

Playboy Interview with Steven Jobs Circa 1985 - drey
http://www.playboy.co.uk/print/print-article/item77251/

======
mcav
Interesting retrospective future-predicting-ish:

Playboy: More important, are you ignoring your potentially biggest rival,
A.T.&T.?

Jobs: A.T.&T.. is absolutely going to be in the business. There is a major
transformation in the company that's taking place right now. A.T.&T. is
changing from a subsidized and regulated service-oriented company to a free-
market, competitive-marketing technology company. A.T.&T.'s products per se
have never been of the highest quality. All you have to do is go look at their
telephones. They're somewhat of an embarrassment. But they do possess great
technology in their research labs. Their challenge is to learn how to
commercialize that technology. Also, they have to learn about consumer
marketing. I think that they will do both of those things, but it's going to
take them years.

\---

and this:

Jobs: I'll always stay connected with Apple. I hope that throughout my life
I'll sort of have the thread of my life and the thread of Apple weave in and
out of each other, like a tapestry. There may be a few years when I'm not
there, but I'll always come back.

~~~
CamperBob
_A.T. &T.'s products per se have never been of the highest quality. All you
have to do is go look at their telephones. They're somewhat of an
embarrassment_

Huh. That's weird. AT&T phones were built like brick shithouses, for the most
part. I wonder what model(s) he had in mind when he said that?

~~~
ma2rten
He prolly meant in terms of design.

~~~
jamesbritt
Because they didn't look like something from Braun?

The AT&T phones were simple and obvious to use. They did exactly what they
were supposed to do, and did it well.

------
justinph
Jesus, I never realized how on message the guy has been for 30 years. If you
showed that 1985 Steve Jobs an iPhone, I don't know if he would be impressed
or be nonplused and see it as some obvious progression that he's had in mind
for a long time.

~~~
celoyd
His consistency seems really important to me, but it isn’t as remarked upon
as, for example, his perfectionism.

When you look at Apple’s product timeline, you can see he’s always thinking
several years ahead. Plenty of good products were just bridges to great
products. Some products didn’t make any sense until later.

Probably one reason that people like to speculate about Apple’s plans is that
Apple actually _uses_ plans, as opposed to hopes. I doubt Microsoft or Google
could give more accurate pictures of where they’ll be in 10 years.

~~~
patrickaljord
> I doubt Microsoft or Google could give more accurate pictures of where
> they’ll be in 10 years.

I doubt that 10 years ago SJ could have guessed Apple would make money mostly
on phones and music player.

~~~
allwein
>I doubt that 10 years ago SJ could have guessed Apple would make money mostly
on phones and music player.

Given that the iPod came out 9 years ago, in 2001, I'm sure the market was on
his radar. Heck, the iPhone started development in 2004, 6 years ago. And I
have to believe Steve has a vision and was simply waiting for the technology
to catch up.

------
CoreDumpling
Compare & contrast, Playboy Interview with Bill Gates (1994):
[http://www.playboy.com/articles/bill-gates-playboy-
interview...](http://www.playboy.com/articles/bill-gates-playboy-
interview/index.html?page=2)

Of particular interest are the somewhat different take on the established
giants like IBM, as well as this new "information highway" development.

~~~
aarlo
Yeah! This interview is great. Get to know bill gates and his take on
microsoft strategy in the 80s and 90s.

------
eddanger
What a great article. There is a lot of insight into what makes him tick.
Reading this article 25 years into the future makes me think his "reality
distortion field" is no distortion at all, just the reality!

------
comatose_kid
Talking about Commodore & Atari 8 bit machines: "I consider those a brochure
for why you should buy an Apple II or Macintosh. I think people have already
determined that the sub-$500 computers don't do very much. They either tease
people to want more or frustrate people completely."

Seems like he's believed that you can't make a good computer at the $500 price
point for a _long_ time now (his take on netbooks is pretty much the same).

~~~
joezydeco
$500 in 1985 dollars is roughly $1,000 today.

------
brc
I love the absolute irony of an article, printed in its day to carefully
explain to people what Silicon Valley was, what a computer was, and what it
was all about. Preserved for eternity on the internet and readable only on
computers.

~~~
epo
Sorry, that's not irony either, you perhaps mean an amusing coincidence.

Not being a gramar nazi but the word "irony" has a very precise meaning,
misusing it devalues the language. Explicit in the notion of irony is
contradiction, e.g. saying one thing while meaning the opposite (such as
saying about the Kin mobile phone "now there was a successful product").

Sorry, personal bugbear, my problem.

~~~
segabach
Actually it doesn't have to be the opposite. It just has to be something
repurposed into a context not intended by the original meaning.

~~~
epo
Granted, the original claim of irony was still incorrect.

EDIT: no, actualy I still disagree. Mere 'repurposing' in the "black is white"
sense is not enough, there has to be contradiction.

------
kemiller
This parenthetical caught my eye:

"(It is also worth noting that of the 100 Americans named by Forbes, Jobs is
one of only seven who made their fortunes on their own.) "

My, how things have changed.

~~~
chunkbot
Now how many people are on the Forbes' list of 100 richest Americans who made
their fortunes "on their own"?

(Not to diminish the work of those who started with "more" in life.)

~~~
jon_hendry
"(Not to diminish the work of those who started with "more" in life.)"

Assuming they've done any work?

------
jackvalentine
I love his answer to "Maybe we should pause and get your definition of what a
computer is. How do they work?"

It would be really interesting to see how he would answer that question now.

~~~
joshes
"At 1,000,000 per second, the results appear to be magic.

That's a simple explanation, and the point is that people really don't have to
understand how computers work. Most people have no concept of how an automatic
transmission works, yet they know how to drive a car. You don't have to study
physics to understand the laws of motion to drive a car. You don't have to
understand any of this stuff to use Macintosh--but you asked [laughs]."

Jobs has been on point for a while now; he's a man with ideals and beliefs
about technology and its role in society. He has been on point with this
message for _literally_ decades and he has seen his ideas through to creation
time and time again.

That's worthy of respect.

------
delackner
Some really amazing quotes in there including some off the cuff observations
that became truly prescient:

"If, for some reason, we make some giant mistakes and IBM wins, my personal
feeling is that we are going to enter sort of a computer Dark Ages for about
20 years."

iPhone, OS X growing like wild today. About... 20 years after he said that.
And Mac OS 9 (yes, the mac also started to suck), Windows 3.1, Windows 95,
Windows XP, Windows Vista, what better description than a dark age.

~~~
patio11
_what better description than a dark age._

The largest, fastest, most important rollout of technology in the history of
mankind. Seriously.

~~~
sudont
Yeah, but .NET, IE6 and a lack of any UNIX underpinnings scares a lot of us.
It was pretty impressive, though.

~~~
erikpukinskis
Actually, what scared me most was things like changing file formats and
protocols to make their competitors' software incompatible and using their
massive wealth to drive competitors out of business.

.NET, IE6, and Win32 aren't the most wonderful technologies in the world, but
they're certainly not the reason for the "Dark Ages".

And re: patio12's point: Microsoft presided over a huge, fast, and successful
technological expansion... it's just that it would've been bigger, faster, and
more successful if they hadn't had such a "break their kneecaps" style of
business strategy.

------
rradu
Funny how much has changed in 25+ years, yet most of Steve's ideas are just as
relevant today.

------
vinhboy
"yet our Macintosh computer takes less power than a 100-watt light bulb to run
and it can save you hours a day. What will it be able to do ten or 20 years
from now, or 50 years from now?"

Make fart apps.

------
np3000
_It's rare that you see an artist in his 30s or 40s able to really contribute
something amazing_

It is interesting to note that Steve Jobs' biggest hits came in his 30's, 40's
and _gasp_ 50's dwarfing what he did in his 20's.

30's - NEXT and foundation for MacOS X

40's - iPod, iTunes

50's - iPhone, iPad

~~~
jon_hendry
Also: Toy Story was made at the tail end of his 30s. (It came out the year he
turned 40).

------
ckuehne
He has problems with the metric system though: "Extend left foot and shift
weight 300 centimeters forward.". :)

------
flannell
Interesting article. I might subscribe to Playboy.

