| > Steve Jobs selected him because he felt he would be the best person for the job out of the executive team. It's not actually Jobs's choice. Apple is a publicly owned company, and both Jobs and Cook are employees, not owners. Jobs could recommend a successor, but the board of directors had the power to reject the recommendation. Never forget that when Jobs demanded that the Apple board of directors choose between him and John Sculley, they chose Sculley. In any case, Jobs didn't expect to die until it was too late. He didn't have years to groom a successor. Cook was expedient. > If you read the accounts, Jobs didn’t want more than two expansion slots and fought Woz on that and lost. Woz was ready to walk away with his design. I'm not sure what this is supposed to prove? They were cofounders. They were both behind the Apple II. This is well known and documented. Of course Jobs wasn't Woz's boss, they were equals. And they had some disagreements, which is natural and expected. So what? I used to have cofounder bosses, and they argued and disagreed all the time. >> Macintosh > Commercial failure. Um, no. No it was not. That's absurd. Otherwise Apple wouldn't exist now. What do you think Apple sold before iPod and iPhone? >> NeXT > Commercial failure. It was acquired for $400 million. I'd love to fail that badly. > But it’s entirely disingenuous to discount the likes of Jony Ive, Scott Forstall, and all the other people who made those products happen. Good thing I never did that. You're arguing against a straw man. Jobs was the leader of a team. By the way, Cook purged Forstall from Apple. And it's rumored that Ive was disappointed Cook didn't care about design like Jobs did. > he was hardly singularly responsible for the success behind those products I never argued that. What I argue is that Tim Cook is not a "product person" like Jobs was. Cook is not making design decisions; Jobs was. It's funny that you're arguing against me with the straw man that Jobs deserves 100% credit, but you don't argue against the person I was refuting who claimed "Cook was arguably the real brains behind Apple's turnaround back in the early 2000s" and "Cook was actually the main driver of the company's success even before Jobs departed". Why aren't you criticizing that argument as much as or more than mine? However much credit Jobs deserves for his over 30 year body of work, how in the world would Cook deserve even more credit than Jobs for that??? |
And what point are you trying to make? Jobs recommended him, the board selected him. Saying the board had to agree doesn't change the fact that Jobs and board felt he was qualified and the best option for a successor, which was the point.
>> If you read the accounts, Jobs didn’t want more than two expansion slots
> I'm not sure what this is supposed to prove?
You said "Jobs was behind Apple II" and a host of other products, but at best in the case of Apple II he saw Woz's good design as something he could take and sell. He was hardly responsible for what that product actually was.
>>> Macintosh
>> Commercial failure.
> Um, no. No it was not.
Yes, it was. I'd suggest actually reading up on the product release and what happened after. If it hadn't been for the cash cow of Apple II, the company could have failed. That's according to numerous accounts, including Woz. I believe it was at least three years before it even matched the sales of (what was then an 11 year old) Apple II.
> Jobs was the leader of a team.
Like Tim Cook.
> By the way, Cook purged Forstall from Apple.
Yes, and if you understand what happened there, it was the right thing to do. And the rest of the exec team, especially Ive, was very happy about that move.
> I never argued that. What I argue is that Tim Cook is not a "product person" like Jobs was. Cook is not making design decisions; Jobs was.
By every account I've read, Jobs primary contribution was as an editor, saying "no" to bad ideas. And again, by every "insider account" I've seen published, Tim Cook is doing the same. Jobs wasn't spending most of his days brainstorming with the design team, although he did do some of that. More than Tim Cook, sure, but most of the idea generation in the company was coming from a large crowd of people, not Steve Jobs.