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Steve Jobs died 10 years ago today. To the extent that Jobs was enigmatic, his mark on the world is tangible. Apple’s last big thing under Jobs – the iPhone – has really changed everything, including government. Like the Ford Model T, the iPhone wasn’t the first of its kind, but it was so drastically different from its background that you can draw a line between before and after.
The products that beat the world are often the result of the unique motivation of one person, although it may take a large number of people to bring them to life. In the case of the iPhone, or the Model T, we know the name of the person.
I had a few smart phones before my first iPhone, but it didn’t take long to realize the relative primitivity of these Treos, Palms, and the like. You could say that a service like Google search has been revolutionary. It does, but the iPhone allows people to have full computing anywhere and anytime.
The idea for the application moved mobile computing away from the use of poorly performing pocket or mobile browsers. It forced businesses and eventually government agencies to deploy fully functional mobile apps. Having used typewriters in my first three professional jobs, I still marvel that people can, for example, plan an entire vacation or sign up for Social Security from a phone.
As a user group, federal employees have been a bit slower to adopt the iPhone. Many preferred the robust and, at the time, more secure Blackberries. Jobs scoffed at those “plastic buttons” covering smartphones of the mid-2000s. But many users found physical keyboards much easier to use than the iPhone’s soft keyboard. To this day, the software keyboard can confuse and exacerbate the frustrations of autocorrect.
I’ve had Mac computers for many years, after literally throwing a 486-equipped metal case PC on my cobblestone driveway due to OS corruption from adware, spyware, and all the trash that seemed to make Windows PCs unusable after a few years. My Macs have never exhibited this degradation over time. I’m getting seven good years out of one.
On the other hand, I am not an Apple fan. IPhones in particular are filled with annoying bugs and quirks. No software is completely intuitive or free from flaws. Apple is also hardware. I’ve had graphics unit failures, ethernet ports go down, hard drives poop. Then there’s the unforgivable removal of the 3.5mm headphone jack. The endless switching of ports, the non-inclusion of charger packs for the thousand dollar iPhones – chargers that probably cost Apple 13 cents each from China.
When Jobs passed away, of course, it was sad to hear of the passing of a remarkable person while still relatively young. But it wasn’t something I felt any personal grief over. But I thought about something else about Jobs besides the various products. And so he was able to impose on the vast bureaucracy of a very large company the values and practices that lead to such products. Jobs was kicked out in 1985, then returned 12 years later to succeed a string of hapless CEOs, including John Scully, who drove the company to the brink of bankruptcy. But in 2011, Apple’s revenues exceeded $ 100 billion, and yet it continues to innovate.
Large organizations can stumble and fail, and they can stumble and return to success. Jobs has shown that leadership can make a difference.
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