Steven Paul Jobs (1955–2011) was an American computer entrepreneur and inventor who revolutionized the personal computing and digital animation industries. The founder of Apple, NeXT, and Pixar Animation Studios, Jobs was a pioneer of the design and marketing of consumer technology.
Born in San Francisco, Jobs was the son of the University of Wisconsin graduate students. He was adopted by machine-shop technician Paul Jobs and accountant Clara Jobs. He dropped out of college after a semester, went to India for spiritual enlightenment, returned a devout Zen Buddhist, experimented with psychedelic drugs, and then got a job with video game maker ATARI. In 1976, at the age of 21, he founded Apple Computers with Stephen Wozniak, and Apple unveiled the Macintosh computer in 1984.
Jobs left in 1985 to create Pixar Animation Studios and NeXT. Jobs returned to a failing Apple in 1996 and directed a turnaround marketing effort that led to the elegant new iMac computer, followed by the development of the iPod music player, the iTunes music distribution system, and the iPhone smartphone, and the iPad tablet computer.
Jobs was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2003. His health began to decline in 2009, and he resigned as Apple’s CEO in August 2011, just six weeks before his death. He was famously driven but short-tempered. His instinct for consumer preferences, a missionary zeal for perfection, and an ability to attract media attention were critical factors in the success of his companies.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Steve Jobs
The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything.
—Steve Jobs
I do stuff. I respond to stuff. That’s not a career — it’s a life!
—Steve Jobs
Innovation is usually the result of connections of past experiences—and luck. But if you have the same experiences as everybody else, you’re unlikely to look in a different direction.
—Steve Jobs
Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Innovation
It took us three years to build the NeXT computer. If we’d given customers what they said they wanted, we’d have built a computer they’d have been happy with a year after we spoke to them – not something they’d want now.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Computers
Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Excellence, Example, Quality
The things I’ve done in my life have required a lot of years of work before they took off.
—Steve Jobs
I was actually a fruitarian at that point in time. I ate only fruit. Now I’m a garbage can like everyone else. And we were about three months late in filing a fictitious business name so I threatened to call the company Apple Computer unless someone suggested a more interesting name by five o’clock that day. Hoping to stimulate creativity. And it stuck. And that’s why we’re called Apple.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Genius, Business
Don’t be trapped by dogma which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Time
The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.
—Steve Jobs
I want to put a ding in the universe.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Success & Failure, Achievement
Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Innovation
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
—Steve Jobs
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Time
Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Entrepreneurs, Innovation
Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure- these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
—Steve Jobs
For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something…almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Past, Pride, Fear, Now, Thinking, Think, Failure, Life, Fail, Best, Change, Death
Here’s to the ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules or the status quo… They push humankind forward.
—Steve Jobs
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life.
—Steve Jobs
Topics: Death, People, Life, Sin, Best
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