Mikkel Marius Winther is interested in the way the Internet is changing the way we communicate and the consequences it has on society and everyday life. He loves Twitter, Red Bull and writing about himself in the third person.
As the news of Steve Jobs’ death has permeated through the web, lots of people have been writing their memories and goodbyes. I’ve collected some of them here, in random order and without much commentary.
John Gruber of Daring Fireball writes:
But the thing that struck me were his shoes, those famous gray New Balance 991s. They too were well-worn. But also this: fresh bright green grass stains all over the heels. […]
Late last night, long hours after the news broke that he was gone, my thoughts returned to those grass stains on his shoes back in June. I realize only now why they caught my eye. Those grass stained sneakers were the product of limited time, well spent.
Lots of people have been posting Jobs’ famous Stanford University commencement speech from 2005. Clint Ecker remembers reading the speech:
When I first read that commencement speech, it knocked me on my ass. I was living in Ohio, working at a job I didn’t find particularly motivating or interesting. I tried to take the essence of that speech to heart and today I’m working for the President of the United States of America, trying in earnest to do what I can to make my country a better place for at least the next four years, if not the next 40.
Steven Frank writes about growing up with (and next to) Apple, and about the tools Steve has created:
I joked to my wife, “what we just did with that video was straight out of an Apple commercial.” That’s the funny thing about Apple commercials, though. They’re not sci-fi pipe dreams selling you a promise of a future that might be. They really built that stuff, and you can do it right now. Steve understood that a computer by itself wasn’t much more exciting than a hammer. Wouldn’t it be great, to borrow his phrase, if that hammer could help you build something world-class without you needing decades of carpentry experience?
Frank Chimero urges us to asses our own lives in the memory of Steve’s:
Today seems to be a suitable day for us all to step back and assess the influence and legacy of the work that we do. Jobs always said he wanted to put a ding in the universe. We don’t have to be quite so ambitious in scale, but it does seem prudent to consider the effect of our work in this larger concept of time. How will our efforts affect people now, and how will the way they change people extend into the future? The sadness you have (if you feel it) is not from a come-back story ending, or the changing of guard at a company, or from a connection to a device you carry with you daily. That sadness is for the loss of a man who unabashedly devoted his life to making things that helped others live well.
Here’s Tim Cook’s email to all Apple employees:
Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.
Brian Lam regrets being an asshole to Steve:
I was on sabbatical when Jason got his hands on the iPhone prototype.
An hour after the story went live, the phone rang and the number was from Apple HQ. I figured it was someone from the PR team. It was not.
“Hi, this is Steve. I really want my phone back.”
Chris O’Brien discusses why we feel Steve Jobs’ passing so deeply:
He knew us and understood us, it seems, better than we understood ourselves. There may be no better indicator of his grasp of people than the runaway success of his last great product, the iPad. Skeptics could see no reason people would want or need one. Jobs knew better. He oversaw the creation of something graceful and delightful and stunningly simple.
Walt Mossberg remembers the Steve he knew:
After his liver transplant, while he was recuperating at home in Palo Alto, California, Steve invited me over to catch up on industry events that had transpired during his illness. It turned into a three-hour visit, punctuated by a walk to a nearby park that he insisted we take, despite my nervousness about his frail condition.
He explained that he walked each day, and that each day he set a farther goal for himself, and that, today, the neighborhood park was his goal. As we were walking and talking, he suddenly stopped, not looking well. I begged him to return to the house, noting that I didn’t know CPR and could visualize the headline: “Helpless Reporter Lets Steve Jobs Die on the Sidewalk.”
But he laughed, and refused, and, after a pause, kept heading for the park. We sat on a bench there, talking about life, our families, and our respective illnesses (I had had a heart attack some years earlier). He lectured me about staying healthy. And then we walked back.
Some more links:
- Time Magazine’s Steve Jobs covers
- The New York Times review Steve Jobs’ patents
- The official Steve Jobs biography will be published on October 24 (Kindle link)
