[jamornh]

I don't think you can attribute his success to luck. Yes he did take risk and yes he was a sociopath in that he didn't care much about how much he had to emotionally torment others to get what he wanted. However if you want to compare what he did to winning the lottery, it would be like he bought lottery tickets and then flew down to the loterry operator and did everything he could to fix the game so that he would win. just like how Warren buffet bought over companies and then made sure they run it his way.

[pstuart]

There was luck in being in the right place at the right time, and in meeting Wozniak.

[snowwrestler]

Sure but lots of other people had that luck too. I mean, they all went to computer club meetings and spoke openly about what they were working on. How many other people at those club meetings founded transformational computer companies that survive today, let alone as one of the most valuable companies in the world?

Even within Apple there are stories of guys like Mike Scott, who was the 2nd CEO and took Apple public. He was there at the beginning, got super rich, but what was his long-term impact [1]? Have you ever even heard of him, outside of a Steve Jobs bio?

[1] He has arguably had a longer-term impact on the mineralogy of gems than in computing.

[pstuart]

It's not pure luck. It's not pure talent/drive/etc. It's the mixture of the two.

And yes, I had heard of Mike Scott, but I'm an old geek who's a Bay Area native.

[snowwrestler]

> It's not pure luck. It's not pure talent/drive/etc. It's the mixture of the two.

I agree with that. I interpreted your comment above as over-emphasizing luck; perhaps a misinterpretation.

[anindha]

A lot of other people met Woz too. HP turned Woz's idea down. I think it was Woz's luck he met Jobs.