A guy I used to work with, who's in his mid-20s now just finished an M.B.A. program. He told me on several occasions that a large number of his classmates and peers were Apple cultists to a humorous degree. They all wanted to do Apple case studies for assignments, it was taken for gospel that Apple was a model corporation that they all wanted to emulate when they got out into the world, etc. So I think to some extent it's sort of like when a rock star dies young at a point where they are still considered cool and the mythmaking and whitewashing kicks into high gear. Jobs just became this decade's Kurt Cobain.
Not that Jobs wasn't brilliant, but I think he was the beneficiary of some major hagiography over the past 10 years or so ago -- basically since Apple became associated with music. Everyone forgets that, while the company always produced high quality products, it was in danger of being marginalized out of existance for much of its history. And I suppose now that he's gone, it would be churlish to point out that in the early days, Jobs ran a high tech sweatshop where there was considerable pressure from above on employees to work 80 or 90 hour weeks. But I'm a churl, so there you go.
Not that Jobs wasn't brilliant, but I think he was the beneficiary of some major hagiography over the past 10 years or so ago -- basically since Apple became associated with music. Everyone forgets that, while the company always produced high quality products, it was in danger of being marginalized out of existance for much of its history. And I suppose now that he's gone, it would be churlish to point out that in the early days, Jobs ran a high tech sweatshop where there was considerable pressure from above on employees to work 80 or 90 hour weeks. But I'm a churl, so there you go.
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment