HousingPANIC - The Housing Bubble Blog with an Attitude Problem, 2005

December 13, 2006

A speech HP'ers need to see

Nothing to do with housing, but required viewing. Enjoy.

Steve Jobs For President 2008?

39 comments:

Anonymous said...: I doubt it. He may go to prison for backdating options.

Even with a salary of 100s of millions he still needed to steal money by backdating options. Just amazing.

What did he say in a nutshell? I can't use youtube. IT's too slow on my PC.; December 14, 2006 12:09 AM
Anonymous said...: One of the most important men of the past 100 years; December 14, 2006 12:13 AM
Anonymous said...: I just bought my first IMAC yesterday! Awsome! BYE BYE Winblows !! I'm FREE!!!!!!!!; December 14, 2006 12:40 AM
Markus Arelius said...: If you haven't at least used a Mac once - just once, in your life - then you should try one out.

Until then it's difficult to ever understand just how profoundly we've all been given the shaft by Microsoft.

I love my iMac.; December 14, 2006 1:08 AM
Chris said...: That was really good stuff, Keith. I'm glad you put it on here. I'm gonna Google his speech and see if I print it out. Very inspiring, and at the same time, very prudent for achieving happiness in life.; December 14, 2006 1:08 AM
Anonymous said...: >>> He may go to prison for backdating options.<<<

I though he was cleared in the internal investigation. I have not read anything else on this. Are you just spounting off?; December 14, 2006 1:22 AM
Anonymous said...: We are blessed as Americans to have a fellow citizen like Steve Jobs.; December 14, 2006 2:51 AM
Paige Turner said...: Great stuff.

Bill Gates didn't graduate from college either.; December 14, 2006 4:15 AM
Anonymous said...: "bill gates didn't graduate from college either."

and so are the realwhores.lol! but they're no bill gates or steve jobs.; December 14, 2006 5:49 AM
Anonymous said...: So why are these people at commencements?

The problem is that college is there to get a job at Apple since Apple won't hire dropouts like a Jobs or Gates.; December 14, 2006 6:20 AM
Anonymous said...: "What did he say in a nutshell? I can't use youtube. IT's too slow on my PC."

He told everybody that they are idiots for spending so much money on school, that death is the greatest gift so you should look in the mirror everyday and be thinking I might die, and that you should stay hungry and foolish.

I love to hear what people like Jobs, Gates, Bransen, Buffet, ... have to say. But I didn't think this speach was that good overall. The only part I found inspiring was the do what you love part. Everything else I found depressing.; December 14, 2006 7:12 AM
Anonymous said...: The docudrama Pirates of Silicon Valley http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirates_of_Silicon_Valley

does an excellent hatchet job on Jobs. His ego-maniacal ways, the abandonment, financially and emotionally of his daughter Lisa ( yup the one an early Apple PC was named after ), (disputed) theft of ideas for Parc, his penchant for mystical crap are all laid out, - quite an eye-opener.

Clay Feet on the whole lot of them I tell ya !

-K; December 14, 2006 7:19 AM
Anonymous said...: They should call him "Blow Jobs" because that is all he is.
Steve Jobs is a rabid devotee of the counter culture i.e. the post industrial crap hole which has destroyed this countries productive economy in favor of "information"!
One of Steve Job's hero's Stewart Brands was involved in the first official testing of LSD-25 in Palo Alto California. This was the planning stages to bring a massive "new age" fascist ecology movement into the United States in the person of the "baby boomers" generation. Steve Jobs is one of the younger of the hard core baby boomer dopers but he's a new age believer none the less.

I say if you want to save this country then you have to go back and surgically remove every popular development (with the exception of MLK's civil rights movement)that has been placed in our culture since the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.; December 14, 2006 2:40 PM
Anonymous said...: Steve Jobs hero-Stewart Brands
LSD Freaks Meet Cyber-Hackers -
In 1974, Stewart Brand, chief propagandist for both the psychotropic drug revolution and the personal computer revolution, published a collection of his previously published essays under the title, II Cybernetic Frontiers. Two of the essays consisted of interviews he had conducted with Gregory Bateson, one of the architects of the psychedelic revolution in America, through his posting at the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, where much MK-Ultra experimentation took place. Bateson was one of the four or five most influential members of the Cybernetics Group. The other, longer essay in the book, ``Fanatic Life and Symbolic Death Among the Computer Bums,'' was first published in the December 1972 issue of the leading counterculture publication, Rolling Stone.

Brand began the Rolling Stone piece with the startling boast: ``Ready or not, computers are coming to the people. That's good news, maybe the best since psychedelics.'' He continued, ``It's way off the track of the `Computers--Threat or Menace?' school of liberal criticism but surprisingly in line with the romantic fantasies of the fore-fathers of the science, such as Norbert Wiener, Warren McCulloch, J.C.R. Licklider, John von Neumann, and Vannevar Bush. The trend owes its health to an odd array of influences: the youthful fervor and firm dis-Establishmentarianism of the freaks who design computer science; an astonishingly enlightened research program from the very top of the Defense Department; an unexpected market-flanking movement by the manufacturers of small calculating machines; and an irrepressible midnight phenomenon known as Spacewar.''

Brand provided a detailed explanation of Spacewar, perhaps the very first computer war game to be designed. ``Ah, Spacewar. Reliably, at any night-time moment (i.e., non-business hours) in North America, hundreds of computer technicians are effectively out of their bodies, computer-projected onto cathode ray tube display screens, locked in life-or-death space combat for hours at a time, ruining their eyes, numbing their fingers in frenzied mashing of control buttons, joyously slaying their friends and wasting their employers' valuable computer time.''

If this sounds like a mild version of the latter-day souped-up sex and violence video games of today--it is!

Beginning in 1963, when the U.S. space program was moved out of the military and housed under NASA, J.C.R. Licklider convinced his boss at ARPA (what would later be called DARPA) to devote a fraction of the agency's budget to computer research. At the time, the Department of Defense was the world's largest consumer of computers. Licklider became the director of an ARPA unit called IPTO (Information Processing Techniques Office), and, over the next years, disbursed millions of dollars to a wide range of computer and Artificial Intelligence research centers.

Until 1969, when the Mansfield Amendment placed restrictions on how the Pentagon could spend its research and development money, there were no boundary conditions on the kinds of projects that IPTO could bankroll. Billions of dollars went into the early development of computer networking, computer graphics, ``virtual reality,'' simulation, and other key facets of what, today, is a $9-11 billion-a-year commercial industry of point-and-shoot video games. The Media Lab at MIT and the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab were two of the magnets for this money and the research work which fueled both the Pentagon training-simulation programs and the evolving video-game industry.

In his book On Killing, Lt. Col. David Grossman recounts how the advent of high-speed computers allowed the social engineers, responsible for training soldiers to overcome their aversion to killing, provided an unsurpassed technology for stimulus-response behavior modification. The increasingly realistic video graphics, the advanced work on neurological processes--all hallmarks of the cybernetic ``man-machine'' project--transformed the U.S. military into a force of programmed killers, and ultimately became the social engineers' ``weapon of choice'' for twisting the minds of millions of America's youth.

The social engineers seeking to fulfill Adorno, Horkheimer, Russell, and Huxley's visions of a perfectly engineered society, led by a ``scientific dictatorship,'' were never far removed from the computer and AI labs where the technologies were being developed and tested. It was only a matter of time that, like the LSD experiments of the 1960s, the secret military experimental phase ended, and the American population became the targets, this time, of the sex and violence self-programming of Doom, Quake, and the rest.; December 14, 2006 2:50 PM
Anonymous said...: Headline from NYT's.
A Crunchy-Granola Path From Macramé and LSD to Wikipedia and Google; December 14, 2006 3:07 PM
Anonymous said...: If you think Steve Jobs is a self made man then you need to read this link. He is part of this milieu
http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/stone/rolling_stone.html; December 14, 2006 3:28 PM
Anonymous said...: Hmmmm, nice speech, but he appears to have the telltale hooked-nose that is so indicative of one of the "chosen". I guess that would explain him back dating those options now would'nt it?; December 14, 2006 3:37 PM
Anonymous said...: Love him or hate him, Jobs is an icon, a true American success story. Interesting little fact - Jobs was adopted, a bastard child in an era when abortion wasnt readily available and single moms were considered outcasts.

He probably would have never been born if the policies and attitudes we have today were the norm. How many Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Warren buffetts are we flushing down the drain every year?; December 14, 2006 4:13 PM
Anonymous said...: :but he appears to have the telltale hooked-nose

I've got an eagle nose and I'm Catholic.; December 14, 2006 5:26 PM
Anonymous said...: :eagle nose

That's an Italian/Roman nose, see Charlton Heston, a hooked nosed looks like an eggplant.; December 14, 2006 5:34 PM
Anonymous said...: Jobs is another sleazebag impersonating an innovator.

The truth is that many students should have gone to pharmacy school, after an associates degree, rather than a traditional 4yr college like Reed or even Stanford simple because... there aren't many white collar careers anymore.

Instead, we hear the same 'do as you love and the money will follow' crap which has produced tons of starving artists, scientists, and actors. Now, with Jobs being a member of the ownership class, he can say flowery things and yet, only hire the top 5-10% of any given class, exploit their most productive years, and then sent them off with a pink slip at the age of 35. Is that so venerable? I think not.; December 14, 2006 5:41 PM
blogger said...: You can hate jobs all you want (weirdly) but you have to give the guy props for innovation

he and his team invented the GUI, the ipod and digital animation

not bad for one lifetime; December 14, 2006 7:18 PM
Anonymous said...: Keith, you're the kind of fool who thinks that Edison was greater than Tesla because he had more money.

The truth is that Tesla was the greatest electrical genius of all time and couldn't make the billions because Westinghouse backed his work and had the rights to the AC patents. We need more Teslas, not more Jobs, Gates, Brin/Paige, and any of these other goof balls who know how to bilk their more innovative workers and public of money.

The more you post, the more of a mediocre intellect you make yourself look like. Did you ever study science, math, history, or anything?; December 14, 2006 11:07 PM
Anonymous said...: Greedy scumbag who backdates options and gets his friends at Apple to buy his worthless company at an inflated price.

Dildo! I'd never buy an Apple because Steve Jobs sucks!; December 14, 2006 11:32 PM
Anonymous said...: Jobs is a popularizer, not an innovator. He rode on the backs of people at PARC, Wozniak and a whole collection of smarter and more productive, but less socially savy, people.; December 14, 2006 11:37 PM
Anonymous said...: Of course Keith has a mediocre intellect. If he was any better, he'd be writing a newsletter and charging for his entertainment.

"Gold stocks are going to the moon!"; December 14, 2006 11:38 PM
Anonymous said...: As I'd said about Jobs earlier, why is he at a commencement when a true college education, as oppose to auditing caligraphy classes which anyone could do at an adult continuing ed community center at a fraction of the cost of Stanford, is of no consequence to him?

You see, he's once again trying to con impressionable young people instead of simply telling them the facts that one needs to attend college to apply for white collar careers in law, medicine, consulting, finance, and Apple corp since a h.s. diploma isn't going to cut it with HR depts and hiring managers. Really, it's that simple and the purpose of attending Stanford as oppose to let's say Oregon State is so that one has a better shot of getting interviewed at a Goldman Sachs since GS doesn't interview at state colleges. Again, this should be clear to people out there but instead, we get recruiting spin designed to fool young people into handing their ideas over to Jobs via Apple/Pixar Corp so that he can make his millions while giving those kids a pink slip once they're in their mid-thirties.; December 15, 2006 12:02 AM
Chris said...: Wow...as Casey Serin would say, "There are a lot of haters here. Sweet!"

Some of you think that just because Jobs didn't graduate from college, that he's standing up there saying you don't have to graduate from college to be successful. While it's true since he has proved that himself, that wasn't the message of his speech.

Consider his audience here. He was careful to only make a speech like this in front of people who are GRADUATING from college. For them, the implied message that it may be acceptable not to graduate from college is irrelevant to these people.

Also, those people sitting there listening to his speech understand that because he started his own company, he calls the shots. He is the brainchild, the motivator, the entrepreneur. He doesn't have to graduate from college because he was calling the shots and directing his own career, yet he had enough ingrained charisma to ask a lot of good questions and get people to rally around him. See, you don't need a college education to do that, but you do need to demonstrate the desire to learn and the desire to improve yourself over time, as well as those around you. The people sitting in the audience understood that.

While I am bearish on the housing market, I sometimes get an unfortunately strong whiff of the cynicism on this board, and much of it is because many of you lack what I think are some basic reasoning skills. In this case it is a failure to understand the difference between the message of Steve Jobs' speech and a short autobiography of his life.

One of you has explicitly stated that he is trying to "con impressionable young people", instead of stating that you need a college diploma for law, medicine, or working at Apple. Are you kidding me? Do you think he really has to say that to people who are graduating from Stanford? Ridiculous!

And all of the tangents people are making here...good grief. They see Steve Jobs making a speech, and instead of feeling the least bit inspired, or properly understanding the context of his message, people go into a tirade about how he has "stolen" technology or referencing Pirates of Silicon Valley. And one goofball decides to bash Keith saying that he would probably cheer Edison over Tesla. Sorry, but that's just weird.

Take the speech for what it is -- an attempt to inspire, and to clear the air on how to look at life and how to be truly happy.; December 15, 2006 1:21 AM
Anonymous said...: Its not just about his speech - the opening entry offers the thought "Jobs for President 2008".

Given that opener, all the stuff brought out in "Pirates of Silicon Valley" is relevant.

-K; December 15, 2006 3:47 AM
Anonymous said...: typical liberal crap..take a swipe at Christians (nobody want to die even thouse who want to go to heaven)...uhmm yeah really, hmmm I recall a few people to want to die to get to heaven and the 72 virgins...not in Steve's mind of course, in the liberal mind, the muslim mean no harm, it is all the Christian's fault; December 15, 2006 6:42 PM
Anonymous said...: ::And one goofball decides to bash Keith saying that he would probably cheer Edison over Tesla. Sorry, but that's just weird.

Yes, it's called cheering for robber barons over those who actually create the technologies of the future.

So, if we were to use the prior centuries heroes, it would like saying that Rockefeller was the innovator of energy because he drove 90% of the oil producers and distributors out of business or that Genghis Khan was such a great organizer/leader because he killed not only the kings and majors but every inhabitant of any city he invaded who resisted.

So fine, Jobs was successful in the winner-take-all model but because of his insincere rhetoric, people invite him to commencements whereas Larry Ellison, another college dropout (Univ of Chicago) and CEO of Oracle, tells people the truth that jobs are moving to Asia and that his company mainly hires stateside salesmen and consultants, that he's not invited for these type of public relations events. They're both cut from the same cloth, however, Ellison's the only one willing to level with the public then feed them a bunch of b.s. I can respect Ellison for his candor.; December 15, 2006 9:06 PM
Anonymous said...: Fellows, I'd attended Columbia many years ago and here's what I've deduced from the whole experience with ivy and ivy-like schools. It's essentially a way for people to feel like they're in an upwardly mobile cohort so that when rich alumni like Warren Buffett or Henry Kravis show up to speak on campus, that someday, someone else on the quad will be filling their shoes in the distant future. And sometimes, if the gathering is small, one can collect business cards to hob knob for an internship. That's about it.; December 15, 2006 9:31 PM
Anonymous said...: First of all, this thread is distracting in the sense there's some ivy envy and the idea of a billionaire being an innovator than a robber baron.

For one, Stanford's an elite school with elite recruiting. And if one fails at that first job, the name's of no value afterwards w/o family connections a/o a lot of money in the pot. I have ivy friends who're in dead end careers because outside of doing well on exams, they're workforce duds.

Next, unlike either John D. Rockfeller or even Larry Ellison, Jobs is a happy medium between an inventive person and a ruthless businessman. True, much of it was Steve Wozniak's creation but in a sense, it was more a two man team then just one guy doing the work and the other, simply taking the credit. That's a radical departure from the Westinghouse/Tesla deal where Tesla did pretty much 100% of the work while Westinghouse made all of the money. This was possibly the greatest rip off in history whereas in contrast, Wozniak was well paid for his efforts (some $200 million dollars). So how can you really fault Jobs?; December 15, 2006 11:10 PM
Anonymous said...: Stanford shmanford. Go Bears!; December 15, 2006 11:22 PM
Anonymous said...: Anon 11:10 is spot on. The others have some sort of issue with the man but use standard Bernie Ebbers/Ken Lay ad hominems to make their case instead of the facts. Personally, I like Jobs and even supported his Next computer, the first unix-like workstation at PC prices which eventually failed in place of an OS (on top of an Intel motherboard) sideline projects. The remainder of this project ended up in MacOS when Next was acquired by Apple. During this weird sort of science/IT project, a lot of people thought that Jobs was becoming irrelevant for the times and that's when he made his comeback with Pixar with Bug's Life/Toy Story 2 and then Disney decided to merge Pixar and Jobs became a 7% Disney equity holder.; December 16, 2006 12:42 AM
Chris said...: I said:

"And one goofball decides to bash Keith saying that he would probably cheer Edison over Tesla. Sorry, but that's just weird."

Then the mysterious anonymous person says:

"Yes, it's called cheering for robber barons over those who actually create the technologies of the future."

The reason I said it was weird is because you take a speech from Steve Jobs along with a positive comment from Keith, and somehow morph the message into a statement about how Keith would probably praise Edison over Tesla. That is a quantum leap away from the purpose of Keith's posting of the speech, and completely irrelevant to the purpose. That's why I said it was weird. I'll say it again...you missed the point.; December 16, 2006 12:49 AM
Anonymous said...: ::That's why I said it was weird.

I think it's a confusion of "hating the game" vs "the player". Of course people get screwed in big business but that doesn't mean that every minted billionaire out there is the ghost of a Bernie Ebbers or an Ebenezer Scrooge (since we're near Christmas). Realize, at both Apple and Microsoft, a lot of first line workers became new millionaires. It's the ones who'd joined later that were regularly waged salary employees but that's typical for established companies. So I see nothing weird in anon's pov, just a lack of clarification on the issue at hand.; December 16, 2006 1:07 AM
Anonymous said...: Hey there, I'm the Jobs hater and although I recognize that Wozniak had equity in Apple and left with a pile of cash, the fact of the matter is that as a society, we see Jobs as the innovator rather than its chief marketing officer just like we'd forgotten that IBM research had created PC Dos, not Bill Gates coding away till dawn.

Now, in contrast, Larry Ellison was an Amdahl (mainframe clone) programmer but people only think of him as Oracle's founder and chief salesmen because he doesn't talk b.s. to the public. Instead, he levels with them on the brutality of the IT business and in the truth of consolidation waves. Nonetheless, if you look at the body of Ellison's ramblings, he'd spoken of multimedia backend servers back in '93 and network computing in '97 which has proven to be more visionary than the typical IT wonk b.s. of a Gates or a Jobs. The difference, however, was that Oracle was too early for both product lines yet, in the world of corporate consolidations, Oracle's most definitely the back office behemoth so in a sense, Larry can back up what he says while keeping a bit of the hyperbole as well.; December 16, 2006 11:31 PM
Anonymous said...: I like Jobs and think that a salesman is what a CEO is. The idea that every engineer is also a promoter is a myth. Engineers tend to work behind the scenes.

Somehow, Gates has used that myth to promote himself as a guru on all things IT related. Fortunately, he's now moved on to charities so there'll have to be a new chief for the information age.

I'm sorry that Larry Ellison isn't acknowledged for his bluntless. I guess he's the HP of the IT world where he doesn't pull any punches so he doesn't get the same attention as either a Gates or Jobs. I suspect that being likeable rather than being frank is what the media requires.; December 18, 2006 5:36 PM

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December 13, 2006

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