

Steve Jobs to Valleywag at 2:20 AM: “Why are you so bitter?” - derekc
http://venturebeat.com/2010/05/15/steve-jobs-to-valleywag-why-are-you-so-bitter/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Venturebeat+(VentureBeat)

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jsz0
It's a great question. Why are people so bitter? We have several really good
SmartPhone platforms to choose from today. Looks like the tablet market will
be as competitive. So if we're not being forced into one platform and have the
freedom to simply buy another product that suits our needs what's the real
issue here? The post-PC era is going to be about making technology accessible
to everyone. Is this bitterness maybe from the old guard who _likes_ a world
where they get to be the tech savvy computer genius their friends & family
rely on? Or have they built their identity around being one of the privileged
elite who are educated enough to do complex and interesting things with
technology? Are they offended by the idea a company might choose not to design
products specifically for their needs? There's definitely some deeper issues
here. Also if Dylan was 20 today he would probably be more concerned about
real world issues like climate change, human rights, the corporate take over
of America, the ever growing inequality between the rich and poor, etc. I
gotta believe his choice of which telephone to buy might be kinda far down the
list of concerns.

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batiudrami
"By the way, what have you done that's so great? Do you create anything, or
just criticise others work and belittle their motivations?"

Burn.

~~~
mburney
Upvoted for hilarity factor. But from a logical standpoint this is really a
bad argument. Writing often has a destructive purpose; what the person has
"created" has very little to do with whether his criticism is valid or not.

~~~
_delirium
Yeah, it's also a pretty weird attitude. Certainly not one that scientifically
or engineering-minded people should have. If someone alleges that your physics
experiment has a problem, the proper answer isn't: "Oh yeah? Well I've got
tenure and recently won a major award in my field. What kind of physics
discoveries have _you_ made lately?" Scientists actually lose a lot of
reputation if they start getting that sort of attitude--- it's been the sad
fate of some late-career scientists.

~~~
andreyf
But unlike a physics experiment, the decisions about open or closed platforms
are moral. It's the equivalent of criticizing Gandhi for some minor detail of
his fasting, to which he says "no, this is how I will fast, because this is my
fasting and my movement". "Oh, and when have you ever started a movement? Or
do you just criticize others?"

~~~
jpark
Btw, it's this type of close-mindedness and insularity that leads to
tremendous abuses in society. Witness the Catholic abuse scandals. Can one
criticize the Church without being a member or part of its leadership
structure or even without believing in God? I hope so.

~~~
andreyf
Did you seriously just equate curating the App Store with raping children? And
get 5 points for it?

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chipsy
Internet drama really has come a long way, hasn't it?

~~~
jrockway
Indeed. Instead of arguing with Apple fanbois on your favorite forum, you can
have the exact same inane and irrelevant argument with one of Apple's co-
founders! And it even ends with namecalling and a personal attacks! I love it.

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waterlesscloud
It's good to be reminded that Jobs really does think he's doing the right
thing. He's wrong, but he does seem to genuinely believe it.

~~~
acqq
No, he is right. If you don't want to make great apps, you are free not to
make them, or to make that what you think would be great with Flash for
another platforms (but note that evan Adobe can't make the demo which doesn't
crash on these other platforms(!)).

Exactly the selection of what makes his platform is what makes it unique and,
to people who buy the product, better than other offerings.

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ecaradec
As a programmer I thought that preventing the use of some language on a
platform by contract really sucked, but I've seen applications written in
flash on the IPhone since and they are painfully slow.

I don't have an IPhone but I can understand that having lots of applications
in the store and not knowing whether an application you try would be slow or
fast would really feel like a lottery. It's sad because the adobe flash tool
are great animation tools, and I don't know of anything coming close on the
Iphone.

The impact on the battery would be unsolvable too. Sometimes it's better to
avoid issues.

~~~
drivebyacct
"The impact on the battery would be unsolvable too."

That simply is not true. Flash on Android does not destroy the battery, going
off of what testers, developers have reported as well as the video demo that
plays video in Flash for a while and shows the impact on the battery life.

Also, your comment does not speak to the fact that Apple is banning the Flash-
to-native iPhone app compiler. That does not fall victim to the Flash-is-slow
scenario you're offering.

Also, poorly written Flash apps _can_ be slow. Poorly written iOS apps _can_
be slow as well.

~~~
ecaradec
Yes the impact of the battery would be unsolvable. Even if it isn't very bad,
just a bit bad, the issue is that you have all that extra layer, consuming
battery life. And battery life is probably the biggest issue in portable
devices these days. There is no way to put a bigger one to solve the problem.
There is no bigger one, and there won't be one in the next years probably.

Yes, the flash to native ban suck but it's probably not the way the flash
works on the iphone with cs5 given the performance I've seen. As a programmer,
it has no sense to vorbid a language, as every language are sort of equivalent
in the end.

I would like to see flash works on iphone, and androids but the current port
is slow for even the simplest thing. Even a single movie clip was slow on what
I've seen. It's not possible to write a responsive flash app if even that is
slow. There is no code, it can't be poorly written...

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rrhyne
I love that there is no reply after Steve's final question. What DOES this guy
make?

~~~
jrockway
I don't think that really matters. Imagine someone _makes_ a disease, and
starts infecting people with it. Should you really dismiss the guy who says,
"hey, this disease is bad, stop infecting people with it" simply because he
doesn't make a vaccine?

If anything, not making anything means you are less likely to be biased. Steve
likes the iPad because he made it, not because it's intrinsically good. This
biases his views on how it affects the software world.

Anyway, making something is good, but not making doesn't mean that your
commentary on other people's products is not useful.

~~~
grinich
_Anyway, making something is good, but not making something doesn't mean you
lose any credibility._

It means you don't have credibility to start with.

~~~
jpark
and what has Steve Jobs literally _made_ himself as opposed to telling others
what to make? Jobs has _made_ less than probably most people on HN. Let's hear
it for the countless thousands of engineers and designers who break their
backs for Steve so he can be literally lord it over those who obviously aren't
the great "maker" that he is.

~~~
patgarner
For one, Apple Computers.

~~~
jpark
sorry, most of that early work was done by Woz. please demonstrate any
significant code written or schematics created by Jobs.

~~~
patgarner
My apologies, I wasn't clear. I was speaking specifically about the company
itself.

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zecg
Except for that ridiculous moralizing about porn (firstly, the platform should
not be designed to censor content and secondly, stopping porn by not having
Flash seems stupidly inefficient), Jobs is perfectly right. It's their
platform and they can choose what to offer. While not an Apple user, I am
nevertheless thoroughly enjoying Adobe's problems - been burned by crappy
Flash plugins on Linux and I feel a sane and open wrapper for video is long
overdue. Go suck a bag of dicks, Adobe. Your indispensible Flash is getting
less so with every effort such as this one.

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buster
And another one that didn't get it. The mails are not about Flash videos on
the web. They are about writing cross platform programs that are not running
on a flash plugin on the iPhone but are cross compiled to ObjC.

The "but developers can choose whether they want to write their programm for
iPhone OS or for other platforms"-argument is so ridiculous, it makes me cry.
In practice people have no choice but to develop for iPhone OS (because it's
the biggest app platform) and then, if money/time/effort allows, write a
second app for the rest of the world. And i think, as a developer i can
complain and bitch all day about it, even if it won't change something. Of
course, Steve can do whatever he likes with the platform. If developers like
that is another question.

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voidpointer
It looks like some commenters here and on the linked site actually believe
this is a genuine email exchange with the real Steve Jobs... Why?

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bartl
It looks like you don't believe that it's even possible. Why?

~~~
voidpointer
It feels like it is more likely that this is made up than Jobs actually
replying to some random dudes email.

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iamdave
Heh, I chuckled pretty hard at the Skunkworks joke.

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gojomo
I think Steve Jobs has hired Dan Lyons as an email assistant!

