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by eyelidlessness 1278 days ago
I love Apple products and have since childhood, and I have little doubt Jobs’ personality, thinking, and talent, are major factors in what I liked about Apple then and do now. And I detest Musk.

That disclosure out of the way… Jobs was notoriously quick to anger, imperious in his internal role, very selectively rational, and generally… well, often kind of a jerk. I know all of that can overlap with coherence and persuasion, in fact in a cynical sense it could be argued it was part of his persuasive strength.

But… this isn’t the most infamous, nor probably the most convincing, example, it’s just the one that always resurfaces in my own memory: dude chucked a camera at some poor soul whose job it was to hand it to him on stage, because he was frustrated by a technical glitch during a presentation. That’s how not “put together” he could be in one of the more publicly visible tech events of the time: he did violence to a person who was helping him with tons of people watching because of something which wasn’t that person’s fault.

I’m not saying Musk is any better, but I’m also not prepared to pretend that Jobs wasn’t an epic asshole.

3 comments

That “poor soul” was a senior director of marketing, not some minimum wage assistant. And violence, a bit hyperbolic, it was an underhanded toss - no one calls that “chucking” where I’m from at least. Sure he had a temper but this is painting a misleading picture of that episode.
You know what, I looked it up, you’re right, and this is an incredibly poor example of the point. I will stop using this example of Steve Jobs being an asshole.
> no one calls that “chucking” where I’m from at least

not disagreeing in substance, but a couple of quibbles: that absolutely does qualify as chucking--it's the way woodchucks chuck--but it does not qualify as chucking at someone; so as an underhand toss, it wasn't underhanded

This is the best kind of pedantry: agreeing in spirit with the intent but clarifying words used to express it.
> but I’m also not prepared to pretend that Jobs wasn’t an epic asshole.

I think the video linked to (Steve Jobs Insult Response) is honestly one of Steve's finest moments (with regard to dealing with people that is). But to bolster your point, there are of course an overwhelming number of stories that capture Steve's less stellar moments.

The one where Gassee disses him for bad behavior is funny; wonder if it really happened.

https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Handicapped.txt

Gassée was always quick with a burn: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lie3C2kjCjo