Letting Go Of Steve

Jobs had been teaching us to say goodbye to all that for decades — we just didn’t know it.

… in these final years, when the auditorium lights in would go down and the crowd would go wild for Jobs, who increasingly greeted his followers and touted the latest neat, new thing even as he wore the look of a person who was not going into that future with us.

He would be getting off here; we were to proceed without him … Let it go and look ahead was the message all along.
Hank Stueval in the Washington Post

Okay, I’m going to cry some more.

Such a lovely piece. Not that Steve’s death has sunk in—I can’t think of anything weirder than seeing the words Steve Jobs and Dead together. Was there ever anybody more alive, more publicly embracing of this temporary condition we call our lives. And Jobs and I had so much in common. Hippies who wouldn’t take direction from anybody, the kind of people who have to do things their own way. Perhaps that’s what made it so personal; I recognized his star—you know, the one by which you set your course. Not that my own outcome didn’t fall apart, but still, if you are born that way, you are.

The Lion Sleeps Tonight

What is important to understand is that these same messages about how awful the latest version of Mac OS X is appear each and every time there’s a new upgrade. Thomas Reed, Apple Discussions

An Apple user since 1992, and OS X since Jaguar—I strongly disagree.

The Silence of the iPad

It is also dead quiet—no fan, no humming, nada. This is the future of computing. Daring Fireball.

I don’t doubt it. Did I mention? I bought an iPad? Did you imagine I would not?

Like so much of the future, the iPad tiptoes in on little cats’ feet. I wasn’t knocked out by Steve’s unveiling, I don’t think anyone was. Nothing like the time the big screen zeroed in on his right front pocket and he withdrew, not from the pocket of his jeans, but from the watch pocket, that itty-bitty Shuffle. Now that was a wow moment.

No Squalor, Thanks

I’m surprised no one has mentioned, in all this flap about the iPad—and I have my own theories about that name, I think it was Steve’s, pardon me, Teh Steve’s idea, and no one wanted to disabuse him. I mean, we know this thing has been His baby, for a long time. If a problem with the name didn’t occur to him—would you want to be the one to tell him?

Oh Frabjous iPad

Just call me a happy camper. Why, this thing’ll write my books for me. Where do I sign. (Not to worry, already have.)

{ fin }

Apple Tablet Rorschach

The invite, which shows the Apple logo superimposed over a series of graffiti-style paint splatters, gives few clues as to what Apple will announce at the event.

Now, now. Use your noggin. Colors. Paint. Freeform. Outside the margins. Creative. Do whatever you want? Layers. Layers? Be original. Lots of splatters. Kids? Education? (Little mouse suggested as much to me. A smart little mouse.) (Did you know that Steve Jobs has no sense of humor whatsoever?) (Which makes Dan Lyons even funnier, even more talented, more necessary to this world.) (Where was I.)

Snow Leopard Stumbles

You’d think it such a lithe creature. And indeed, Apple did a remarkable thing in releasing an OS update that is cheaper, smaller and more streamlined.

Until it bricked my external drives. All of them, except one lame, elderly firewire, thirty whole gigs in size. So we’re talking a chipset issue here, but not just Firewire. Three backup drives I used for USB backups—

Tablet of God

I was stricken by a cold realization this morning. Mid-tablet-rumor-euphoria, mid-schadenfreude (look it up.) This mythical tablet isn’t what I’ve been waiting for at all.