
Steve Jobs: “I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stolen product.” - technoslut
http://9to5mac.com/2011/10/20/steve-jobs-im-going-to-destroy-android-because-its-a-stolen-product-im-willing-to-go-thermonuclear-war-on-this/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+9To5Mac-MacAllDay+%289+to+5+Mac+-+Apple+Intelligence%29
======
fpgeek
Jobs: "I want you to stop using our ideas in Android, that’s all I want."

This is a dangerously broken and, for Jobs, hypocritical idea. Where would
Apple and the rest of us be today if Audio Highway or Diamond "owned" the idea
of an MP3 player? If Microsoft "owned" the idea of a tablet computer? If
Ericsson "owned" the idea of a touchscreen smartphone?

This, of course, is what is broken about software patents today. We're handing
out ownership stakes in pure ideas within a system intended to protect
realized, specific implementations.

~~~
raganwald
_We're handing out ownership stakes in pure ideas within a system intended to
protect realized, specific implementations_

I’d say the iPhone contain specific, realized ideas. Thus, I challenge this
statement. To me, if you can’t accept Apple patenting the specific, tangible
things they do to make the specific, shipping products they sell, you might as
well join me over here in saying that _all_ patents are broken.

They’ve solved an awful lot of problems at one infinite loop. I’m sure they
have filed plenty of overly broad patents, and plenty where you can toss out
half or more of the claims, but like Microsoft, they have pumped billions into
R&D that has resulted in actual products with discernible differences from
what came before them.

Apple is neither a patent troll nor is it a copycat shop like most of the PC
manufacturers. If Apple doesn’t deserve patent protection, nobody does. And
yes, I’m perfectly fine with the idea that nobody does.

~~~
OpenAmazing
Actually, Apple spends significantly less on R&D than both Google and
Microsoft. They spend, but not billions like their competitors.

<http://www.asymco.com/2010/05/25/apples-rd-efficiency/>

~~~
rphlx
When you're mostly creating a better case, better UX, and better marketing..
and your partners do most of the really hard low-level technical stuff [1]..
why bother with R&D?

Your whole image is based on non-engineer-driven products.

[1] Excluding the A5 CPU

~~~
grkhetan
Really? Do you think making an OS (Mac OS X and iOS) and all the hardware
designs of their dozens of products (remember airport express, iPods, macbook
air, etc) are all "easy" to develop? Mac OS X and iOS are based on BSD, but
they have been hugely modified. In fact, the kernel is far from BSD now, and
they release it as open source Darwin -- it has influence from other OS'es as
well.

~~~
rphlx
Almost all of the difficult underlying technologies in Apple products were
created 10-50 years earlier by other companies and government agencies such as
Intel, Xerox, NASA, Qualcomm, the US DoD, etc. They are basically the world's
most famous system integrator. If you still disagree - let me reflect the
question: list the fundamental, widely accepted contributions that Apple made
to cutting-edge EE/CS research between 1990-2010. And compare that versus
NASA, Microsoft, Intel, etc.

Apple is like that apocryphal hot girl in high school who got the nerds to do
her homework. Due to her popularity - it's almost impossible to question her
intelligence without bringing a world of hurt down upon yourself, yet despite
her good grades and high social status, she isn't generating very many
fundamentally new ideas on her own.

~~~
homosaur
Then why compare Apple with these companies? Compare them with other systems
integrators and product people like HP or Compaq or Gateway, etc. Apple does
manufacture the most competent desktop environment available, even if the core
is open source, they made all the desktop GUI and the dock that every OS
(including Windows 7) is now ripping off. HP never managed anything like that.

Besides, clearly the UX, making the better case, and the marketing, etc. is
_actually_ the hard part, because there's dozens of companies making chips.
There's only one out there releasing Apple-level consumer goods.

------
joebadmo
Steve Jobs: "Picasso had a saying, 'Good artists copy, great artists steal.'
We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas."

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0DUg63lqU>

~~~
rsl7
This is the same as the old saying about teaching someone to fish versus given
them a fish.

To steal is to make it your own, to so thoroughly understand it that you can
move it forward as if it was always yours. To copy is to simply have it for
today without having the understanding it takes to have had the idea in the
first place, and so you can't go forward.

~~~
joenathan
Good job, you copied the highest rated youtube comment on the link.

------
tptacek
Some context that may be helpful for nerds whose heads are exploding at the
idea that Google "stole" iOS (which is based on FreeBSD, which is inspired by
Danger, &c &c): Schmidt was on Apple's board, apparently never disclosed his
intent for Google to go head-to-head with Apple on an extremely similar
product, and was surely privy to many confidential details about Apple's
product plans.

~~~
fpgeek
Here's the thing: If it was such a big problem, why was Schmidt allowed to
join Apple's board in the first place?

Schmidt was elected to Apple's board in August 2006, a year after Google
bought Android (and over a year after Apple started work on the iPhone).
Unlike Apple, Google's smartphone ambitions weren't secret. Could they
seriously expect Schmidt to file everything he learned about Apple's
smartphone plans in an unmarked section of his brain that he didn't use when
he was at his day job?

~~~
Steko
"Google's smartphone ambitions weren't secret."

Techcrunch the day Eric Schmidt resigned from Apple's board:

"back in August 2006 when he took the seat Google had virtually nothing even
remotely competing with Apple’s core products and services. "

[http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/03/google-ceo-eric-schmidt-
res...](http://techcrunch.com/2009/08/03/google-ceo-eric-schmidt-resigns-from-
apple-board-surprised/)

~~~
Kylekramer
Considering both the iPhone and Android were still in development at the time,
the statement holds true. If potential products stopped CEOs from joining
other companies' boards, then no one outside the company could ever join a
board.

~~~
Steko
Yeah I'm not disputing the statement from Techcrunch. I'm disputing the
"google's smartphone ambitions weren't secret".

2005: Android is a "mobile software company"

2007: Android prototypes look like blackberrys

2008: G1 launches as a iphone knock off with noticeable differentiation (horiz
slider).

2009: Droid first high end Android smartphone, another horizontal slider

Jan 2010: Google releases a Google branded straight up iphone clone, Jobs
flips out.

~~~
fpgeek
Android was more than a "mobile software company".

They were known at the time to be a re-assembly of parts of the Danger team
working on a smartphone OS. To me, that's enough to know where Google's
ambitions were pointing. The huge volume of "Google phone" rumors that started
long before Android was unveiled says to me that plenty of other people saw
that too.

I just don't see how, too anyone paying attention, "Google is working on a
Danger-inspired smartphone OS" doesn't automatically imply "Google is working
on something that could easily crash right into the iPhone."

------
Kylekramer
Seems more to be about multitouch than Android itself considering the rant was
following early 2010 HTC phones, which if my memory serves were among the
first American Androids to have multitouch. After all, the G1 and Droid were
out for a while before that. And there was a strange period where Android
devices were capable of multitouch, but it wasn't enabled in American devices.
All signs pointed to a sort of gentlemen's agreement between Google and Apple.
I don't really buy into the Eric Schmidt as mole theory, but I can easily see
two at one point close partners making a non-binding agreement that over time
became untenable for Google.

I can see Jobs getting angry about that, especially since he always seemed
very proud and protective ("and boy have we patented it!") of the iPhone's
multitouch. It strikes me as more than a tad hypocritical, but the personal
betrayal might explain the reaction.

~~~
pinwale
Before the iPhone came out (and it's glass-slab form factor), the Android
cellphone prototypes looked a lot like Blackberry clones. However after the
iPhone was announced, Google apparently switched to the slab form factor with
a twist and produced the G1 with HTC. In 2010, Google started making glass-
slab phones with Google branding.

Whether or not that is "stealing" is another debate; however, it wasn't until
the original iPhone arrived that the slab form factor became ubiquitous.

~~~
joshu
The HTC Sooner:

[http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss109/5y24r/exca300/800px...](http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss109/5y24r/exca300/800px-
GoogleHTCG1withSooner.jpg)

~~~
defen
Really makes you appreciate what Apple has done for phone design.

~~~
vitalysh
Or maybe LG? <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Prada_(KE850)>

------
jroseattle
Funny how "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" turns into "this was
stolen".

I would sympathize with Mr. Jobs here if his company wasn't the most valuable
in the world, that continues to deliver record-breaking profits and generates
enough wealth to make many a small nation jealous.

My point is not that Apple deserves to be ripped off because they're flush,
but rather that customers know the difference between great products and
obvious imitations. Those same customers are the ones contributing to the
incredible wealth creation around Apple.

In short: when you're the heavyweight, don't sweat the knockoffs.

~~~
dasil003
I couldn't agree more. If this report is true it makes me sad that Jobs would
take this so personally. The iPhone and iPad were brilliant products that Jobs
should have been proud of. They were so far ahead of the competition that it's
inevitable that others would copy. It's not like this is the first time Apple
has been copied. Everyone at Apple should be proud to have helped create the
future, even if it is dominated by knockoffs, it's not like it's hurting
Apple's bottom line to their detriment. To the contrary, having Android
snapping at its heels has got to be pushing Apple to continue to innovate and
do better. I would like to think that's what Jobs' vision would have been, and
that taking personal offense at the copycats was just a knee-jerk response
that would have mellowed over time.

------
kalleboo
Imagine if Steve Jobs had destroyed Windows back in the day because it was "a
stolen product". Say what you want about Microsoft and Windows (I've been a
die-hard Mac fan since birth), but they really drove the global personal
computer revolution.

If it wasn't for Microsoft competing with Apple, we would be so far behind
where we are today. E.g. Steve Jobs resisted making a computer with a separate
monitor so hard, that if he wasn't pushed out of the company, Apple would
never have released the Mac II. Now imagine that in a world where Apple also
had a monopoly on the GUI.

Competition is _good_! Copy things and improve upon them, that's how we move
forward.

------
fpgeek
Andy Rubin: "Why don't we have a chat about everything you stole from the
Danger Hiptop?"

------
guelo
The much more informative original AP article
[http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5izacIaKf2h...](http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5izacIaKf2hT_w5hDjmST8YtIM4Hw?docId=a5654bae694f41acbd6041476daf2a65)

------
linuxhansl
Just continue to strive to build the best device...

This idea of stolen design makes no sense. Should patents on dropdowns be
allowed, how how buttons, windows, hyperlinks, menus, etc, etc? Or how about
cellphones itself?

Should car manufacturers learn from each other? Somebody copied gears,
automatic transmission, catalytic converters, airbags, radios, sun roofs,
convertibles, etc.

Somebody has an idea, others follow. That's how it should work. That's how we
get the best products. That is how we keep competing. It's not that Android
stole iOS code or something.

The idea of multitouch does not have much value (in the sense that a lot of
money was spent on it, something had a great idea), the value is the
implementation.

------
Steko
Context is important. To me this seems like a quote from Jobs at his angriest
after he felt like he had been stabbed in the back by Schmidt.

------
SkyMarshal
_"In a subsequent meeting with Schmidt at a Palo Alto, Calif., cafe, Jobs told
Schmidt that he wasn’t interested in settling the lawsuit, the book says. “I
don’t want your money. If you offer me $5 billion, I won’t want it. I’ve got
plenty of money. I want you to stop using our ideas in Android, that’s all I
want.” The meeting, Isaacson wrote, resolved nothing."_

I've overheard quite a few conversations in random Silicon Valley cafes, from
startup pitches, to arguments over money, to people detailing their health
problems. Given how open people are around here about discussing anything and
everything in public, seemingly no filter, that would have been an interesting
meeting to have randomly witnessed.

~~~
adamjernst
Someone did. I remember seeing it on Macrumors at the time. They only
overheard snippets, after which one of the two said "Let's take this someplace
more private".

------
toddh
Rome always found a pretext for conquering a new territory. They never
destroyed without first find a "reason" that would excuse their violence.
Sounds like Jobs follows the Roman example.

------
arron61
Apple steals good ideas and improves upon them all the time.

Does he have to hold such a grudge? A bit ridiculous and a bit petty.

~~~
kondro
I think it is the lack of "improving on them" part that he had a problem with.

~~~
arron61
I find most of the iOS5 additions taking an inspiration to how Android
"improved" on the mobile space. So it's ok for Apple to do it then?

------
acak
Original article with more info:

[http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Jobs-questioned-authority-
all-...](http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Jobs-questioned-authority-all-
apf-1873950574.html?x=0)

------
serge2k
"I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, "

He did and he lost.

------
antidaily
All these quotes coming out are really starting to tarnish my opinion of the
man. It's annoying.

------
exit
what's his case against google docs?

~~~
aphexairlines
"Jobs used an expletive to describe Android and Google Docs" -- maybe the
writer just means he described Android and Docs as crap.

------
wavephorm
The iPhone was stolen from Compaq's iPaq and Microsoft Windows CE/Mobile. Bill
Gates should've been the one who was angry.

------
rustyuf
Almost as if his core operating system doesn't copy FreeBSD.

------
channelmeter
"I’m willing to go thermonuclear war on this"

------
staunch
Eric Schmidt was friends with Steve Jobs, got insider info on Apple's efforts,
then started an "open" competitor to the iPhone with Android.

Bill Gates was friends with Steve Jobs, got insider info on Apple's efforts,
then started an "open" competitor to the Macintosh with Windows.

Steve Jobs inspires and educates his friends so profoundly that they become
his enemies.

~~~
arron61
Android was bought behind Eric Schmidt's back by Larry And Segery. Andy Rubin
went and pitched it to them to buy Android.

There is no proof that Eric Schmidt got insider information. Android had been
in development for awhile and was only changed to be more of a touch screen
after the iphone got released.

~~~
staunch
1\. Android would have ended up nothing like it is today if not for the
iPhone. It would have been the best of a bunch of crappy smart phones. Phones
like this:
[http://news.cnet.com/i/ne/p/2008/android_prototype_550x385.j...](http://news.cnet.com/i/ne/p/2008/android_prototype_550x385.jpg)

2\. Eric Schmidt was the CEO of Google at the time. It's obvious that his
position on the board of Apple and foreknowledge of the iPhone gave him a huge
advantage.

~~~
wvenable
Given that companies like HTC were producing both touch based phones
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Touch>) and keyboard phones
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Wings>) all around the same time -- it
stands to reason that Android would be planning to support both (especially
since even before the iPhone, the touch models were more popular).

~~~
grkhetan
"the touch models were more popular".... are you kidding? Are you saying touch
smartphones were popular before iPhones? Do you have any statistics?

I hadn't seen even one of these before the iPhone (there were a few people who
used them, but i would say their market share would be less than 1% in
smartphones)

~~~
kalleboo
Aside from Blackberry and Nokia, weren't all smartphones before the iPhone
touchscreen? Palm, Windows Mobile, Sony Ericsson UIQ...

Blackberry was never popular where I live, so I mainly saw touchscreen
smartphones and Nokias (and I really hesitate to call the nokia symbian phones
"smartphones")

~~~
sjwright
I think there's a pretty substantial difference between touch as defined by
the Apple iPhone and "touch" as defined by Windows Mobile 5 or BlackBerry OS
4. Do fingernails and styluses _really_ qualify?

~~~
wvenable
The TouchFLO UI from HTC (released on the first touch) was designed to be used
by your fingers. What they lacked was the capacitive screen of the iPhone.

------
joejohnson
Android stole inertial scrolling. The app store. Multitouch user interface.
Mobile Safari. The entire blueprint for Apples touch based interface design.
They copied everything which MADE an iPhone an iPhone. The notification
system, or whatever other "features" the Fandroids claim Apple stole from
Android is not what made Android. The things that made Android were the same
exact things as the iPhone. Mobile browser, multitouch interface, and apps.
All the things that Apple designed.

All you need to do is look at Android in 2006, and Android today. Googles goal
with Android back then was to use it on dumb phones and feature phones. To
bring Google to every cell phone. That's what they would tell Jobs and
Forstall, while behind their backs stealing the iPhone design.

~~~
homosaur
Multitouch was inevitable and demonstrated long before the iPhone. Mobile
browsers existed long before the iPhone. What the iPhone did was have enough
juice to run a real browser correctly. They did a good job on mobile Safari,
but this is not a mind boggling invention. App Stores? Are you kidding? I had
app stores on my smart phones for years. Yeah they sucked, but Apple didn't
invent it, they just made it better.

Inertial scrolling, yeah, that's a good call, and the only one you mentioned
that's a legitimate invention.

~~~
arn
I'm not so sure multi-touch was inevitable. I mean, as a general concept
perhaps. But the trend for phone during the time that the iPhone was released
was tiny-keyboards. It was the Blackberry era. It's no accident that 2006 era
Android protoypes looked like Blackberrys. Jobs made a point that they were
going to do away with that, and go full screen multitouch.

It wasn't obvious and there were a lot of skeptics about giving up a physical
keyboard. Typing on a screen just hadn't been done sucessfully.

You say this is obvious now, but what phone did you own in early 2007? I had a
Palm Treo.... with a keyboard.

~~~
homosaur
HTC Dash. A horrible phone.

I guess when I mean multitouch was inevitable, I meant as a technology and not
necessarily on the phone. Yes, Apple did perfect that technology first, but I
saw demos of multitouch on tablet-like devices years before the iPhone. There
were no commercial products that I can recall, but they were working
prototypes and not just demos.

