• OscarRobin@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    84
    arrow-down
    42
    ·
    1 year ago

    Steve Jobs did at least actually do things. Musk just buys things and claims he did them.

    • SternburgExport@feddit.de
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      181
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      Nah Jobs didn’t do anything himself. From Wozniaks first computer up to the multitouch display for the iPhone, all of these things were just bought/stolen/copied. Jobs just knew how to put these technologies into something that would sell.

          • herrvogel@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            28
            ·
            1 year ago

            There’s no version of this reality where Jobs isn’t a good businessman. You might not like the company or their products, but they’ve somehow managed to build a huge and successful business selling those overpriced toys to tons of people. They managed to create a cult around expensive consumer electronics. That is a massive success no matter how you slice it. And you can’t deny that Jobs played a big part in that.

            • jj4211@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              5
              ·
              1 year ago

              The weird thing is that Apple without Jobs was a failure, but also Jobs without Apple was also a failure.

            • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              4
              ·
              1 year ago

              it was just a gag for comic effect. it wasn’t the breadth and depth of my thoughts and feelings of the digital and manufacturing epochs since the 1980s.

              But also, it was kind of begging the question of “is there such thing as a good business man?”

              There’s good for /their/ business. But is that- in general - good?

              • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                Does the current head of Larian Studios count as a businessman? If so, that’s one I would consider good for the company AND the consumers

            • SCB@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              5
              arrow-down
              2
              ·
              1 year ago

              Also you can tie it directly to Jobs, because when he was gone for a bit, apple fuckin tanked, and then he came back and they came out with the iPod.

              That’s not an accident.

        • hackitfast@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          arrow-down
          4
          ·
          1 year ago

          Yeah, Steve Jobs was definitely an asshole, and he didn’t personally design any of his products, but he did know what direction to move things in and what consumers wanted in a phone. He was the first to put a truly usable portable touchscreen computer into our pockets with a phone in it, and every phone nowadays is basically just a reimagined, upgraded version of the first iPhone. The way we communicate is forever changed because of the iPhone.

          But yeah iPhone’s are kind of the pinnacle of “how much can we fuck you over before you notice” now. All because of the little Apple on the back of the phone.

          • general_kitten@sopuli.xyz
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            6
            ·
            1 year ago

            There is a story that the concept of touchscreen phones was stolen from a Nokia engineer who tried to get nokia to produce them but the feature was dismissed as a ‘gimmick’.

          • Comment105@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            He didn’t know what customers wanted in a phone.

            He knew what customers would want in a phone when they were taught about its existence.

            The customers had no idea they would want it before he showed it to them.

        • R0cket_M00se@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          7
          arrow-down
          22
          ·
          1 year ago

          Jesus I’m no Elon fan but how many companies do you have to take from a couple million to hundreds of billions before you’re good at your job?

          What is it with modern society and the need to reduce everything about a person just because they’re a POS? He might be evil but he’s clearly pretty good at being a businessman or you wouldn’t even know his name.

          • RegularGoose@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            9
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Being a succsessful businessman does not make one a good businessman. Half of the equation is ethics, because it fucking matters.

            A successful businessman with bad ethics and an unsuccsessful one with good ethics are both bad businessmen.

            The only good businessman is one who both succeeds and has good ethics.

          • jj4211@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            7
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            While he has had some success, he’s also demonstrably been a glory hog benefiting from crazy good luck.

            He had an Internet company during the first dot com boom. He got a bunch of cash from Compaq for effectively nothing, because businesses had to snap up anything vaguely Internet. Right place at right time, basically won a lottery.

            So then he founded an Internet bank. But want allowed to lead it, no matter, either way it was overshadowed by PayPal, which was a runaway success. Somehow he managed a merger with him being put in charge of the joint company. Then he almost tanked it and was put aside to salvage the company. However, he managed to be popularly thought of as “the PayPal guy”

            He founded SpaceX. Off the top of my head, that one seems fair enough.

            Then you have Tesla, which existed prior to him Knowing about it, yet he still insisted on being called a founder. It’s possible that without him, Tesla wouldn’t have gone far, but either way, he’s been a glory hog about it to the point of again getting himself framed as “the” Tesla guy.

            • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              Also in the case of Tesla, it was a company entering a market with virtually zero competition. Compare the available fully electric cars of 2013-4 and take a wild guess as to which consumers were drooling over: the one that looks like an actual car or ones that screams “eco-friendly toy” (Mitsubishi i, Nissan Leaf)?

      • HiddenLayer5@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        19
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Just like how Elon did not design his rockets, SpaceX engineers did, Steve did not design the iPhone, Apple engineers did.

        Also everyone seems to conveniently forget about the factory workers actually building them.

      • jarfil@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        15
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Jobs insisted on removing the keypad from a smartphone. He didn’t make the multitouch display, but he did force app developers to take it seriously.

        • AssholeDestroyer@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          The iPhone didn’t originally have apps other than basic ones that shipped with the phone, like Safari, YouTube, calculator, etc…

          People hacked the first gen to run things like an NES emulator. Apple promptly shut that down and introduced the app store.

        • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          I don’t hate Jobs for that, but I despise almost every other fucking company panicking in order to copy that shit. Blackberry keyboards were great stuff in the early 2010s.

      • Chocrates@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        1 year ago

        I feel like he had a part in the first apple. Wozniac did the work but Jobs sold it. Selling and marketing are not easy and a different skill set. I’d be curious what Wozniac has to say about it though.

        • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          1 year ago

          Not only Jobs managed to sell, he managed to sell way above cost. Apple became synonymous with premium features, even when it was clearly lagging behind the competition in terms of raw power (late 80’s) or offering sub par experiences.

      • SokathHisEyesOpen@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        13
        ·
        1 year ago

        He was a visionary who was able to see the applicability of new technology, and was able to force his will for better than the standard upon people who would otherwise have thought the improvements impossible. The guy was a fucking jerk, that’s true, but he also completely changed the world with his vision. To say he was nothing more than a Musk, or a thief, is to be disingenuous.

        • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          1 year ago

          but he also completely changed the world with his vision

          Which is a fucking shame, because his vision sucked for the most part. “Less power to the consumers, let them grovel for our products; You can only use our products the way we demand you to; Fuck repairability, buy new; Fuck keyboards”

      • jarfil@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Jobs insisted on selling a touchscreen-only smartphone. Turns out, he was right on that one.

        • Roboticide@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          But like, he didn’t design or build it himself. His company did.

          So by that logic he’s still the same as Musk, who insisted on a mass-market EV car or reusable rockets.

          • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            His company did.

            It wasn’t even his company, they stole the concept from another company. The home button also wasn’t an apple original. The “sum of the parts” was the “original” thing

        • smackjack@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          He was also right about not supporting Flash on the iPhone. People wanted to crucify him for that, but better video and web standards came about because of it, and we’re all better off living in a world without Flash.

    • porkins@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      This sells Musk short. He is making smart entrepreneurial decisions for the most part. I hate the monkey testing controversy though.

    • jarfil@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      arrow-down
      12
      ·
      1 year ago

      Didn’t Musk start SpaceX? That’s, at least, one thing. Too bad he can’t stick to it.