Steve jobs ain't a genius. He was just a good salesman.
this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2025
1197 points (99.8% liked)
Greentext
5445 readers
2185 users here now
This is a place to share greentexts and witness the confounding life of Anon. If you're new to the Greentext community, think of it as a sort of zoo with Anon as the main attraction.
Be warned:
- Anon is often crazy.
- Anon is often depressed.
- Anon frequently shares thoughts that are immature, offensive, or incomprehensible.
If you find yourself getting angry (or god forbid, agreeing) with something Anon has said, you might be doing it wrong.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
The sales people almost always end up doing well in companies. And then when they get high up in the company they only value others ability to make sales and work for bonuses. As time goes on a company's e-suite gets more and more saturated with charismatic dummies who will do anything for a buck, leaving less room for good administrators and engineers.
Small thing, but I've never heard it called an e-suite, only c-suite. I assume the "e" stands for executive vs the "c" being chief.
where’s the lie?
He tried to fight P.C. with apples.
Jesus Christ. That is fucking poetry.
This 😂. A fucking genius choosing pseudoscience...
Jobs paved the way for Musk. I hate that he's so often cited as a genius to look up to in the tech world
The behind the bastards episodes on Jobs was really eye-opening to just how awful of a leader he was
People mistaking Marketing people for tech genies happens to often.
I find it really amusing to know Bill Gates ones made fun of him:
"Steve's achievements are all the more impressive when you know that he couldn't look at a piece of code and know what it was."
However he also said:
"Clearly, he had so many skills that I didn't, but we were both a little bit pied pipers in terms of getting people to work ridiculous hours."
Which really should tell you everything you need to know given who made the money and how many people were made to work "ridiculous hours".
Back on the old site on one of those text based subreddits there was a question posted:
Would you rather have free WiFi wherever you go, or any apple product you wish at any time.
My (then unrotted) brain was like: mmh WiFi everywhere is good, but apple cake, apple pie, apple sauce, apple spritz, apple cider, apple strudel, dried apples... Yeah I'm going with apple products
Wifi might become obsolete some time in the future, but apple pie is eternal.
Until Jimbo fucks it.
Apple cream pie
Also bought his way up the organ donor list even after he took so long ignoring it, passing over a bunch of people who should have had claim to it and some who died instead, all just so he could die anyway because he took too long to get treatment. Failed so hard multiple people died.
Source on this? I read that Tim Apple offered a donation and Steve refused. I have not read that he had the surgery.
He did get a transplant, in TN. Not in CA where he lived. He used his wealth to add himself to a areas with more donors and fewer on the wait list because he could hop on a jet unlike normal plebians.
You can literally just look on Wikipedia. Tim cook offered part of his, jobs said "nah I want a whole one from some poor person" and the rest is history.
Being rich makes you so divorced from consequences that you start to believe that what is in your brain is what is real. Money isn't what we think it is.
Money is like radioactive material. Having a little bit in your house probably is fine but having a mountain of it will make you hole up in a Las Vegas hotel with tissue boxes for shoes
load more comments
(1 replies)
These words resonate so hard with me that my head is ringing like a bell right now. “Money isn’t what we think it is.” ^5, you.
The truth of genius is its only momentary and usually highly specific.
Except for Euler. That guy was on a hot streak for his entire life.
Ramanujan did pretty good, just died young.
Not to mention the actual pioneer of generic-text languages, the inventor of the compiler, Grace Hopper.
I highly doubt the consequences of Dennis Richie not existing. Yes, his work was foundational, but he didn't do it on his own, and if he wasn't around, someone else would've filled in.
The same is true for Steve Jobs. In fact, most of his contribution was being a jerk to people so his ideas won. He had a clear vision, but his internal implementation was... iffy.
My crusading teenage ass posted this in 2011 on social media. Nobody cared lol
Fact of the matter is way more people know who Steve Jobs is compared to Dennis Ritchie, so it’s no wonder his death garnered way more attention too. But the sentiment still stands IMO
load more comments
(1 replies)
Only fanboys. The same kind that worship Musk or any other fellated-by-the-press CEO as some kind of hero. They softball any criticisms and turn them into positives - “He murdered a bunch of kids, but the creativity he got from the blood splatter and time spent in court-ordered community service got us this addictive device we’re all fawning over…let’s justify the ridiculous price and wait in line for one!” Something about objectively shitty people heading up organizations seems to attract sycophants and bootlickers.
load more comments
(1 replies)
I mean, fucking up is a common thing people do and is an integral part of the human condition. What should be emphasized about Jobs case is that he fucked up his own liver, learned the cause and treatments, used his wealth to cut in the waiting line to get a liver transplant, and then fucked his second liver just the same way. This is the definition of terminally stupid, and no UX focus will ever change that.
I remember reading a story a while back about the documentary they were making on him. He had his special diet of juices and supplements and whatnot, which he claimed helped him while his liver was failing. The actor who portrayed him started following the same diet to better get in character. Only then he collapsed on set with liver problems. They did a full medical work up and basically told him whatever you're doing stop doing it because it's killing you. He went back to his normal diet and he was fine. Raising the serious question, did Steve Jobs outsmart himself to death? If he had given up all the diets and supplements and whatnot might he have lived?
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(8 replies)
It's unfortunate because his leadership / sense of taste is what made Apple a powerhouse. Under Tim Apple, the software has languished. They're great at hardware and the software is far from great. What a shame.
"leadership" by which you mean being abusive to his colleagues and refusing to take a shower.
He was a dick, but he had a good mind for products. He wasn't infallible, but he had a sense of taste that was useful in driving others who had greater skills than he.
load more comments
(1 replies)
Eh, I feel like Jobs was in charge when he could create new products.
Outside of a different Apple Watch launch, I don't see Jobs really having the ability to create new innovative products.
Yeah computers were doubling in speed every 18 months back then. And there were competing products oftentimes years before Apple put out their version. Apple primarily put a lot of polish onto the technological innovations that were happening at the time.
Don't get me wrong polish is really important. Apple didn't invent the MP3 player or the smartphone. But the MP3 players before the iPod were really fiddley and janky. BlackBerries had a downright primitive look and feel next to an iPhone.
Also marketing... a lot of people didn't know MP3 players existed until they saw advertisements for the iPod.
load more comments
(3 replies)
view more: next ›