterprise have converged. Everybody expects to able to read email on their phone. Many people expect their consumer laptops to be able to encrypt their hard drive (at least Apple users) just like the enterprise IT department. The difference between enterprise and consumer as an IT user has become smaller.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by cbs on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:17PM
(#2925642)
rather than Apple having to accomodate "enterprise" needs (and thereby perpetuating often antiquated or just poor ways of doing things).
Thats kind of a plastering over of the reality though.
iOS plays nice with ActiveSync, right there thats Apple accommodating enterprise needs. I can hit up exchange to remote wipe any employee's iPhone right now.
Its not that IT departments are forced to accommodate iPhones, they're forced to accommodate yet another smartphone.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by mgkimsal on Thursday August 25, 2011 @01:30PM
(#2925695)
Yes, I did realize I was generalizing some. But... Apple's supported some of those protocols, but not out of the gate, and they've not built their initial products around some competitor's idea about a market (at least, not that I've seen). So... yes with the iPhone, they did accomodate "the enterprise", but didn't base the success of the iPhone on how well it was accepted by 'the enterprise'.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by randomdata on Friday August 26, 2011 @01:30AM
(#2927499)
One could easily look at it from the opposite direction:
Consumers want to access their company email on their personal property. The inclusion of ActiveSync wasn't to help enterprise IT departments, it was the help the consumer access the resources they want to access.
That said, there are other features of iOS that do support your point of view.
Re:My one question for Steve Jobs in 2000
by VladRussian on Thursday August 25, 2011 @07:08PM
(#2926744)
>What we've seen over the last 10 years or so is the increased consumerization of the enterprise. Essentially, large IT depts have been forced to accommodate iPhones and iPads, ...
i'd not say "consumerization of the enterprise" is limited to the last 10 years - it is more like for the last almost 30 years "large IT depts have been forced to accommodate" PC, notebooks, iPhones, iPads ... (mental implants? ask Jobs what is the next :)
http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/Larry_Ellison_Discuss...
"Q: Another person who has a certain mythology about him is your friend Steve Jobs. Everybody seems to believe they know the book on Jobs: heis brilliant but hard-driving, overly sensitive. Do you and he ever talk about that?
A: We almost decided to wear T-shirts: 'The Mercurial Steve Jobs' and 'The Arrogant Larry Ellison.'
Steve Jobs is my best friend, and I love him dearly, and heis one of the most remarkable people on this planet. You watch him create Apple, then in one of the worst human-resources mistakes in the history of Silicon Valley -- the only thing worse was when the French fired Napoleon -- they fire Steve Jobs and Apple almost completely disintegrates. Then he comes back and he saves a company that was on life support.
I never see this quoted about Steve, but they once asked Andy Grove who he most admired in the PC industry, and he said, "One guy: Steve Jobs. He invented the PC industry."
You know, we live in a very egalitarian world. We donit like heroes. And Steve is one of these heroic guys whose accomplishments are of such epic proportions, and it gnaws away at our egalitarian sense of the world."
I need friends like that. Glad to know indecision has good company.
You like our software enough to want to use it at work and/or want others to get to use it? Yeah, fuck that.
The 'cost', to Apple, of going to Enterprise is pretty large. Enterprises need things like stable patch schedules, forward-looking roadmaps, and integrated control structure. The toughest, culturally, on that list, is the forward-looking roadmaps. As one of many examples: Apple's switch from PPC chips to Intel chips was done with no warning & negatively impacted order fulfillment. (I was working at a university at the time, and lab computers ordered well in advance of the change were delayed 2 weeks -- other schools who ordered later were waiting months.)
Compare & contrast Microsoft's "patch Tuesday" with Apples "patch whenever". There's a cost to 'going enterprise' that goes far beyond "we don't want you to use this at work".
And that's not even touching the issue other's have pointed out regarding 'image' and 'branding' and emotional associations with the system you're using at the job you hate.
What we've seen over the last 10 years or so is the increased consumerization of the enterprise. Essentially, large IT depts have been forced to accommodate iPhones and iPads, due to large numbers of people buying them then saying "I want to use this at work", rather than Apple having to accomodate "enterprise" needs (and thereby perpetuating often antiquated or just poor ways of doing things).
I'm generalizing here a bit, but that's another way I'd read it. It probably would have been difficult for people in the late 90s to foresee how much consumerization of IT we'd see 10-15 years in the future
Thats kind of a plastering over of the reality though.
iOS plays nice with ActiveSync, right there thats Apple accommodating enterprise needs. I can hit up exchange to remote wipe any employee's iPhone right now.
Its not that IT departments are forced to accommodate iPhones, they're forced to accommodate yet another smartphone.
Consumers want to access their company email on their personal property. The inclusion of ActiveSync wasn't to help enterprise IT departments, it was the help the consumer access the resources they want to access.
That said, there are other features of iOS that do support your point of view.
i'd not say "consumerization of the enterprise" is limited to the last 10 years - it is more like for the last almost 30 years "large IT depts have been forced to accommodate" PC, notebooks, iPhones, iPads ... (mental implants? ask Jobs what is the next :)