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Steve Jobs Takes Leave of Absence From Apple
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Jan 14, 2009 05:53 PM
from the get-well-soon dept.
from the get-well-soon dept.
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from Network World: "A number of sites are reporting that Apple's CEO Steve Jobs is taking a leave of absence till June at least. Speculation over Jobs' possibly failing health has run rampant in the past few weeks. Prior to the recent MacWorld show, Jobs said he had a hormone deficiency that had caused him to dramatically lose weight. In a memo today Jobs told workers his health issues are more complex than he thought." Reader Bastian227 adds a link to this letter from Steve Jobs on Apple's website, which also says that Tim Cook will be responsible for daily operations, though Jobs will remain involved with major strategic decisions.
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Submission: Apple's Steve Jobs takes leave of absence by Anonymous Coward
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Get well, Steve (Score:4, Insightful)
Love 'em or hate 'em, he's changed a lot in the tech sector. His presence will be missed.
Re:Get well, Steve (Score:5, Funny)
He's not dead yet!
Parent
Re:Get well, Steve (Score:4, Funny)
He's not dead yet!
He doesn't want to go on the cart.
Parent
Re:Get well, Steve (Score:4, Funny)
The Apple cart?
Parent
Re:Get well, Steve (Score:4, Funny)
That's why it's "Get well", not "RIP".
Parent
Re:LOL, No... (Score:5, Insightful)
He still built up a ton of excitement around all of the Apple products. MP3 players were drab and virtually useless before the iPod - a few years later everyone had one.
Apple products have influenced design across the hardware and software landscape (for the better IMHO).
Without the iPhone, there just wouldn't be any exciting phones out right now. It changed the playing field and helped bring us the G1 and Palm Pre.
Parent
you bullshit (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm kind of sick of facts
Fixed that for you. Facts:
1. Apple was the first to use a micro hard drive.
2. Everything else was either a tiny flash memory player (64 megs) or used a heavy desktop drive.
3. Apple used 400 Mbps Firewire when everyone else used 11 Mbps USB 1.1.
4. They had a good hardware/software interface.
As to point #4, I remember a nice Penny Arcade strip from way back (which unfortunately I can't find right now) where Jonathan asks Tycho how well Musicmatch staked up against iTunes. It went something like this:
Tycho: Imagine iTunes as a fresh orange, glistening with morning dew...
Johnathan: Okay...."
Tycho: And Musicmatch is a bag filled with dog poop.
Johnathan: Yuck! Dog poop isn't even food!
Tycho: Exactly.
Parent
Re:LOL, No... (Score:5, Informative)
mp3 players might have been drab before the iPod, but they were certainly far from useless.
Are you forgetting that Apple was the first to use a 5 gig micro hard drive? Everything else was either tiny flash memory (64-256 megs) or heavy desktop hard drives. And Apple used 400 Mpbs Firewire when everything else used 11 Mpbs USB 1.1.
You can argue the iPod was priced high, or that it's nothing special now. You can't argue that it wasn't revolutionary when it came out.
Parent
Re:LOL, No... (Score:5, Funny)
Inverse snob.
Parent
Re:LOL, No... (Score:5, Funny)
Let me get this straight: you let the opinions of the type of people who post semiliterate anonymous screeds on Slashdot dictate when, where, and how you use a useful piece of equipment? Wow.
Parent
He shall return as iSteve (Score:4, Funny)
He had to lose weight and do hormone therapy before all of the bionic implants could go in...
On the upside... (Score:5, Funny)
... Apple now has the thinnest, lightest CEO on the market.
Parent
Re:On the upside... (Score:5, Funny)
That is just sick... freaking hilarious... but sick. Mod up. I mean down, I mean up. I feel so guilty.
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Re:On the upside... (Score:5, Informative)
Meh. XKCD did it first.
http://xkcd.com/527/ [xkcd.com]
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Re:He shall return as iSteve (Score:4, Interesting)
When he first came back to Apple in 1998, he was known as the iCEO, because for awhile it was thought that he would only be interim CEO until they could find a replacement.
Parent
Re:He shall return as iSteve (Score:5, Funny)
and the "i" in iCEO is not a letter but actually a tiny picture of Steve.
Parent
Re:He shall return as iSteve (Score:4, Funny)
...so Apple will have a cyborg in charge, like MS had the Borg in charge until not so long ago? It's true. Apple IS the new Microsoft.
Parent
Soo... (Score:5, Funny)
Would it be safe to say that there is a Jobs opening at Apple?
Or would that be Steve closing?
One more thing... (Score:5, Funny)
This is all just part of the build-up for what will be the most astounding corporate marketing stunt of all time: the death and resurrection of Steve Jobs.
Nothing To See Here, Move Along (Score:5, Insightful)
Even with the prospect of Jobs having of an extended absence from the day-to-day at Apple I think we will see the company continue to do fine, or at least continue on their existing business path.
While leadership is a key element of business success, so is having a well balanced team of professionals driving your development/innovation teams.
I have to image Apple has this balance in their organization.
Good luck, Mr. Jobs (Score:5, Insightful)
I wish him well. As someone who had to retire at age 33 to fight cancer, I know how discouraging it is to have your body spoil what your brain wants to do. But I also found that giving up the full-time job really did improve my health and led to greater productivity in my remaining activities.
Seems like a good idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Since the major aesthetic overhall in the iMac, MBP and MB lines in the past year or two, and OS X 10.6 shaping up to be a smaller update (aesthetically and technically) to 10.5 than the 10.4->10.5 jump was; it doesn't appear that there is going to be much "new business" from now to then. Maybe some hardware line updates to faster chips, and some 10.5.x updates; but nothing major. I'd imagine 10.6 won't even ship until summer [wikipedia.org]; just in time for the WWDC in June.
Re:Seems like a good idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Steve may be a mirco-managing megalomanic, but he also has some REALLY good people working at Apple who don't receive wider recognition (much).
For all we know, all those annoying things about Apple (eg - lack of headless iMac, lack of Firewire on Macbooks, crappy iLife feature refreshes...) might go away with Steve's absence too.
Those guys working under Steve might be getting their chance to shine.
Parent
Cancer sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Cancer sucks (Score:5, Insightful)
Story goes that Charles de Gaulle [wikipedia.org], who was often referred to as France's "indispensable man" due to his huge influence in setting that nation's course after the Nazi conquest, was asked what he thought of that title.
His response: "The graveyards are full of indispensable men."
Parent
Scotty!... (Score:4, Funny)
Buy buy buy (Score:5, Interesting)
I just don't see that Jobs going changes the fundamentals of the company all that much. I think Apple at the current price is a great buy, and if it tanks tomorrow, it is a great buy. Time to take some money out of bonds :)
Re:Sell quick (Score:4, Insightful)
the market says "sell sell sell!"
Makes me glad I'm long Apple put options. Ahh, schadenfreude.
Parent
Re:Sell quick (Score:5, Funny)
I bought AAPL at $50 a few years ago, it's the only individual stock besides AMD (which I got burned on in the late 1990s) I have ever purchased. For a while there AAPL was touching $200 and my wife and I said that our stock in AAPL is going to pay for our daughter's college education someday.
With the way that AAPL has been going lately, I think she's going to have to go to a community college :/
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Re:Sell quick (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Sell quick (Score:5, Interesting)
Not that I recall - the major theme that I recall is that millionaires tend to be the winners of a high risk bet - entrepreneurism. They're also people of normal taste and lifestyle, with a large difference between what they bring in and what they spend.
My original point was that, on average, people don't value what they're given, just what they have to work for.
Parent
Re:June... (Score:5, Informative)
That's usually when WWDC happens. I think he's planning on doing that keynote.
-jcr
I don't think so. WWDC was June 9-13 last year, and Jobs' announcement [apple.com] specifically says "until the end of June." There will be tons of cool stuff to show off at WWDC this year, and it doesn't make sense to bet on Jobs' health improving enough to be able to do the keynote, especially if he won't be involved with operations beforehand.
Parent
Re:June... (Score:5, Insightful)
On a different note, this is a sad day for those owning AAPL shares - expect them to plunge even further than they have over the past year.
Well, if you didn't see this coming a mile off, you probably shouldn't be in the market at all.
Parent
Re:June... (Score:5, Funny)
The iDroids dream of them.
Parent
Re:June... (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:5, Insightful)
No.
If the company is sound, this will be a short term drop follwed by a recovery. If you own shares, and think AAPL is sound without Jobs, then selling makes no sense. Instead, you should be buying the discounted shares in anticipation of a recovery, which is what strong companies do.
On the other hand, if you think AAPL is not strong without Jobs, then WTF were you doing buying AAPL in the first place?
In short, you are making the same mistake all amateurs make.
And no, I'm not a pro, but this point has been emphasized enough, and proven accurate enough, that I take it as correct.
Parent
Re:As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:4, Insightful)
Also AAPL is good to own in a recession.
Imagine the total demand for computers shrink 10%.
If you're Dell, you car a lot.
If you're Apple, you can still double your sales, you simply grow in market share.
Parent
Re:As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:5, Funny)
If you're Dell, you car a lot.
Do we have to bring car analogies into everything?
Parent
Re:As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:4, Insightful)
This is true, but intriguingly, Apple also sells iPhones and iPod Touches, which many people can use as substitute computers. A friend of mine got iPod Touch for his birthday and pecks out his documents with the Notes application and emails them around, instead of using a computer.
iPhones are cheaper than any computers, even netbooks, and are not significantly different in price from other smartphones.
Apple has a pretty big iPhone developer community now, and they are compensated pretty well through the App Store. What do those nice folks who made $100,000 do with their well-deserved gains? Buy 17" MacBook Pros, of course. Tax deductible and all that. And as lovely as a well-designed sports car, just a lot cheaper.
The one huge advantage Apple has is that people love their products, so they will scrimp and save and suffer to buy them. For this reason, I expect them to gain market share, especially in tough times. The enthusiasts still buy, while the pragmatists stop buying. Thus, the total market shrinks but Apple's market share is likely to increase.
D
Parent
Re:As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:5, Interesting)
I am in the market and write trading systems, and could not have said it better myself.
The thing about Steve Jobs and these sorts of leaders is when to let go. Lou Gerstner brought back IBM from the dead. Then he let go. IBM is still alive and kicking.
Nokia's past CEO made Nokia what it was and then he let go. Nokia is still alive and kicking.
Microsoft is an example of how one half let's go and the other half does not. I am actually much more pessimistic with Microsoft than Apple.
In the past Apple lacked execution. They had great ideas, but poor execution. Now Apple has execution, and it is NOT STEVE JOBS that did the execution. Think about it, how well did Apple execute with Steve Jobs previously? Or how about Next? NOT AT ALL! What was different this time is that Steve Jobs built a team...
Ideas are a dime a dozen. The ability to execute on the idea is what makes the difference... And that Apple can do...
Parent
Re:As always, amatuers like you fail at stocks (Score:5, Funny)
On the other hand, if you think AAPL is not strong without Jobs,
Well, I am a whiney apple fanboy, so of course I believed Apple's statements saying Jobs was in good health & thought he'd be running the company for years to come....
Parent
Re:June... (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think so.
Don't count Apple out just because Jobs is gone. He isn't the ONLY person working at Apple and he certainly isn't the once and future designer.
Sure they might not do as well but they still have Ipods, Itunes, Imacs and a lot of Fanboys and Girls.
And say what you will Apple does make some good, if expensive hardware and software.
Jobs may be more than just a figurehead but he is hardly all the company has going for it.
Parent
Re:June... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ohh and I don't know it might also be a sad day for his family. Let's get some perspective here. He has serious health issues and people seem to care more about the stock prices.
Parent
Nah. (Score:5, Interesting)
If he was going for six months of chemo, he wouldn't be talking about returning in six months. More like a year. I think he's taking the leave between now and the next major event, which would be WWDC.
-jcr
Parent
Re:Cancer (Score:5, Informative)
Your data is not relevant, and Jobs and Patrick Swayze are going throgh very different things. Jobs had/has a neuroendocrine tumor, which is much more survivable than the much more common adenocarcinoma that Swayze has, which has a 5% 5-year survival rate. Jobs basically has a completely different type of cancer than you usually think of when you hear the term pancreatic cancer.
Parent
Re:Pancreatic Cancer (Score:5, Informative)
Learn to discriminate your pancreatic cancers. Adenocarcinoma has a 5% survival rate. Steve had a islet cell neuroendocrine tumor, which has a 50 to 75% 5 year survival.
Parent
I meant, good thing Disney bought Pixar (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:What's changed? (Score:5, Insightful)
Jobs has had more than a decade with which to root out the nonperformers at Apple and replace them with performers. Performers can carry on in the boss' absence. Nonperformers cannot.
If over all that time he did nothing to replace the people who couldn't run Apple with people who could, he's not as good a CEO as we all thought.
Parent
Re:Wow... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm going to make a /. post next time Michael Morhaime (head of Blizzard) is hung over. Honestly, what other CEOs get this cult level of worship?
What other CEOs have personally made noticeable changes to the world?
Jobs was indirectly responsible for the IBM PC, which is what "PC compatible" computers were imitations of. IBM created the PC in response to the threat they felt from Apple.
Jobs was responsible for bringing a lot of the ideas from Xerox PARC to a mainstream market, something Xerox couldn't have done. Most people don't realize that Apple pioneered the "noun, then verb" paradigm we're all familiar with in GUIs (select an icon, then choose something to do with it); Xerox's GUI required the user to select an action first, before selecting the item upon which to perform it. This makes sense if you're used to a command line, but it's less intuitive to the masses.
After leaving Apple, Jobs created NeXT, which was the source of much of what became Mac OS X. Microsoft has been incorporating a lot of Apple's ideas into Vista and Windows 7.
Jobs bought Pixar from George Lucas, and was at the helm during the creation of the first feature film ever to be entirely computer animated. Jobs now sits on the board of directors of Disney and owns 7% of the company. RenderMan has become an industry standard.
This isn't worship; Jobs has been genuinely influential in a lot of areas. The fact that you (correctly) felt the need to add "(head of Blizzard)" after Morhaime's name is why he doesn't get this kind of attention. Sure, Blizzard has had a significant impact on computer gaming... but what else has he done?
Parent
Re:Shoulda eaten more meat, Steve-o! (Score:5, Insightful)
Even healthy living can kill you I guess.
Eat more bacon, you won't live long. but at least you can have some bacon.
Parent