Steve Jobs President & CEO, NeXT Computer Corp and Apple. MIT Sloan Distinguished Speaker Series

>that was something I respected about Jobs (and a few other industrialists) -- the combined ability to understand new technology, visualize how it could be brought to a broad market, and then do it successfully Jobs participated in a Q&A at the MIT Sloan School of Management in 1992, and one of the topics he discussed were the marketing pivots needed for the Mac and Next once he figured out what real world tasks those platforms excelled at that their competition did not. (desktop publishing and enterprise rapid application development) Video of the talk has recently been made available. [VIDEO]

> I fought with him over stores as did virtually everyone on the board of Apple, and it turned out he was right. He actually goes into depth about why Apple stores were necessary in a talk he did at MIT in 1992 [0][1]. Was it that he was not nearly as articulate in person with his team, as he was in this video? EDIT: Luckily, the transcript is available. The money quote is: " ... current distribution channels for the computer industry over the last several years have lost their ability to create demand. They can fulfill demand, but they can't create it. If a new product comes out, you're lucky if you can find somebody at the computer store that even knows how to demo it. So the more innovative the product is, the more revolutionary it is and not just an incremental improvement, the more you're stuck [in getting people to try learn about it enough to try it out]." Here's a fuller quote: There are some things I can't talk about here. In addition to that, if you look at how we sell our computers right now, we have a sales force in the US of about 130 professionals in the field out selling NeXT computers. They spend 90% of their time selling NeXTSTEP software, and then 10% of their time selling the hardware. In other words, if they can get the customer to buy into NeXTSTEP, then they're going to sell the hardware, because right now we have the only hardware it runs on. So they are out there selling NeXTSTEP right now. And this is what is required to launch a new innovative produc

Consulting is like building a castle and giving it away to someone else to rule and enjoy the fruits. I refuse to do it now. With each new contract, you start from scratch, again. After a while, you'll realize - you are just hitting a reset switch on your career, with each new contract that you pick up. I'm glad I share my thoughts with this very smart man - [VIDEO]

Steve said it too, but he said it like he was proud of it: [VIDEO] "You need all the objects that come with it to make it work"

In a talk Jobs gave at MIT [1] he described the NeXT automated manufacturing facility in a positive light. I can only begin to imagine how much better it could be done today than back then. Articles like this one like to point out the number of people involved in the Chinese iPhone manufacturing as if that's somehow indicative of something other than simply using cheap labor instead of automation. If we wanted to manufacture this stuff in the USA, we definitely could, and it would be done using fewer people through automation. My understanding is the core reason we don't do manufacturing here anymore is it's a lot cheaper to do it where industrial pollution goes unchecked, where regulatory bodies are immature or entirely nonexistant. When China gets its shit together enough to protect its lands and people from the toxic output of all this industrial activity, large-scale manufacturing will move on to the next victim. [1] [VIDEO]

This somewhat echoes some of Steve Job's own complaints about the Apple he was kicked out of: [VIDEO] Also note that at the time he was creating a NeXT, a Unix company.

Another interesting resource is Jobs speaking at the MIT Sloan School of Management while NeXT was in the process of pivoting to enterprise rapid application development. [VIDEO]

Instantly reminded me of Steve Jobs' quip and rant [1] on consulting and consultants. (skip to 15:20 if link doesn't automatically) [VIDEO]

I knew the guy who worked with Jobs and hated him with passion. Let's keep the useful image parts. “How many of you are from manufacturing companies?” [Some hands go up.] “Oh, excellent. Where are the rest of you from? Okay, so how many are from consulting?” [A number of hands go up.] “Oh, that’s bad. Yeah, the mind is too important to waste—you should do something.” “I think that without owning something over an extended period of time—like a few years—where one has a chance to take responsibility for one’s recommendations, where one has to see those recommendations through all action stages, accumulate scar tissue for the mistakes, pick oneself up off the ground, and dust oneself off, one learns only a fraction of what one can.” [VIDEO]