
Apple at 40: The forgotten founder who gave it all away - grahamel
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-35940300
======
Stratoscope
There are so many things that might have happened but for one key decision.
You can't spend the rest of your life wondering "what if?"

But it can be tempting!

In my case, I had the opportunity to be the first programmer at Apple. I told
the story on Reddit a few years ago:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/h4n5w/](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/h4n5w/)

As you can imagine, I have wondered "what if?" more than a few times. :-)

But "what if?" can work both ways. I could have become a billionaire and one
of the most famous people in Silicon Valley. Or Steve could have driven me
from the mild depression I'd occasionally experienced into full-blown mental
illness, as happened with one of Apple's earliest employees. You just don't
know which way it could have turned out.

The other story on the front page today about Regis McKenna reminds me of one
of the more remarkable coincidences I've encountered.

As I told in the Reddit story, when I walked out of Apple's answering service
in 1976 I thought to myself, "Those guys are flakes! They're never going to
make it."

It was one of those things that sticks in your mind. I remember vividly to
this day exactly where I was walking and the exact words that were in my head.

A couple of years ago I was reading Michael Moritz's _Return to the Little
Kingdom_ and ran across this:

 _At first there was great uncertainty at the Regis McKenna Agency about Apple
's prospects. The account executive, Frank Burge, explained, "People who knew
Markkula and Apple wondered whether they would make it. We kept saying 'These
guys are flakes. They’re never going to make it.'"_

Other than "these" vs. "those", it's the _exact same words_ I was thinking.

It was definitely a strange feeling to run across that quote!

~~~
tomcam
You made the right choice. I have talked to lots of people who worked at Apple
in the early days, including some key people from the first dozen or so
employees. I never met anyone who said it was enjoyable working with Jobs.
(Lots of people said they grew a lot, learned a lot, and so on, but never
anything along the lines of "I felt great going in to work every day".

For those reasons I went to Microsoft. And you know what? I felt great going
into work every day. That's way more important than a billion dollars.

Also, I'm a somewhat high net worth individual (nothing remotely in the Steve
Jobs range). I'm lucky to be where I am, but the price of being a billionaire
seems much too high for me.

You appear to be at peace with your decision. It is a much deserved peace.

~~~
enraged_camel
>>For those reasons I went to Microsoft. And you know what? I felt great going
into work every day. That's way more important than a billion dollars.

Is it, though? I mean, don't get me wrong, happiness is very important, but
we're talking about literally a billion dollars. You can use that type of
money to do a shit ton of things, and virtually guarantee that your children,
grandchildren, great-grandchildren etc. live very, very comfortable lives.
Personally, given the choice, I'd gladly choose half a decade (or whatever) of
absolute misery working for an asshole boss if it will net me a billion
dollars in the end. Because for me, my own happiness is not more important
than the happiness and comfort of those around me and those who come after me.

~~~
dennisgorelik
You imply that making your [grand]children wealthy is something really
beneficial for them.

It is not.

The same way as winning big in lottery usually leads to misery, the same way
huge inheritances do not really make people happy.

It is better for your descendants to earn their wealth themselves (whatever
that wealth would be).

~~~
mclovinit
I completely agree. There is no guarantee that they will invest wisely.
Adversity is a great teacher and wisdom is the fruit of that labor if not
somewhat liberating. I think through that wisdom, the phrase "never enough"
has much more meaning. 10k needs to be 100k after time passes and we keep
finding excuses to inflate that number.

------
personlurking
I always wonder how true that last statement is - to the tune of "Find
something you love so much that if you do it you'll never work a day in your
life."

I've enjoyed things that, when they became an obligation, I stopped enjoying.
Though I think it says more about myself than the actual veracity of the
quote.

~~~
fmavituna
That's pretty much bullshit for the pure reason that a job very rarely can
only include the things you love. I love programming but I hate polishing up
the same features for days, but that's what's necessary to make a good app. I
hate testing, but it's part of the game.

How photographers really spend their time : [http://www.cambyte.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/05/piechart.j...](http://www.cambyte.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/05/piechart.jpg)

Having said that I'm sure, some people in some industries reach that dream but
I can't think of any...

~~~
epx
Love what you do (easier then "do what you love").

~~~
personlurking
I once had a psych professor who said he wasn't made to teach, in fact, he
pretty much hated it. Since it came with the uni job, he said he used his
knowledge of psychology to make himself enjoy it.

On the flip side, sometimes I see a really happy person doing a "dead-end
job", which also makes me wonder how much disposition plays into it.

------
CapitalistCartr
This is an excellent example of why startups are dominated by the young,
single, affluent. They have nearly nothing to lose. The rest of us do.

"If the company goes poof, we are individually liable for the debts," Wayne
explained. "Jobs and Wozniak didn't have two nickels to rub together. I had a
house, and a bank account, and a car… I was reachable!"

~~~
spacecowboy_lon
Was not Apple incorporated as a limited liability company which limits your
losses?

~~~
manarth
It's very common with "Close companies" (companies that are owned and run by a
small number of people) that banks require the directors/owners to act as a
personal guarantor on company loans.

Without that, it would be quite legal for the directors to take a whopping
loan, pay themselves a whopping salary/bonus, then have the company go
bankrupt without recourse to the bank. Rinse, repeat, profit.

~~~
CamperBob2
_Rinse, repeat, profit._

That "repeat" part is where this plan goes off the rails. You can fool your
creditors once, but then the word gets around.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
Unless you're Trump.

------
mooreds
Don't forget that it is silly to equate 10% of the company at founding with
$60 billion today.

He would definitely be rich, but there would have been a fair bit of dilution.

~~~
eric_h
True, but I think it's quite reasonable to say that his share would still have
been worth N * 10^9, for some value of N > 1

------
gnicholas
> "If the company goes poof, we are individually liable for the debts," Wayne
> explained.

Definitely not true, since Apple was a corporation. Creditors can only "pierce
the corporate veil" (and tap shareholder assets) where a corporation is a
sham, which Apple certainly wasn't. I hope he had other reasons for walking
away, since this one doesn't make any sense!

~~~
steveax
The corporate veil is often thinner than you think and priciplals of young
companies are often asked to sign personal guarantees on contracts.

~~~
redler
And lines of credit, leases, loans, insurance policies, corporate credit
cards... One real-world indicator that your company is beginning to succeed is
reaching the point that personal guarantees are no longer required.

------
SonicSoul
this is incredible. According to the article he backed out of the shares
because of possible liability of the deal went south, but that doesn't make
sense. If they incorporated his personal assets would not be up for grabs if
the company couldn't pay it's debt. Also the fact that he did this means that
he does care about financial stability and this seemed like a bad investment.
In either case, it's impossible to predict these things so statistically he
probably made the right move, but what bad luck!! Im surprised Steve didn't
get him back into apple once they were well off, or maybe there is more to
this story.

~~~
CapitalistCartr
Jobs even ripped off Woz when the opportunity presented itself. He was the
last person to give any part of "his" baby away.

"When they made Breakout for Atari, Wozniak and Jobs were going to split the
pay 50-50. Atari gave Jobs $5000 to do the job. He told Wozniak he got $700 so
Wozniak took home $350."

~~~
cjslep
You may be curious to know Woz does not hold it against Steve Jobs. He
clarified that with me before:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8706690](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8706690)

~~~
bithush
Woz seems to be such a gentle and kind guy who just loves tech and gadgets. I
don't think I have ever read of anyone having a problem with him. Pretty
interesting as most people at such a high level in any sector (not just IT)
are usually known to be assholes.

~~~
CaptSpify
I've always felt that if people idolized Woz more than Jobs, the world would
be a better place. That's probably just my own tinkerer/engineer bias coming
to light though.

~~~
bithush
You're not alone. Woz seems like a really great guy. He has a big heart. When
I think of what a true hacker is I think of Woz. A person who loves tech and
to tinker but for the better for others and not just himself.

------
rottyguy
Assuming he hung in, would he have sold out when Jobs got fired back in the
90's? We always try and maximize the winnings for a good story but miss the
critical thinking along the way. Risk=Reward (or massive failure). Just sounds
like Mr. Wayne was not big into risk.. Very understandable.

~~~
goodcanadian
Indeed. It calculates what a 10% stake would be worth now, but it is highly
unlikely that he would still be a 10% owner even if he had stayed the course.
It is not as though Steve Jobs still held 45% of the company at the time of
his death.

~~~
rottyguy
I'm also not convinced the stress of it all played didn't play a part to
Steve's illness and eventual death. At 81, Mr. Wayne is still celebrating
life.

------
snowwrestler
We've all given stuff away by making decisions in our lives. We make what we
think is the best choice, and then we live with the consequences. Regret
doesn't change tomorrow.

That said, were I in Woz or Job's shoes, I would have given this guy a big
check at some point, as a thank you. Actually maybe Woz did--neither he nor
Wayne seem like folks who would talk about such a thing if had happened. Not
likely from Jobs though.

------
oniMaker
As mentioned in this thread, the temptation to ask "what if?" is huge, and we
all have built-in cognitive strategies for dealing with it. If this ability
didn't exist, coping with non-fatal mistakes could easily overwhelm us and
paradoxically become fatal!

Imagine waking up every day knowing that you could have been a billionaire but
for a single foolish decision, and having no way to get around that thought.
You'd have a very poor quality of life indeed, even if you were perfectly
materially comfortable. The fact that he cannot keep an Apple product hints at
this; being confronted with a constant reminder would be too painful.

It's a subtle and useful lie to think of yourself or pretty much anyone else
as being non-materialistic or enlightened enough as to cheerfully give up
billions of dollars in wealth. No doubt if this person was given a second
chance with foreknowledge, he would take the deal.

It's only afterward that we cry "sour grapes" in order to reduce our mental
struggles to a manageable level.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance#.22The_Fo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance#.22The_Fox_and_the_Grapes.22)

~~~
CamperBob2
If I were Ron Wayne, I'd take solace in the fact that in 99 out of 100 similar
scenarios, my choice would have been the right one. If he's still kicking
himself, he needs to understand that he's a victim of survivorship bias. Being
"older but wiser" won't help him avoid the same mistake in the future, because
it wasn't technically a mistake at the time. He made a rational choice based
on the information and experience he had available to draw on.

------
girkyturkey
With my luck, this would have been a story from my life! But as I always say,
there are no "should have's" in life; there are "did do" and "didn't do". Life
is too unpredictable to think "what if". It reminds me of the Matrix when Neo
is in the Oracles kitchen and Neo knocks the vase over after the Oracle told
him "Don't worry about the vase." Neo obviously confused says "How did you
know I would break it?" and she finishes with "What really is going to bake
your noodle is would you have still broken it had I not said anything?" No
point in wasting energy on things that never happened.

------
japhyr
"I said: 'Steve, whatever it is that you want to do, you can do it a lot more
easily with money in your pocket. Go ahead and make the money, and do whatever
you want to do. Just don't forget what you wanted the money for'.

This was my takeaway. I have a very clear sense of how much is enough in my
life. When I get there I'm going to quit my job, and be completely free to
just take on work I care to do. I already enjoy the work I do, but I'd love to
be fully in control of my own schedule.

------
yuhong
I wonder what would happen if Gil Amelio stayed as CEO of Apple after the NeXT
acquisition. The beige G3 did sell well and helped Apple return to
profitablity: [http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/15/business/company-
reports-s...](http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/15/business/company-reports-
sales-of-g3-computer-lift-apple-back-to-profitability.html)

------
nxzero
It's hard to tell if he's not materialistic - though he seems happy with the
choices he made and in the end, happiness is a choice.

~~~
gdulli
I don't consider myself unmaterialistic. I'm happy that I'm comfortable and
secure. I don't put too much value on material things but some of them do make
my life better. If I could get a ton more money without anything else in my
life changing, then sure, I'd take it.

But if that money came with power, a high profile job, I'd have to work a ton,
have a ton of stress, change my lifestyle, my main social circles would have
to be with other rich people, nearly all the attention I ever got would be
from people I can't trust not to want something... just no. I'm happy now and
that's not an equilibrium I want to upset. Nothing about the day to day lives
of rich, powerful people seems like so much fun as to outweigh the negatives,
which if you pay attention, seem to be many.

"The best life is one the gods don't notice."

~~~
nxzero
Just to be clear, since it's a bit unclear, you're not the person the is the
subject of the article, but a random person responding to the comment I
posted.

------
kmfrk
Is he really forgotten at this point? I've been told about the founding of
Apple more often than I have the gospel.

Well, the _other_ gospel anyway.

~~~
mikeash
Everybody knows about Jobs and Woz, but I hardly ever see mention of the third
guy. I'd bet that most Apple fans couldn't come up with the name "Ronald
Wayne" without looking it up, and likely don't even realize there was a third.

------
Fr0styMatt88
Wow.... something jumped right out at me in that article.

The photo of Woz & Jobs holding the circuit board. Woz looks like he's jumping
for joy, loving every minute of it.

Jobs looks like a grump who couldn't care less and would rather be anywhere
else but there. He looks so incredibly unhappy.

------
randomgyatwork
Seems like this guy has had bad luck in his decisions to sell apply stuff.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Seems like he was happy with the decision, he doesn't strike me as
particularly materialistic.

~~~
m52go
One doesn't _need_ to be materialistic to feel regret about missing the chance
to acquire money. Maybe he has philanthropic goals that will go unmet, maybe
he has startup ideas that capital could've helped test, etc.

------
ttflee
Is there any term in agreements like that an entrepreneur who chose to quit
prematurely shall transfer his/her share at the price of 1 dollar in 1970s?

------
1457389
So am I the only one here who knows what Pahrump is (in)famous for?

~~~
ChiCommTroll
only on this coast

