

Woz's personal website - Maro
http://woz.org

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michaelpinto
Woz deserves more love and respect -- he was never a manager or a
businessperson, but he's a good person and there's something to say for that
in a world obsessed by money. If you're looking for a role model of a
technical founder he'd be my pick.

~~~
devtesla
> If you're looking for a role model of a technical founder he'd be my pick.

That's a good choice. Still, you might want to avoid some of the PR choices he
has made.

I think it's kind of shame that Woz gets as much mainstream media attention as
he does, especially surrounding his relationship with Kathy Griffin. In many
people's eyes he's just grabbing fame by latching himself onto Steve Jobs. I
think he would have gained less publicity but more respect if he stepped out
of the limelight a little more often.

I don't mean to be overly critical, because there are advantages to the
choices he's made, but it's worth understanding why Woz doesn't get all the
respect he deserves.

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barrkel
I had never heard of this Kathy Griffin before you mentioned her, and never
heard nor read of any connection between her and Woz until now. Wozniak is
almost completely absent from almost all the the media[1] I consume - I don't
think he has much mainstream fame and attention except as colour commentary
when Apple is doing or has done something.

Are you sure that you aren't actively looking for Woz stories, that there
isn't a bias at work?

[1] Mainstream media for me is a range of UK Guardian, Telegraph and BBC
website, Economist, NYT and occasional WaPo, WSJ and FT.

~~~
devtesla
I'm not actively searching for Woz stories, but wouldn't you perk up if heard
Steve Wozniak's name on the promo for Entertainment Tonight? It was extremely
out of place, but sadly that kind of thing is all some people know about him.

All I'm saying is that, even though Woz deserves a lot of respect, his
reputation has been distorted by the American media behemoth. In the end that
doesn't really matter, but it is something that happened.

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alexholehouse
Woz is literally my hero. He is one of the main reasons I got into coding.

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ubasu
Interesting to know from his "About" page that he was a founder of the EFF.

~~~
martey
There is no mention of him on the EFF's history page [1], but their initial
press release [2] suggests that he contributed funds at the foundation's
inception.

It is sort of strange that Woz claims that "he founded the EFF" and not that
he was a founding sponsor, like some of the other organizations on his About
page.

[1]: <https://www.eff.org/about/history>

[2]: <http://www.textfiles.com/law/eff.txt>

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icebraining
While not an Apple or Jobs fan, I've been reading Folklore.org[1] for the past
few days.

It didn't really make me appreciate Jobs more, but he made me look at Apple in
a new light. There were some awesome people working there.

[1]: <http://folklore.org/>

~~~
agent86
Just to be clear for those that don't know, folklore.org isn't a product of
Woz - it's from Andy Hertzfeld.

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j79
This is a random story, but I'm curious if anyone else remembers: A few years
ago, I landed on Woz's personal website, and noticed a small blurb about a
public AFP connection for his personal machine (I think, afp://steve.woz.org)
I connected and was greeted by a bunch of software (a lot of commercial) that
he made available for download. Even more amazing was just how fast
downloading the files were.

A quick google brings up this thread (from 2001!!! which sounds about right,
actually, for when I first connected...I'm fairly certain I was still on OS9
-- my my, how time flies!)

<http://macosx.com/forums/archive/t-10013.html>

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Tichy
Glad to hear that they were still friends - some stories were weird, like the
one where Jobs threatened to fire their design company (was it frog design) if
they continued to work with Woz's new company.

~~~
pkamb
Lots of weird stories, I posted this in another thread: _"I was a little
disappointed — Steve Jobs had indicated he'd write a foreword. But he'd never
written a foreword before and I said, "Just write what we were like back
then."_

 _"We sent him the book and he said, "Oh, I saw some excerpts, and I'm going
to decline writing the foreword." I don't know why because I'm nice to him, so
there must have been something he didn't like."_

[http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/200...](http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2002929498_wozqa14.html)

