I’m from Gen Y. I love technology, how things will be done in the future and interface design. I’ve never owned an iPhone but love iTunes and my classic iPod. No one has ever accused me of being an Apple fanboy.
Steve Jobs was the greatest leader, innovator and individual of my generation.
Thursday morning the local radio stations were playing his 2005 Stanford commencement address. I don’t know that I’ve ever heard a better speech. I can’t think of anyone who has understood my generation and the future the way that Steve Jobs did. He was always there as the one that stood above everyone else.
Apple, NeXT, Pixar, Apple again. Success and then more success and then more success.
No one will argue if you make the claim that he was a tyrant who wanted everything to be perfect and done his way. You’d be right. But it worked. He was the one who knew what needed to be done and he had a company built around executing his vision. Apple became the benchmark that all product developers are measured against. No matter whether you make software or hardware. Every company wants to be Apple. Every leader wants to be Steve Jobs.
Stop right now. No one will ever duplicate his feat. It took from the railroad barons like Vanderbilt until now to have another person that much larger than life.
The world has lost possibly its greatest member.
My generation won’t forget. It wasn’t a bullet, but it was our generation’s greatest quiet killer: cancer.