Steve Jobs Resigns as CEO of Apple

[Kwan Khan]

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2011/08/24Letter-from-Steve-Jobs.html

Sad day, but surprised he has been able to go so long through all the health issues.
I can't see him resigning for anything other than health reasons. I must thank him for his vision and contributions to the world.
All the best to him, his legacy is surely one of the greatest in business and technology.

 

[Graeme Nattress]

Wow. That's a shock. I hope it doesn't mean Steve's health is failing.

Graeme

 

[Martin Weiss]

Steve was never a subscriber to the "good enough" school.

When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.

 

[Martin Weiss]

Job´s letter of resignation has been published.

I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.
I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.
As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.
I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.
I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.

 

[Bastien Tribalat]

SHOCK... I hope that won't mean Apple will go really wrong.
I hope his health is not failling too.
Anyway, goodbye SJ ! You surely are in the most important men of human history !

 

[Brent J. Craig]

I really hope Jobs is resigning to be able to focus more of his time on healing. I'm sure we all wish him the best - cancer sucks!

I hope the markets are smart enough to realize that Apple is now bigger than one man. Jobs rescued Apple and made it what it is today, but he did it by hiring the best and brightest (except those that Red got . Apple has the intelligence, the corporate philosophy, and the leadership to continue to grow and dominate.

 

[Curran Giddens]

I thought there may be some reason why they moved up the date for the Steve Jobs book. I'm a big fan and will probably buy the book.

 

[Alexander Ibrahim]

Thank you Steve.

 

[Jeffrey Loewe]

Thank you Steve Jobs. Hopefully whoever your successor is brings back Final Cut Studio 3!

 

[Billy Barber]

When I think about how much he accomplished over the last thirty five years or so and then how relatively little I accomplished...I might have to grow a beard so I don't have to look myself in the eye when I'm shaving.

 

[Gabriel Winebrenner]

JESUS!!! What is happening to the planet? All these changes....

 

[Martin Weiss]

Some more great quotes:

“Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it’s really how it works. The design of the Mac wasn’t what it looked like, although that was part of it. Primarily, it was how it worked. To design something really well, you have to get it. You have to really grok what it’s all about. It takes a passionate commitment to really thoroughly understand something, chew it up, not just quickly swallow it. Most people don’t take the time to do that.


“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people.


“Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. So they don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have.


“For something this complicated, it’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”


“That’s been one of my mantras — focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”


“This is what customers pay us for–to sweat all these details so it’s easy and pleasant for them to use our computers. We’re supposed to be really good at this. That doesn’t mean we don’t listen to customers, but it’s hard for them to tell you what they want when they’ve never seen anything remotely like it. Take desktop video editing. I never got one request from someone who wanted to edit movies on his computer. Yet now that people see it, they say, ‘Oh my God, that’s great!’”


“Look at the design of a lot of consumer products — they’re really complicated surfaces. We tried to make something much more holistic and simple. When you first start off trying to solve a problem, the first solutions you come up with are very complex, and most people stop there. But if you keep going, and live with the problem and peel more layers of the onion off, you can often times arrive at some very elegant and simple solutions. Most people just don’t put in the time or energy to get there. We believe that customers are smart, and want objects which are well thought through.”


“Every once in a while a revolutionary product comes along that changes everything. … One is very fortunate if you get to work on just one of these in your career. Apple’s been very fortunate it’s been able to introduce a few of these into the world.”


“Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.”


“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.”


“Innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about a problem. It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea."


“It’s more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.”


“When you’re young, you look at television and think, There’s a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that’s not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That’s a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It’s the truth.”


“I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what’s next.”

 

[Craig W. Bickerstaff]

Apparently he's not really leaving Apple he just won't be CEO anymore so I imagine he will still have influence on product design like he has ever since he went on a medical leave of absence. "And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role. " whatever that means.

It's the end of an era but Tim Cook is sure to make a fine CEO for Apple.*

 

[Mark L. Pederson]

Just make sure to buy more stock tomorrow while the foolish dump - it's far from over.

I think HP throwing in the towel was enough.

I miss Steve already. He changed the world ... in a black turtle-neck and jeans.

Bravo Steve - best wishes and thanks for (almost) everything.

 

[Douglas Learner]

I hope he is well...and for many years to come.

 

[Mark L. Pederson]

“I’m the only person I know that’s lost a quarter of a billion dollars in one year…. It’s very character-building.”
— Steve Jobs - Apple Confidential 2.0

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Jobsonian ethic

Jobsonian ethic

“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.”

“It’s more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.”

Thanks for those quotes Martin. I have always felt like Jim had quite a bit in common with Steve Jobs, I am even more convinced now. Let's just hope Jim's health isn't another parallel.

Cheers - #19

 

[glenncogan]

All the best to an incredible man, steve we will miss you greatly....

 

[Eric Santiago]

“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.”

“It’s more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.”

Thanks for those quotes Martin. I have always felt like Jim had quite a bit in common with Steve Jobs, I am even more convinced now. Let's just hope Jim's health isn't another parallel.

Cheers - #19

Maybe Steve will share <insert whatever here> with Jim and talk about the future Steve's not going far, he's just now getting started

 

[John Bellari]

Steve as CEO was both iconic and ironic...

Apple stock at $350+/share and Microsoft at $25/share
without Steve Jobs would not have been possible.

I think it also ironic it took Steve Jobs 35 years to turn the Mac/PC revolution back over to the Corporate Heavy Iron boys with cloud Client Server applications.

I hope the pendulum swings back to the Personal Computing side in the near future, as I think the last decade has been a diversion from
truly high GHz multi-threaded technological progress...

Either way, I hope him the best and I am sure there's several movies waiting in the wings...