This is a Macintosh.
It comes from a little company
called Apple.
Apple was started in a small town
in northern California by two friends:
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak.
United by their interest in technology,
and dissatisfied with the attempts...
... at personal computers by others,
they knew they could do better...
... and set out to make the world's
first good personal computer...
... in the form of the Apple I.
The Apple I became the Apple II.
The Apple II
became the cornerstone...
... of an industry
that would change the world.
In 1984, Apple introduced Macintosh...
... and Macintosh thrusted the industry
forward into a new era.
Its style and ease of use
gave computers to the rest of us...
... and inspired the next revolution
in computing.
But dark times followed...
... and Apple slipped into the background
of the computer industry.
In the late '90s, a reinvigorated Apple
would return to shake things up again...
... and push the envelope of design
and engineering.
Whether you know it or not,
these events have changed your life.
We're good. We got your sound?
- Is she on speaker?
- Yeah.
Jordan, hold on.
- Are you ready to go?
- Yeah.
Okay, so this is the story...
...of how I was introduced
to Macintosh unintentionally.
My first Macintosh was an SE...
...with a 30-megabyte hard drive.
The first Mac I used
was my dad's Classic.
He had a Mac Classic, a Mac Plus...
First Macintosh I purchased
was on the day of the introduction.
Well, I had an Apple II in '79.
And then I had an Apple III.
And then I got to play with a Lisa
in 1980.
I had a Blue and White G3,
had a Lombard PowerBook...
...had a Pismo PowerBook,
had a Titanium PowerBook.
I was given a Macintosh 128
as one of the...
...you know,
first hundred people in the Mac division.
The first computer that we had...
The LC, right, which I had to
take away from you...
...because you told me
it was gonna cost $2500...
...I gave you my credit card...
Thirty-five hundred.
I think it must've been about 1980,
I played with a Lisa...
...and that changed everything.
So it had two floppies in front
and a 30-meg hard drive...
...and I thought I was in heaven.
I mean, how could anybody ever use
that much hard-drive space?
After the introduction, we were so keyed
up we couldn't really go back to work.
So that afternoon we drove around
to the different computer stores...
...in the Bay Area,
trying to purchase a Mac.
The first one I owned, the first one I
bought with my own money, was a 7200.
And I bought an expensive monitor...
...and it cost me about $3500.
I got my Aluminum PowerBook,
I had a dual 800 G4 with a SuperDrive.
I've got my G5 at home.
I stopped counting.
Yeah, you ended up spending 7000,
so I had to go...
...and retrieve the computer from you
and get it back.
And so I inerited this computer...
...that I had no fucking idea
what to do with or anything.
And it was, like, a lot of money.
I had to borrow it off my mom.
And it took me years to pay her back.
If you think about it, from '84 to 2007,
you know, that's 20-something years.
I've probably had 50 Macs.
And basically I've had a Mac
since April of '84 and pretty much...
...have had almost every Mac
in my hands since then.
So that's how I was introduced
to Apple.
I had to go and get it from you
and retrieve it from you...
...because you had spent too much
money on my credit card.
It was the hardest thing I ever did.
I had to go and retrieve the computer
from my own son.
Yeah, it was pretty hard, man.
It was not easy.
Okay, all right, all right.
So that ends that discussion, okay.
All right, so we're gonna move on now.
Okay, bye.
Apple was founded twice.
And each time
there were three founders.
Two of them were Woz and Jobs...
...but the third one, in both cases,
is not extremely well-known.
In the first case,
it was this guy named Ron Wayne...
...who was just sort of a smart,
general-purpose guy.
He, being artistically inclined,
drew that first Newton logo...
...that the Apple Computer Company,
not the corporation, had.
The logo essentially was my own idea.
They had hit upon the idea of using
the name Apple for Apple Computer.
Once they had done that,
and if you have an original idea...
...and you have an apple and you...
The two simply fall together.
The classic story
of Newton and the apple.
And so it was that I sat down...
...and thoroughly enjoyed myself...
...with India ink and pen
and illustration board...
...and went ahead and created this
image of Newton with the apple above...
...in a detailed, wind-blown ribbon...
...that had
the "Apple Computer Company" on it.
And around the border I had put in
the philosophical comment:
"Mind forever voyaging through
strange seas of thought alone."
Which, of course,
comes from the Wordswon'th sonnet.
And that last line seemed to fit perfectly
with the whole concept...
...of this wonderful new product...
...that was going to make the foundation
of a new company.
Apple was founded again, though,
as a corporation in 1977...
...and third founder was Mike Markkula.
He's a little more well-known
than Ron Wayne.
When Apple came out, they were
building the Apple I's in the garage.
The Apple I could have a keyboard
attached directly to it...
...and a computer monitor attached to it
instead of lights and switches.
You could actually have
your own interface.
It was groundbreaking technology.
Wozniak had designed this
genius piece of engineering...
...but he wanted to give it away.
What kind of crazy idea is that?
So Jobs was the one who figured out
this thing should be sold.
What Woz said recently...
...I think he said, "I don't want credit for
designing the first personal computer...
...I just want credit
for designing the first good one."
Rumor has it that Jobs
hated the Apple I.
I've heard numerous stories
that it didn't work properly all the time...
...or there was issues with it.
They were encouraging
and promoting the Apple II,
so they were giving discounts on
Apple ll's if you traded in your Apple I.
Sometimes they would do
an outright swap.
They wanted them off the market.
Then they were getting
bandsawed in half.
But there was supposedly
Now, not all of those were sold.
I hear Woz has some in storage...
...who knows how many,
maybe a half dozen or so.
Value?
I've heard as high as 50,000 for one,
but a perfectly running one in a case
is gonna fetch more.
If it's got the cassette and
the manuals and all that stuff.
I started doing my research
on the Apple I's and the value of them.
Pretty much realized
I could never afford one.
And I had gone to
the user-group website Applefritter.
I talked to some people
and there was discussion...
...about making a replica of one, and
nobody really stepped to the plate, so...
It was a lot of research.
I've still, to this day, never seen
an actual Apple I in operation.
A lot of it, electronically,
I could figure out.
Some of it, visually,
there was no way to tell without...
...asking people, so I had to interview...
...owners or previous owners
of Apple I's to see:
"Hey, what does the cursor look like?
Is it solid, is it blinking?"
It's authentic and it's true to its
memory locations and it's functioning.
It will completely operate
just like the Apple I.
There wasrt really a lot of
commercial software available.
Most of the stuff was converted from...
...programs that were given out in
Creative Computing magazines...
...or written initially for another computer,
which was converted over to the Apple I.
There was no such thing
as a production case for it.
Most Apple I's that you see in a wooden
case, somebody built on their own.
One of the most common things l...
Questions I had was:
"Why didn't you
make it look like an Apple I?"
I didn't want people selling these
as forgeries, as being an actual Apple I.
For one, it's Woz's work, and I don't
want anybody infracting on that.
It's respect for the people
that actually do own the Apple I's.
I don't want this project
to devalue the Apple I.
I had tried getting ahold of somebody
from Apple and, you know, saying:
"This is what's going on. Can I get
permission to use the source code?"
I didn't hear anything back...
...so I tried to get ahold of Woz
through his website...
...and next thing you know,
Wozniak had written back, saying:
"Go ahead and use the source code.
I think it's, you know, a noble idea.
Apple probably wouldn't let you, but
the worst thing Apple could say was...
...that it was mine long before
there was an Apple computer."
He had given out the source code,
schematics and everything...
...at the Homebrew Computer Clubs
long before Apple existed.
So it was pretty much his source code
to give out.
I guess, yeah, they're kind of an
unlikely couple, an unlikely pair, to...
You know, Steve Wozniak
was the hardware genius.
He's kind of a blue-collar hacker,
interested only in the engineering.
Jobs was the salesman, the slick,
smooth talker, good-looking young guy.
You gotta remember, the Apple II
were designed essentially by kids...
...who didn't have any success
behind them.
And Woz is like a hero,
the great nerd hero of our times.
I mean, every geek and nerd
reveres Woz.
He is, you know, a living legend,
a demigod, a god amongst man.
Not only for his genius, but just
for that sort of purity of hacker spirit...
...you know,
the generosity of his genius.
The idea that he's not motivated
to enrich himself.
You know. He wants to build
astonishing things.
And he did.
This was more... The Apple II was more
like a work of art, it was whimsical.
It was outrageous,
some of the techniques in the ROM.
And so as I worked
my way through it, I thought:
"Who would design
in such a style and why?"
And it's just the greatest thing
I'd ever encountered.
It was very much like...
...reading a great novel
from an author you've never heard of...
...or hearing a great piece of music.
It captivated me.
It captivated me.
One of the biggest success stories
would have to be Team Number 1.
Team Number 1
was the original franchisee...
...of the Team Electronics chain.
Team Central was the organization...
...of all the Team Electronics stores,
some 100 stores...
...mostly in the upper Midwest,
and it continues to operate to this day.
They've changed their name
to FirstTech...
...with the demise of Team Electronics.
But to my knowledge,
that would make them...
...the longest continuously running
Apple reseller in the United States.
- There's more back there. Yeah.
- You've got a Bell + Howell.
I don't think we ever wanna fly this.
It's probably not...
- Not flight-won'thy?
- Whoa, is that a kite?
- It is, but it's just too valuable, you know.
- Oh, yeah.
We got an Apple III back there
and some other stuff too.
But most... This is mostly the fun stuff.
- Oh, yeah.
- And we're pretty sure it all works.
Back in 1977, I convinced my boss...
At the time I was working as a buyer...
...for the Team Electronics chain, which
was headquartered here in Minneapolis.
- Convinced him to let me go to the
first annual West Coast Computer Faire.
Out there, I discovered
a number of companies.
I'd gone to look
at the processor Sol machine.
I was already aware of the Altair.
Discovered a little company
called Apple...
...who had a pretty good-sized booth
right inside the front door.
Struck up a conversation
with the gentleman...
...who told me they really
werert producing yet.
It would probably be later that year,
October, something like that.
The gentleman seemed
quite knowledgeable...
...and once he found out
that I was a buyer...
...for a chain of electronics stores,
was very interested...
...and it turned out the person
I was talking to was Mike Markkula.
Mike proceeded to talk to us about
the program over the coming months...
...we put together agreements
and whatnot, and in the end...
...he grabbed one of the first machines
to come off the line...
...put it in a bag, jumped on an airplane
and brought it to Minneapolis.
This was that machine.
And you'll notice that the bag
does not have a bite out of the apple.
I don't know if that was a mistake on the
part of the people who produced it...
...or more likely, that it was produced
early on, before Apple decided...
...taking the bite out of the apple...
...would make it more registerable,
if that's a word.
And this is the original brochure...
...that came with the Apple II,
or for the Apple II.
It's very simple,
has an apple on the cover.
And if you'll notice
on the wall beside us...
...there is a photo
that looks suspiciously familiar.
That is one of three photos
that was ever produced in photo form.
I was given one for Christmas
by Mike Markkula...
...l'm told that their banker
at the Bank of America got one...
...and that there was
a third one at Apple.
And to my knowledge...
...there are probably only one or two
in existence any longer today.
You'll notice many of the things here
on the original brochure.
One was that they came
with cassette tapes to load the programs.
For a long time, we sold
Apple cassette-tape machines...
...to sell with the machine because
they couldn't get them otherwise.
Remember, the computer
was fairly expensive.
In fact, I happen to have
an October 1977 price list.
And a computer system
with 16K of RAM...
...which was what
we typically sold it at...
...was $1698.
Now, you can have
a good chuckle today...
...16K was $540.
So to outfit a machine completely
would take you up to about $40,000.
These are the pieces of software
that were available originally with it.
There was a checkbook,
home-management cassette.
There was the Breakout game,
which was a little bit like Pong...
...a Star Trek game
and high-res graphics routines.
And that was what you could get with it
at this point in time.
That was every piece of software
Apple had.
And then this is the real deal.
This is the real deal.
It's a used computer.
It was actually used, but here's the key.
There's the serial number.
And as you can see,
this was serial number five.
Fifth machine
to ever come down the line...
...assuming they put stickers
on one through four.
This machine was in regular use
probably up until...
Well, it was in regular use past
the introduction of the Macintosh...
...so probably up until 1984 or '80...
No, '86 or '87.
- This machine was in regular use.
That's what you came
all this way to see.
So basically you had this
before anybody else did.
Yes, we...
I guess I have to say
I identified the potential of the product.
We were the first dealer/distributor
that Apple ever had.
I wrote Apple's first distributor
agreement, which was liberally plager...
I mean, inspired by
a Pioneer car-stereo agreement...
...went through
and defined the terms...
...and what would be done
and sent it back.
And Apple had their lawyers
take a look at it and we signed it.
And we were the first-ever Apple dealer.
The Macintosh began with Jef.
Jef Raskin was a professor at UCSD.
Jef was a music professor
as well as a computer professor.
Jef was hired at Apple
to start the Pubs Department at Apple.
Jef is a great writer. Was always...
Just had a great sense of humor,
was really articulate...
...had a great rebel attitude.
In... I believe February '79
was the very beginning...
...of the Mac project, where he
approached Mike Markkula to ask...
To talk about his ideas about a low-cost,
easy-to-use computer.
And so he started writing
a series of papers...
...later became called, I guess,
the Macintosh Papers.
And then around the fall of '79, he...
Mike Markkula was impressed enough
with the papers...
...that he gave him some budget
to pursue starting a project.
Jef needed hardware for a prototype.
Jef had sort of the basic idea
of the hardware spec'd out.
He had the notion
of the bitmap display...
...which was, of course,
crucial to it being a Macintosh.
But anyway, he needed to find
a hardware designer...
...and Bill Atkinson ran into Burrell,
who was working in Service Department.
Bill had seen glimmers
of Burrell's genius.
He introduced him to Jef as:
"Here's the guy who could design
your Macintosh for you."
Jef said, at the first...
"We'll see about that."
Jef was very proud of himself.
But he quickly...
To Jef's credit, he quickly saw
Burrell was the man to do the job.
The project really took on reality...
...when Burrell did his first design
over Christmas vacation...
...at the very, very end of the decade.
I think that's a notable point about
the Mac that writers don't really make.
It was really born with the 1980s...
...because it was designed
right at the cusp of the decade ending.
But meanwhile, once he got that going...
...Steve Jobs got wind of it,
as well as other people at Apple, that...
...boy, here's this board that is
one-third the price of the Lisa...
...that's twice as fast. That's amazing.
The most common inspiration, clearly,
was the Apple II.
Steve Jobs was even
explicit about that...
...telling us we were reincarnating
the Apple II for the '80s.
I realized, as we were trying
to complete the software...
...that, boy, the Mac was so heavily
graphics-based...
...we needed someone who was
a world-class graphic designer.
I had basically asked Susan
to come as my date...
...to a few of the
Macintosh parties we had.
That was kind of the first connection.
And she met some of the team
and really liked them...
...and so I proposed that she work on it.
But the Mac prototypes
were too rare to get her one.
So I first started her off
with graph paper.
Went and just bought
some pretty fine graph paper...
...and told her to make drawings
by filling in the squares or not.
And she did some fantastic work,
doing some drawings that way...
...that I think I still have somewhere.
And so I showed them to people
on the team and they said:
"Boy, yeah, she's good."
Jef made one other key hire,
a woman named Joanna Hoffman...
...who became the Macintosh's
first marketing person.
She has a great story about being
interviewed by Jef...
...while Jef was at his piano keyboard.
And when he liked something she said,
he'd play a happy little melody.
If he didn't like it so much,
he'd express his reactions musically.
And those original Mac team members,
to this day, are my best friends...
...my extended family.
I would do anything for them.
Apple, consciously or not...
...positioned itself
as an alternative to IBM...
...which represented the establishment,
the government, big corporations.
In 1977, Apple,
a young, fledgling company...
...invents the Apple II, the first
personal computer as we know it today.
IBM dismisses the personal computer
as too small to do serious computing...
...and unimportant to their business.
And this was at a time...
Post-Watergate, late '70s.
- People were suspicious of the
government and what it represented.
And the PC, the personal computer,
was a revolution in computing.
And at the time,
there was a utopian mindset.
The idea that technology, especially
personal-computer technology...
...would enable people to throw off
the shackles of society...
...and foment a technological revolution.
IBM enters
the personal-computer market...
...in November '81 with the IBM PC.
It is now 1984.
It appears IBM wants it all.
Will Big Blue dominate
the entire computer industry?
The entire Information Age?
Was George Orwell right about 1984?
He made a lot of money out of Apple...
...but he dropped out of Silicon Valley
and he taught high school for 10 years.
He volunteered in, you know,
the local high school...
...to teach kids engineering
and computer science.
When Apple lost Steve,
they lost their way, to some extent.
They became a shadow
of what they were.
You know, the first half of the '90s,
they were sort of all over the place.
They didn't know exactly
what the best thing for them to do was.
Didn't know if they were supposed
to be licensing the operating system...
...or if they should be making the Newton
and trying to do the next big thing.
Well, I think the main thing that
touched most people was at the time...
...all the press was bad about Apple.
Apple's gonna die...
...Macintosh's market share
was slipping.
There's no software,
there's no hardware.
Everything was coming unglued.
My first job at Apple
was software evangelist.
So my duties were to find developers
or meet with developers...
...and convince them to write
Macintosh versions of their software...
...as well as hardware manufacturers,
to create peripherals.
So it was basically
to proselytize Macintosh...
...to the third-party-developer
community.
Well, the first time I was there, we were
going to change the world, all right?
We're bringing out Macintosh
for the first time...
...no one's ever seen it,
changing the world.
The second time, obviously,
the world had been changed.
Perhaps the world had been changed
by adopting Windows too.
So the second time
was much more dire...
...sort of digging yourself out of a hole.
The first time was just...
It was like being paid
to go to Disneyland.
Second time was more like,
you know, Vietnam.
Although I wasrt in Vietnam,
so that kind of trivializes it...
...but, you know, it was a war.
The second tour of duty came
when Apple was supposed to die again.
So every 10 years ago,
Apple's supposed to die.
And I went back at the height, or depth...
...of these problems.
Basically to ensure
that the Macintosh cult...
...remained vibrant and alive
and cared for.
And so because I couldn't really
control any medium...
...I started an e-mail list server...
...which had at its peak
about 44,000 subscribers.
And it was only good news.
So one could make the case
that I was blogging...
...before anybody else
knew what blogging was.
I just didn't know it.
So I had a very big list.
Forty-four thousand for, you know...
Even today, 44,000 would be a big list...
...but it was very big back then.
And I would just push out good news.
And it became a source of information...
...so that software developers would
send us notices and special offers...
...and all that, then we'd push it
to the community.
And the community would then
push it out to the rest of the people.
A Guy Kawasaki law
is sales fixes everything.
So when you have great sales,
everybody gets along. Life is good.
Everybody's a visionary. You know,
everybody thinks it's good, right?
When sales sucks, everything sucks.
So sales were sucking.
So Apple was divided into factions.
There was the Jean-Louis Gassee
faction and the Bill Campbell faction.
Campbell believed in marketing, Gasse
believed in engineering. Pick one.
And that kind of tore the company apart.
And the reason why I survived all this...
...is because I never
really joined either camp.
Now, you could make the case...
...that that means
that I was this neutral wimp...
...but I just...
I didn't see the world divided that way.
And so I got along with Sculley
and I got along with Jobs.
I got along with Amelio.
I got along with everybody.
One of the reasons is because
I'd never wanted any of their jobs.
All right? So Sculley wanted to be Steve.
Gassee wanted to be Sculley.
Bill Campbell wanted to be...
I don't know who he wanted to be.
But, you know, that's one of the things
that's pathetic about Silicon Valley...
...is everybody wants to be
something they're not.
And if you're the venture capitalist,
you wanna be the entrepreneur.
Me, I just wanna be
a hockey player, okay?
So everybody wants to be
something they're not.
And at the time,
that was rampant at Apple.
When I got started was 1979...
...when I took spare parts
and built an Apple II.
I tried to figure out how I could attach
musical instruments to the computer...
...which led to why I needed to
learn how to write code...
...which led to quitting college...
...which then led to getting a job...
...and then over the years,
that turned into getting hired at Apple.
I was sort of informally
in the QuickTime group as I was...
...a formal member of the OS team...
...although I didn't really
report too well into that group.
We were always kind of a renegade
kind of a group. But we got shit done.
But the work was the Sound Manager,
which was this complete rewrite...
...that ended up
fixing a lot of problems...
...and imported it from all this
nasty assembly code...
...and rewrote it in C, and made it
actually go like 10 times faster.
And then right about the same time
we got the Sound Manager working...
...I started working
inside of the moonlight hours...
...over in the forbidden zone of what
the QuickTime guys were doing.
They were hiding out
in the Networking building.
And the original idea was,
"Now we got these CD-ROMs.
They're not just bigger floppies.
What can we do with them?"
I know. Let's make movies.
And so that's where the postage-stamp
movie idea came from...
...was you couldn't put one on a floppy,
but you could put one on a CD-ROM.
So, you know,
taking advantage of the new media.
So that was the basic idea
for QuickTime.
And then that invented
all these other ideas...
...of how do you compress audio,
how do you compress video...
...how do you stream it, how do you
play it, how do you synchronize it...
...how do you do all these things
in real time, how do you control it?
And then QuickTime turned into
this entire industry...
...based upon that basic idea.
The people on the outside think that,
you know...
...it's like this wonderful world of
Oz or Disney going on...
...and all of us are just all these
brilliant, amazing, happy people.
And it's not.
It's like a sausage factory, man.
You really don't wanna know
how this stuff happens.
A lot of it is just bad arguments
and politics...
...and working around the rules
and not doing the right thing...
...and apologizing for it later,
getting fired a few times.
I mean, that's how things got done.
It's definitely, like, don't pay attention
to the man behind the curtain.
There's a lot of that stuff.
And you really don't wanna know
how this stuff is built.
To me, it's embarrassing, like...
...there's always big flaws
to a lot of the stuff, you know?
There was a computer that we shipped
where the speaker's magnet...
...was right next to the hard drive.
Now, when you played a sound...
...it caused
the hard drive's read-write head...
...to misalign.
So in the midst of, like,
playing your QuickTime movie...
...your computer would completely freeze
because it played a sound.
And I'm like, "What kind of engineers
do we have around here...
...that would put a magnet
right next to your hard drive?"
Jesus Christ, it's just a...
It beeped and it crashed, you know?
Then they wanted me...
This was the solution.
They wanted me to change the decibels
of the speaker...
...so that it wouldn't interfere
with the hard drive.
You're kidding me.
That's classic. See, you know,
engineers are retarded.
They have
some kind of brain damage...
...that allows them
to not have social skills...
...so that they could concentrate
long enough to write code.
But it's a disease.
That's why I had to quit. I mean,
I'm like an engineer in recovery.
I don't wanna write code anymore.
It just makes you retarded.
I mean, get a girlfriend.
Get a life.
There were times
when it was more difficult...
...you know, when Microsoft
was at its strongest.
Yeah, when I think about comparing
Microsoft and Apple...
...I think about the basic values
of the company...
...being almost diametrically opposed.
They have managed
to distinguished themselves...
...as the company that isn't Microsoft.
And I think there's a lot of Mac users
who choose to use a Mac...
...for that reason,
that isn't a Windows machine.
I've used Windows to the extent
that I've had to use Windows.
And I just cannot understand
some stuff there.
I've hated Windows
for a number of years...
...and I could never figure out why.
And about three years ago, it finally
hit me that the reason I hated it...
...was because
it always makes me feel stupid.
I go to do something...
...it gives me a warning
that I don't understand, it's cryptic.
But, you know, Microsoft was one of
the first big developers for Apple.
I mean, they made a fortune
developing software for Apple.
And also for the Mac. They're one
of the first big Mac developers as well.
As far as the PC users...
...and Mac users being compared?
I really feel that there is a lot of
give-and-take in the PC users' world...
...but that the PC users really get off
on how complicated it is.
It makes them feel superior...
...when they sit down with somebody
and totally confuse them.
And, you know,
not every PC user is like that...
...but the ones that I have talked to...
...basically just love to rattle on
technical information...
...at a mile a minute
because it makes them look good.
Everything that, you know,
went into Office, I think were initially...
...purchased from other companies
and developed for the Mac.
And then, of course, you know,
rolled into Windows.
And then they... You know, I mean...
...Bill Gates saw that the Mac
operating system was the way to go.
And Windows, you know, 3.1
borrowed heavily from that...
...and then Windows 95, 10 years later.
The rest is history.
To start us off in the right direction
is an individual...
...who really needs little introduction.
After all... After all...
Steve Jobs has been around
since the very first Macintosh.
So please join with me now
and welcome, from Apple Computer...
...Steve Jobs.
Thank you.
The last several weeks, we have
looked at some of the relationships.
And I'd like to announce
one of our first partnerships today...
...a very, very meaningful one.
And that is one with Microsoft.
One of the things that I hear
over and over again...
...always from Windows people,
of course...
...is that Microsoft saved Apple
from certain doom...
...by giving them $150 million.
Well, if you look at the whole story,
Steve negotiated agreement...
...where Microsoft agreed to produce
Office for another five years.
Apple wasrt gonna compete
with them.
At the same time,
Microsoft made an investment...
...of $150 million in Apple stock
that particular day.
That served two purposes:
One, it made it look like Microsoft
was confident in Apple's survival...
...because they wouldn't have
bought stock if they didn't.
And secondly,
it kind of cemented the agreement that...
...we're not only sure you're
gonna be successful with this product...
...we're gonna back it up
by buying some stock so we're part of it.
We're not only a competitor
in producing software...
...we're a partner and owning stock.
What most people don't tell you...
...is that they didn't need the money
for Microsoft to survive...
...this was all a marketing game.
And a lot of Windows people
don't understand that.
Microsoft didn't save Apple.
And if we wanna move forward...
...and see Apple healthy
and prospering again...
...we have to let go of a few things here.
We have to let go of this notion
that for Apple to win...
...Microsoft has to lose, okay?
We have to embrace the notion
that for Apple to win...
...Apple has to do a really good job.
What makes companies
very successful...
...and what makes companies fail
is the same thing.
It's sort of the passionate adherence
to a strategy.
People who are passionately involved
in a concept or philosophy...
...a design, a product, all right,
will put everything of themselves into it.
And you don't want somebody designing
a product who isn't passionate about it.
Innovation is...
It's really the only interesting thing.
If you're not innovating, what's the point?
When Apple creates through engineering
something very cool...
...that people want to buy, it does well.
And when it doesn't, it doesn't.
So, you know, guess what.
Newton didn't succeed.
Apple III didn't succeed.
Lisa didn't succeed.
If you stand back and you look at
the Macintosh, the Macintosh line...
...everything they implement
into their computers has personality.
It's like the difference
between owning a Ferrari...
...versus owning, you know,
just a Ford Taurus.
You know, it's sleeker style, design,
it's fun to drive...
...you know, versus one
that you just use to get to work.
So Macintosh was the mega hit,
but what was the first company...
...that really made CD-ROM drives
on every computer?
Guess what. It was Apple.
Guess who democratized 802.11.
AirPort and Apple, right?
And so how about FireWire?
Who made that a standard?
How about USB?
Some companies can think
you can innovate too fast...
...because you don't sort of
milk the cash cow...
...to the maximum before moving on.
That's not the way Apple usually thinks.
So after a while, it's not just the big hit,
it's also...
You know, you can say
that these revolutions...
...were caused by little uprisings
that Apple, you know, made successful.
The mouse.
Now, someone could say,
"Well, PARC had the mouse"...
...and all that, but, you know, PARC
didn't make it a commercial success.
Apple sort of...
And it basically comes from
both Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak.
They don't really care about that.
Sure, they wanna make money,
but that's not what it's about.
It's artistic values.
Apple wants to do
the greatest thing possible.
They don't compare themselves
to someone else. Who cares about...?
Other people can do great things too.
That's great.
It's more, like, you know,
being transcendently brilliant.
No matter how well you've done it,
how can you make it better?
I would like to hear
what Jonathan lve would say.
His design is so inspired.
It's like it's divine providence
or something.
He has a team of, like,
phenomenally talented people...
...and they keep working on a problem...
...until they come up
with something fresh and new.
You know, like the scroll wheel
on the iPod or that Luxo-looking iMac.
If you look at what Apple does,
after it does it...
...one thing you always have to say is:
"How come nobody else
did this before?" Right?
There's nothing, like, mythical
about the iPod and the wheel, right?
Anybody could have done that.
You know, the colored iMacs
changed design in everything.
You know
even on the lids of PowerBooks...
...you know,
they open up very smoothly...
...because they have
this weird counterbalancing system...
...and no one is ever gonna see this.
It's not something that consumers
will actually go out and buy.
So wouldn't you think that some
of these computer companies would say:
"Apple does well
because it has beautiful products.
So how much could the most expensive
industrial designer in the world cost?"
You know, a million dollars
a year in salary?
Two million dollars a year?
Five million dollars?
That's what makes these products
so beautiful...
...that level of commitment
and dedication to the thing...
...to make it the best thing possible.
I'll tell you what, I'll take it to Fry's
and I will you show you lines of crap.
Ugly portables, ugly towers,
ugly monitors, ugly MP3 players.
Why is that?
I guess in a sense,
it proves the point...
...that these people
don't know what to steal.
They don't know what to steal.
They seem to be all kinds
of different people.
You think that the prototypical Mac
users seem to be...
...like the graphic designer, you know,
who lives in New York...
...or San Francisco, is liberal,
you know, young, sort of hip.
You know,
there's a lot of different age groups...
...a lot of different income brackets.
A lot of people
who are in a lot of different jobs...
...a lot of different professions.
Although Apple would like you to think
that everybody is a young buck...
...that's 20 years old that has a Mac...
...the truth is
most of the user group members...
...are between 55
and a hundred years old.
Well, I think the Apple community
has stayed remarkably consistent.
It's people who love good engineering,
they love product design.
They love being different.
No pun intended.
They love probably being the underdog.
But then you ask marketers... You know,
there are marketing guys...
...and they're convinced
that Apple is a brand.
And it conjures up brand associations
of creativity and liberty, freedom.
And people are buying into the brand,
the way they buy a Coke...
...or beer or a car or a pair of sneakers.
It says something about them
and their personality.
So I think people might be
a little more attracted...
...to the rebelliousness of it.
I mean, you're the anti crowd anyway
because you don't have a PC, right?
For a lot of people, it's a revelation when
they go to Macworld to see other users.
It's amazing. They never knew
all these people were out there.
Yeah, actually,
I went to my first Macworld this year...
...which turned out to be
a good one to go to.
That was when
they introduced the iPhone.
So actually, what I wanna do...
Switch over to Danny.
Hey, Danny.
People take their vacations
at Macworld.
That'll be like a weeks' vacation
just to go to Macworld.
Probably 15th.
I missed last year and Janet and I,
my wife, we really regretted it...
...because we really like coming here
and meeting with people.
You know, I've seen people show up
with these giant suitcases.
These huge suitcases,
you know, the ones on wheels, empty.
Just for all the crap
they're gonna collect at Macworld.
All that leaflets
and the freebies and the buttons.
I did get my T-shirt, yeah.
That I made sure of.
It's just like being on a casino floor
at Las Vegas.
You know, without the cigarette smoke
or the drinks.
So you're horribly sober
and people are barging into you...
...and screaming and shrieking.
You know, I've been at Macworld...
...and Jobs will whip out, you know,
some new machine.
And my God,
I've gotta have that machine.
Even though I've already got
six computers.
I've gotta have that one
he's just unveiled.
Why? Because it's faster,
or it's got a silver case...
...or it's got,
you know, Bluetooth built-in...
...or something
just crazy and stupid, really.
But I got to have that machine.
So just before Apple
is about to open a brand-new store...
...a lot of people
will camp out outside...
...just for the honor
of being the first inside.
There are lot of people who
are really passionate about it.
When they open the Apple store,
I went out...
...there was 3-, 400 people who camped
out overnight to get into the store.
And then by the time they opened it,
there was several thousand.
I figure, 2-, 3-, 4000 people.
And they were wrapped around
the block, you know, a couple of times.
And before Apple had Mac stores,
you know, across the country...
...a lot of people would go hang out
at their, like, mom-and-pop Apple store.
People would come in
with their broken down computer...
...intending just to drop it off,
but they'd end up staying all day.
They start bullshiting,
talking to the other people...
...they would meet
other people who are like...
They don't have anything in common...
...except they're Mac users
and that's enough.
You know, to cement it for them.
Yeah, this is a ma-and-pa business,
absolutely.
And I couldn't have three stores
without them.
One of my stores is managed
by my oldest son who's 27.
He manages the Ventura store.
My wife manages this store
while I manage the Woodland Hills store.
I have two daughters
who are teenagers.
Jessica works here regularly...
...Kayla comes over
and kind of participates.
My little boy, he works here daily.
He mans the little kid's station.
This is definitely his operation.
You know, he captures the attention
of most women and all kids.
At one point,
I became a real Mac person because...
- I'm not sure how it happened, but...
- Okay. How are you doing?
They were just computers
and all of a sudden I realized...
...you know, I am a Mac advocate.
I do push this stuff.
Not just trying to sell it
because it's my business...
...but because they work well.
I don't bang my head on them.
Stop it, that's not nice.
So here's what's happening,
there is a sound mike right there.
- Every time you talk, you interfere with it.
- It's in there.
Sorry.
- This was my first foray into retail.
- Look how cute I am.
Successful?
I'm putting everything back into it,
working to make it successful.
So this started out just as an idea.
I'm trying to figure out new ways
to advertise.
First I tossed it out to the guys
in the Apple specialist group.
And I got
maybe three or four responses...
...from people
who have done similar things.
I didn't see any pictures
of full-car wraps.
But I looked on the web
and I saw all kinds of cars...
...that were wrapped
with full-body designs, and I liked it.
It seemed like it could work.
I'm trying to become a retailer
and learning new things about it.
The big box guys don't entertain me
when I go into their stores...
...but they've got mountains of product.
They've got negotiating power,
the likes of which I can never imagine.
But hopefully we give
a little bit better experience.
Ninety percent of the things I do
doesn't work.
Hopefully, the 10 percent that works...
It seems like it's paying for itself.
Pushing things forward, so...
I'm gonna keep on trying.
People like us keep the machines
around for so much longer.
I mean, I don't think
PC owners really do that.
But, you know, a Mac user...
They'll keep
an old machine around forever...
...if it's lights are still running.
We've all got old Macs,
like, you can't bear to throw away...
...in a basement,
or in a cupboard somewhere in the attic.
They're hard to part with. You figure
one day you're gonna dust them off...
...do something with them.
You never do.
They just sit, rotting away.
There's a lot of people that collect them.
But some of them are more serious
than others.
Okay.
Up first, this is our G3 monitor.
Very rare.
When this came in...
A friend of mine brought it in.
- It's the first time I'd ever seen it.
I didn't even know that Apple made it,
but it was... Got the Apple logo on it.
And it was made for the G3 tower.
This is Apple's entry...
It's got the Apple logo on it.
- Into the portable printer...
You recognize, these?
Black with the Bell + Howell
name on them.
Apple made it for Bell + Howell.
And they were mainly education.
I started buying a couple
of these machines from people I know.
And then refurbishing them.
Here's my II Plus that I purchased
originally, way back when.
I replaced my Apple II Plus
with an Apple llc.
I should've thrown the II Plus away,
but never did.
No, this is like
our conference room that is...
I ran out of space to fix my laptops,
so I started fixing them in here.
I didn't wanna see a nice room
go to waste, so I put more stuff in it.
In education, this is probably one of
the biggest ones, these Microzines.
Where it's like a magazine
and a diskette.
Almost every school had these.
Here's my 20th anniversary
and everybody's favorite, the Cube.
Here's a cool machine, Mac mini.
They hit a home run
when they made this.
Here's something that's...
Three-and-a-half-inch diskettes,
still shrink-wrapped.
They have the old, old, old Apple logo.
Apple's had several different logos
over the years.
And that's one of the old ones.
You may think it's an Apple lle,
but when you take this cover off...
...you may still think it's an Apple lle,
but it's not.
Apple llGS before the llGS cases
were made.
Anything interesting over here?
No.
And the I bought a lle.
Then I bought a lle
with a numeric keypad.
I should've been throwing these away,
but never did...
...so maybe that was my training.
Junk. That's a long name for junk.
Back here, we made some kind
of attempt at putting things on shelves.
Dual drives.
The Apple 51/4s. The Apple 31/2s.
Some Apple printers.
Apple keyboards, Apple mice.
Original boxes that are empty...
...that I just ain't got the heart
to throw away.
Just don't film my butt
as I'm going up here.
- Oh, I won't, I won't.
- Just watch your step up here, Rob.
Okay, we're in the bowels of the building,
up in the rafters.
There was too much nice space up here
that we didn't wanna waste.
So we built little shelves
so we could put all our lle's, II Pluses.
And it looks like critters
have been up here...
...because some have
fallen down on the insulation.
Apple II monitors, GS monitors,
and every single one works.
They were tested
before we put them up here.
Back here is a storage shed.
It was meant to hold the things
that were in my basement.
And luckily we built a little bit bigger
than what I intended.
Bell + Howells.
These things are going on eBay...
I've seen them as high as,
It's not ever been a money issue,
collecting or disposing of the Apples.
It's probably a sickness that I have.
I have the 128 Mac in hiding.
A lot of the SEs, SE/30s.
Classics.
Only a couple Color Classics.
Six-thousand square feet building
and this is only maybe...
...less than half of what I have.
There are probably
other Mac people out there...
...same boat as I am,
that just won't throw this stuff away.
So I see all these
complaints about Cult of Mac.
"What are...? It's not a cult.
This a rational choice."
And these are all these new Windows
people that have just come onboard.
You know, and are sort of defensive
about it a little still.
Because their other Windows
friends who haven't crossed over yet.
There's that Macintosh cult following.
You don't get a following for nothing,
you know? You get a...
If it's a good product
and it makes people excited...
You can have lots of good products.
They are lots of good products.
I got a skillet and it's good.
But I'm not crazy about the skillet.
Well, it's always been
kind of interesting.
There's definitely a fanatical
sort of zealotry of Mac people.
You know?
It's not a religion. It's a computer.
I got a lawn mower too,
but I don't sit around talking about it.
Yeah, I mean...
So I cut my grass, whatever, you know?
I type a Word document.
It's a screwdriver or it's a blender,
you know, like whatever.
You know, I'm not really in love
with my Mac.
I like a good movie
more than I do a good Mac, you know.
I like good beverages
more than my computer.
I watch the rumor sites like a hawk.
And I was a little more lucky this time
because my Blue and White G3...
...we got it and then the G4 came out
two weeks later. It's like, "What?"
Look how they're suing bloggers now,
you know...
...for revealing some details
about a very insignificant product.
Although, it's a problem that's plagued
the company, this kind of rumor control.
I get between 2500
and 3000 unique visitors a day.
And which is, you know,
for the fact that I'm just putting up...
...goofy little jokes
about a computer company...
...I think that's pretty good.
I was a pretty avid reader
of rumor sites for a long time.
And, you know, usually, I mean, pretty
much through the late part of the '90s.
And constantly checking on what
Apple's gonna do next, that kind of thing.
And then it sort of hit me that...
I think around the time
that one of them predicted...
...that there was gonna be
a crank-powered iBook...
...that these guys didn't necessarily know
what they were talking about.
I think they also just got worse
when Steve Jobs came back...
...because he cracked down on the leaks
that were going out to these sites.
And so they were probably actually better
during the mid-90s...
...they were probably more accurate.
I've actually gotten, you know...
Been fortunate enough
to have some contact...
...with some of the Apple executives...
...who apparently read the site
on a fairly regular basis...
...and e-mail me when they find
something particularly amusing.
There's one person
who I can mention...
...since he's not there anymore,
was Avie Tevanian...
...who was the chief technologist
at Apple.
And I had written... I had written a story
about him going into puberty again.
And just how he was
sulking around the office...
...and, you know,
kind of shuffling around.
And he wouldn't do any work,
and, you know...
And Steve was just having a terrible time
with him...
...and didn't know what to do.
And so, you know,
I usually end up writing...
Publishing the stories at night.
And then I go...
You know, pretty much go right to bed.
And so I woke up the next morning
and there in my Inbox...
...was this e-mail
from Avie Tevanian and I thought:
But he was a very good sport about it.
He was amused.
And I managed to avoid any litigation.
Well, I mean it really...
You know, I didn't start out
with any goal other than...
I just found myself
writing these things anyway...
...and I wanted a place to publish them.
So there was no grand plan in mind.
I never thought that I was gonna make
any money doing it.
And I do manage to actually make...
...at least a little bit of money
doing it.
Keeps me off the streets.
The idea of a start-up sound
was from the Apple II.
The Apple II once it reset,
made a little beep...
...with the square wave speaker.
So we thought that was a great idea.
Let's the computer know it's...
Let's the world know it made it,
like an infant's first cry.
The very first one we did
for the earliest Mac prototypes...
We had a square-wave sound generator
built into the early Mac prototypes.
We later got rid of that.
So I made a thing
that incremented the frequency with...
You know, I tweaked the delay
so it made a whooping sound.
The first original boot sound
was more like something like:
Or whatever. And it was a little comical,
but it wasrt very elegant.
And so I was experimenting
with different things for the boot sound...
...but a guy named Charlie Kellner
had just joined the Mac Team...
...who's also a brilliant musician...
...and he had actually designed one
of the first PC-based synthesizers...
...called the alphaSyntauri
for the Apple II.
He was an accomplished musician...
...and he kind of looked
what I was doing...
...messing around
with different boot sounds.
I guess for the time I was doing it,
everyone could just hear it.
You know, trying this, trying that.
And he said... Oh, he had an algorithm
he always wanted to use.
That was...
It's not conceptually musical.
It's more conceptual
at the algorithm level...
...which was just filling sound buffer
with a square wave.
And then just making passes through
averaging every adjacent sample...
...till they got to be all the same.
And that made
a chiming, bell-like sound.
It was in the Mac, you know,
starting in 1984...
...and it lasted up until the Mac II...
...where once again, they put in even
more sophisticated sound hardware...
...and they came up
with a different sound...
...that I wasrt involved with.
Well, the start-up sound, let me think...
Well, the main inspiration was...
...how horrible
the one on the Mac II was.
So a tritone is the most dissonant sound
you could imagine.
And stack four of them together.
And that was the sound that you heard
when you turned on the Mac.
Which was horrible. And so...
...I set out trying to change that
because it didn't make any sense.
Especially when you usually hear
the start-up sound after it crashed.
And so I'm like,
"Great, reward for a crash."
So the sound that I wanted to do
turned out to be, politically, a challenge.
No one wanted to change it.
They thought of it as the brand.
There was this new machine...
...that we were building
at the time called the Quadra.
And the Quadra
was going to have better speakers.
And then I'm like, "Great, horrible sound
on better speakers."
And so I started working on new sounds
that would be the sound of...
I kind of thought of it as:
"What's the palette cleanser
for a crash?"
Plus, it was this new,
bigger, badder machine...
...and I wanted it to sound like
a bigger, badder machine.
I remember when Byte magazine
did the review.
The very opening paragraph
of the review was:
"I knew it was gonna be a good
computer by the way it sounded."
So I was like, "I did it."
That was the actual goal, was I wanted
it to sound like a good computer.
And then unfortunately, what happened
was no one wanted to change the sound.
We ended up just doing it.
And after that...
...everybody changed the start-up
sound with every new ROM...
...which was
exactly the opposite problem.
You can't establish your brand...
...if you keep changing your logo
with every release.
And so, you know,
these sonic logos or earcons...
...where, you know, that should be
a recognizable sound.
Right about the same time
Steve Jobs came back, I heard...
The story I heard was he had said,
"Let's go back to that good sound."
And that was the one
that I had done...
...and so it's still been there.
It's the same one. It's the only one
that's ever been there since.
So, I mean, it's kind of cool to hear it
every time, I mean...
I never really think about it,
millions of people crashing...
...and hearing me
play the C-major chord.
No, it was a widespread
C-major chord...
...with a high E, I think,
in the upper voice...
...which, to me, just sounds more bright
and sort of unresolved, but happy.
It's a happy chord.
It's way better than a tritone.
One psychologist said...
...that, you know, people form
a social relationship with their machine.
It becomes like a friend,
it becomes personalized.
It seems a little silly...
...but you kind of build up
a relationship with your computer.
And it can either be a good relationship
or it can be a dysfunctional relationship.
You can customize
any computer system...
...but these are very easy
to develop a relationship with.
That's different from customizing.
They're the closest devices
that I know of...
...that are really symbiotic.
And I'll admit it,
you know, when they...
When they do make it
so that you can kind of jack in neurally...
...l'll do that.
Yeah, I think maybe somebody
needs to sit down with those people.
Maybe it's Dr. Phil.
Your computer doesn't love you.
This relationship is not working.
Don't be an enabler.
Their soul is somehow reflected
in that machine.
It's an object of communication,
but also of creativity.
You know, the most essential things
that they are...
...the things that express themselves,
are expressed through the computer.
And so they invest, you know,
so much in that...
...that it's a cybernetic relationship.
When Steve came back...
...he was like, "Hey, you know,
we should get into this music thing."
I mean, he saw it.
But to me it was, like, five years late,
like that was obvious five years earlier.
I think Apple
could be as big as Sony right now...
...if it had been five years earlier.
A phone? Finally? Whatever.
A couple of years ago when they...
Apple said it was gonna come through
with some breakthrough device...
...there was a lot of speculation
about what this might be.
People figured it was a music player,
but exactly what, no one knew.
And people were saying on the forums
they were gonna buy it anyway.
It didn't matter. They were gonna get it
because it was gonna be fucking great.
The iPod people
have had the iPods in their pocket...
...mainly because they love music.
And that's... And as do
the Apple employees who created it.
You know, people complain about it,
but it's...
The fact that they were able
to make the iPod is actually why...
You know, one of the reasons
why Macs are still around.
It's only really clear
when you compare it to other products.
They're a pain in the ass to use.
I mean, they are impossible.
There are more iPods in my house
than there are people.
By probably 2-to-1.
But I never use an iPod.
I have...
...five.
I think I have five or we have five.
The family has five, I think.
You know, that's like this whole
video thing on your iPod. Who cares?
I thought we used to complain
about postage-stamp movies.
I mean, that was the complaint we had
I got this iPod. What am l...?
A movie on an iPod.
I don't even get it.
Like, you think, "How long
can I hold this up in front of my face...
...before my arm gets tired?"
I mean, I can't even get through
one TV sitcom.
Progress.
A big part of Apple's marketing budget...
...was, like, sticking the machines
in movies and TV shows.
You know, so it culminated with...
What was it called? Independence Day.
When the PowerBook
taps into the alien computer...
...and blows up the alien ship.
They paid, you know, tens of millions
of dollars, I believe, to do that.
This is when product placement...
...was starting to become big business
in Hollywood.
But since then, you know,
you see them all over the place.
I mean, they are all over TV.
You know,
part of it is product placement...
...part of it is because Macs
are popular in Hollywood, you know.
Obviously, they're used for video editing.
I've edited somewhere
between 40 and 50 movies.
Television, theatrical movies.
No documentaries.
Richard Halsey
Los Angeles, California
We'll, I'll start with my calling card:
Rocky, Down and Out in Beverly Hills...
... Beaches, American Gigolo,
Sister Act...
... The Net, Payday,
one of my favorite movies.
I was a very successful film editor.
Editing mechanically
with German machines...
...KEMs, Steenbecks,
Moviolas, whatever.
Everything you can imagine.
Every piece of mechanical equipment
you can imagine, I used.
Well, I wanted to move forward
into computers...
...but believe it or not,
they were reluctant to.
They still thought it was cheaper
to edit the old mechanical way.
I had experimented around
with the Lucas system...
...the Laserdisc system.
That thing was ridiculous.
The Montage, that was ridiculous.
And the Lightworks,
that was sort of starting to happen.
And basically, it wasrt till 1995
which was late in the game.
And mostly at that point,
early '90s it was, you know, the Avid.
I went and I had to do a picture,
a Columbia Picture...
...a Sandra Bullock picture
called The Net.
Had a very short
post-production schedule.
I had no experience,
had no idea what I was doing.
Within three hours,
I had the basic principles down.
So it was a good system.
I continued editing on that system
for at least seven, eight years.
And then I jumped into Final Cut.
And I've been editing in Final Cut,
you know, ever since.
I mean, it's an amazing system.
Take a simple film
like Edward Scissorhands.
We were editing mechanically.
I was editing with my wife.
Well, we went to location
with four KEMs.
I was editing, she was editing.
And then we had
a husband and wife team.
They were our assistants.
So there was four of us
and that was really economical.
And we had four editing machines, and
we were able to keep up with camera.
We were able to get a Christmas release
and do the movie quite quickly.
With this system, I'm pretty much
a one-man band and my assistant.
I can do the job...
...of six or seven editors
in the old system.
Well, you can see.
I mean, look at the environment now.
Instead of editing in 1200 square feet,
I can edit in 200 square feet.
Apple is Steve Jobs, for sure.
I mean, he is the one
who defines the company.
He founded it, but I mean,
look at its recent history.
He has his personality
stamped all over it.
I used to say about Steve...
...that he was the best person possible
to work for and also the worst...
...because he's a man of extremes.
Steve's extremely passionate.
He's incredibly sharp.
He's, more than anything else,
incredibly quick.
He's got the quickest mind
of anyone I've ever talked to.
Yeah, I mean, I idolize Steve Jobs.
He's absolutely, you know, one of my...
He's my favorite celebrity,
but I don't pretend that I'd understand...
...what would come out of his mouth
if I asked him a question.
I cannot explain
how Steve comes up with these things...
...because he has a different
operating system.
So mere mortals
cannot understand him.
That's why
when people try to understand him...
...and his quirks and all of that, they get
very frustrated because you can't.
It would be like telling a fish how
to understand how a bird feels flying.
It cannot be. The fish is stuck
in the water, the bird is soaring.
It's a different operating system.
That's what it is.
I think Apple is his place in the world.
This is where it all began.
And obviously, it's...
You know, it's a piece of himself.
It's a company that...
...seems like it needs somebody who's
not just your ordinary CEO to run it.
They've tried a number of ordinary CEOs
in the '90s and it just didn't work.
Because if you look at the time era
that Jobs was not there...
...Apple fell into a category
where their Macs...
...were just becoming
like everyday computers.
And there was nothing special
about them.
But of course Steve Jobs
has an incredibly strong aesthetic...
...in case you can't tell.
I don't think you could change the DNA
of Apple if you tried.
So Apple's DNA
is in building cool stuff...
...it's an engineering company.
They can say
they're marketing and all that.
But a marketing-driven company
is a company...
...that theoretically listens
to the market...
...and delivers
what the market says it wants.
You could say many things about Apple,
but that ain't one of them. Okay?
They don't listen to anybody.
Apple's idea of market research is,
you know...
...Steve's right hemisphere
is connected to his left hemisphere.
That's the focus group.
Immediately when Jobs came back,
the first thing he did was the iMac.
He set the personality, he set
the tone of the computer. He's like:
"Here. We're gonna break boundaries,
we're gonna take it to the next level...
...the next edge."
You could make the case
that Apple III wasrt his...
...and Newton wasrt his,
and Lisa wasrt his.
So the only time it flubbed
or stubbed its toe...
...was when Steve wasrt behind it.
I don't see Apple being able to continue
at the pace that it's going right now.
I mean, I don't expect it to suddenly,
you know, fumble and fall...
...but it's not gonna be what it is now.
No, the problem is going to be
post-Steve.
If you bring in some dickhead
who thinks that he's mini-Steve...
...and he, too, is a visionary...
...and, he, too understands
what people need, but cannot express.
So this dickhead is gonna say:
"All right, so this is what I've decreed
people will want.
And I'm the new Steve Jobs."
The company will implode.
That depends on whether or not
the philosophy employed by Steve...
...in focusing on product and having
a passionate view of the product...
...and it's relationship
to the rest of the operating enterprise.
If they get somebody like that in there
then it will continue...
...as an ever-growing, ever-expanding,
ever-creative enterprise.
Well, that's interesting.
You know, that's an interesting thought.
I don't know.
Whether it just...
Apple's just gonna stagnate, you know?
Well, the story,
and I don't know if it's true...
...but when you went into the HP lobby,
there was H's portrait and P's portrait.
And when Carly came in,
she put her portrait, okay?
You know what I'm coming to, right?
I mean,
you hire some dickhead who does that...
...it's game over, baby.
We'll all be listening to Zunes
and using Windows machines.
If they get a bottom-line man in there,
it may succeed...
...but it will never have the aura
and the passion that it has today.
You can trace the greatness
of Apple pretty closely...
...back to the greatness of Steve.
Some of the flaws of Apple as well.
I can't build a case that it's going
to be easy to find another Steve Jobs.
It may not be that
you want another Steve Jobs...
...because there can be no other
Steve Jobs.
The Macintosh spirit was not something
we created with the Macintosh...
...although we sort of contributed to it.
But it was there before the Macintosh...
...because it's really the spirit
of the Apple II.
And so much of the spirit
of the Apple II...
...is the spirit of Steve Wozniak's
personality as well as Steve Jobs'.
You know,
the core of Apple is to change the world.
And that has not changed.
I don't think it can.
I don't think it could change
if you tried to change it.
In a broader sense,
some of that spirit of the Apple II...
...was the spirit
of the personal computer revolution.
And really what that is,
more than anything else...
...is the celebration
of unbounded possibility.
The key thing...
Those first microcomputers...
...even pre-Apple II, but even
the Apple ll's couldn't really do much.
Yet they were incredibly exciting...
...because you knew they were the seed
that would change the world.
And if you look at Steve and Woz,
what they did is they created Apple I...
...which was to change the world.
Apple II changed the world.
Macintosh changed the world.
IPod changed the world...
...and maybe this phone
will change the world.
So, you know, that's five things.
You can't call that luck.
We filled the machine with our love
and passion for what we were doing.
And it radiates out
on the other side of the screen...
...and it affects the user.
A lot of people were shown
Apple computers in schools.
Apple's very, very prominent
in schools...
...and therefore people that have
gone through the school systems...
...into college
have just stuck with Apple.
The ones that see it as
a truly superior product, which it can be.
Well, we're like all other user groups.
We got together because, you know...
...stuff was really expensive,
you couldn't afford much.
And quite frankly...
...almost every user group in the world
started out as a pirate group...
...and became legitimate.
The commercial is great.
The commercial is fantastic.
I then edited Pirates of Silicon Valley
many years later...
...and the movie started off
with that same commercial.
Well?
- Oh, my...
- Oh, God, not...
Now, I don't have... Oh, shit.
Another thing Burrell and I
would do every day...
...in the earlier days of the project
when we were at Texaco Towers...
...is before we were
doing something healthy...
...we would go across the street
to Cicero's Pizzeria and play "Defender."
For one thing I'm living proof...
...if you do one thing right in your career,
you can coast for a long time.
A long time.
Do you think Steve Jobs is gonna
be willing to sit down and talk to us?
Sit down and talk to you? No.
Oh, I didn't wanna tell you this...
...but Steve was in here
about four months ago...
...and spent part of a day,
about three hours here.
But I'll make a prediction,
and my prediction is...
...you will not talk to Steve Jobs
for this documentary.
No, that's good.
That's... I'm glad that he...
Probably, probably would say no.
That depends on the mood he's in
when you try to talk to him.
If you hit him on a good day,
it's, "Come on in.
Come down, we'll go to dinner."
I mean, half the time he's not willing
to sit down and talk to CNNfn.
You know what I mean? He...
I think he bolted out of one of those
interviews a couple of years ago.
You get him on a bad day, it's,
"Sorry, I haven't got time for this."
Presuming you don't go skidding
down the stairs on your hindquarters.
The only way you could hook him
would be to show him some of the film.
I called him up and asked him
to come visit when he had a chance.
- You're fibbing, of course.
- I am fibbing.
Okay. That was good.
Okay. That was good.
Had enough?
Steve will not talk
to the New York Times usually.
It might be better
even if you didn't have him.
- It might be better...
- That was a discussion, yes.
- If you had a, like a cloaked figure
behind the background.
You know what I mean?
And this was the mysterious Jobs.
You know?
I shouldn't tell you this,
but he lives walking distance from here.
- You could go stake out the house.
- No, he'd probably call on us.
- Yeah, he probably would.
- Yeah, that's the thing.