Re:Steve Wozniak gives jailbreaking the thumbs up, wishes iT...
by gadders on Tuesday October 02, 2012 @05:42AM
(#4601252)
You know what? If he wrote a 3 page blog post saying "why it would be good business for Apple if iTunes supported Android" (or whatever) I'd be more interested. But all we get are soundbites.
Re:Steve Wozniak gives jailbreaking the thumbs up, wishes iT...
by crusso on Tuesday October 02, 2012 @08:25AM
(#4601590)
I say this as a big fan of Apple, my Apple II+ and all that Woz created so brilliantly when he was there...
I think that your criticism above is the heart of the matter. If Woz had deep thoughts he were relating that informed in a meaningful way, great.
Instead, he tends to spew out populist geek one-liners without any supporting rationale.
What's disappointing is the way that the tech culture picks it up as an appeal to authority or noteworthy opinion.
Re:Steve Wozniak gives jailbreaking the thumbs up, wishes iT...
by desas on Tuesday October 02, 2012 @08:24AM
(#4601587)
He doesn't really care about business. From memory he was originally very cautious about monetising the original apple. His perspective isn't "why this would be good business for apple", it's "why this would be cool for me".
It's not so much that Woz is a source of wisdom and insight, it's more that there are few gurus and "experts" in computer science (generally a good thing) willing to offer opinions.
Woz is in the position of being able to take philosophical positions that people won't be likely to argue with, because of his long incumbency in the field of computer technology.
But that's an explanation, not an excuse. In fields that depend on scientific reasoning, there's no justification for accepting the opinions of experts based solely on their position. As Richard Feynman famously said, "Science is the organized skepticism in the reliability of expert opinion."