23.02.12
Almost twelve years ago, my wife and I were shopping in Whole
Foods grocery in Palo Alto, California. Despite her calm argument
that better food would save us medical expenses later on, this
simple Michigan boy was griping about the prices, and how the place
was too darn bourgeois for me. To prove my point, I pointed at the
couple in the next checkout lane: Mr. & Mrs. Steve Jobs.
Beyond symbolizing superior product design and the good life we
all deserve, Jobs was a symbol of progress and American excellence
for a lot of people, as expressions upon his death this month have
shown. My own years illustrating animated instructional disks at
Apple were both post- and pre-Jobs; after he was kicked out of the
company he founded with Steve Wozniak, and before his amazing
return to command it, yet Jobs' influence still prevailed. Profit
margins were large, times were fat -- if a meeting ran to 12:01,
our team's Administrative Assistant would call the caterer for
sushi -- though Apple's market share of computers in the U.S. was
small. "It's a more humane company now," sighed Jean-Louis Gassée,
the elegant vice president with from France with the diamond
earring, "but like a fine French sausage factory, you don't want to
see or smell the product is made.
Source: Midland Daily News