苹果总裁steve jobs的英文简介及评价!十分感谢

苹果总裁steve jobs的英文简介及评价!十分感谢
苹果总裁steve jobs的英文简介及评价!十分感谢

苹果总裁steve jobs的英文简介及评价!十分感谢
Steven Paul Jobs (born February 24, 1955) is the co-founder and CEO of Apple and was the CEO of Pixar until its acquisition by Disney.[2] He is currently the largest Disney shareholder[7] and a member of Disney's Board of Directors. He is considered a leading figure in both the computer and entertainment industries.[8]
Jobs' history in business has contributed greatly to the mythos of the quirky, individualistic Silicon Valley entrepreneur, emphasizing the importance of design while understanding the crucial role aesthetics play in public appeal. His work driving forward the development of products that are both functional and elegant has earned him a devoted following.[9]
Together with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Jobs helped popularize the personal computer in the late '70s. In the early '80s, still at Apple, Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of the mouse-driven GUI.[10] After losing a power struggle with the board of directors in 1985, Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT, a computer platform development company specializing in the higher education and business markets. NeXT's subsequent 1997 buyout by Apple brought Jobs back to the company he co-founded, and he has served as its chief executive officer since his return.
Biography
Early years
Steve Jobs was born in San Francisco[1] to American Joanne Carole Schieble and Syrian Abdulfattah John Jandali, a graduate student who later became a political science professor.[11] One week after birth, Jobs was put up for adoption by his unmarried mother, who was also in graduate school. He was adopted by Paul and Clara (née Hagopian) Jobs of Mountain View, Santa Clara County, California.[12] They gave him the name Steven Paul Jobs. His biological parents later married and gave birth to Jobs' sister, the novelist Mona Simpson, whom Jobs did not meet until they were adults. The marriage of his biological parents ended in divorce years later. Jobs dislikes hearing the "adoptive parents" appellation applied to Paul and Clara Jobs and refers to them as his only parents. He attended Cupertino Middle School and Homestead High School in Cupertino, California,[9] and frequented after-school lectures at the Hewlett-Packard Company in Palo Alto, California. He was soon hired there and worked with Steve Wozniak as a summer employee.[13] In 1972, Jobs graduated from high school and enrolled in Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Although he dropped out after only one semester,[14] he continued auditing classes at Reed, such as one in calligraphy. "If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts," he said.[15]
In the autumn of 1974, Jobs returned to California and began attending meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club with Steve Wozniak.[16] He took a job as a technician at Atari, a manufacturer of popular video games, with the primary intent of saving money for a spiritual retreat to India. During the 1960s, it had been discovered by phone phreakers (and popularized by John Draper) that a half taped over toy whistle included in every box of Cap'n Crunch breakfast cereal was able to reproduce the 2600 Hz supervision tone used by the AT&T long distance telephone system. After reading about it and later meeting with John Draper, Jobs and Wozniak went into business briefly in 1974 to build "blue boxes" that allowed illicit free long distance calls.
Jobs then backpacked around India with a Reed College friend (and, later, first Apple employee), Daniel Kottke, in search of philosophical enlightenment. He came back with his head shaved and wearing traditional Indian clothing. He returned to his previous job at Atari and was given the task of creating a circuit board for the game Breakout. According to Atari Founder Nolan Bushnell, Atari had offered US$100 for each chip that was reduced in the machine. Jobs had little interest or knowledge in circuit board design and made a deal with Wozniak to split the bonus evenly between them if Wozniak could minimize the number of chips. Much to the amazement of Atari, Wozniak reduced the number of chips by 50, a design so tight that it was impossible to reproduce on an assembly line. At the time, Jobs told Wozniak that Atari had only given them US$700 (instead of the actual US$5000) and that Wozniak's share was thus US$350.[17][18][19][20][21]
Beginnings of Apple Computer
See also: History of Apple
When twenty-one-year-old Jobs saw a computer that Wozniak had designed for his own use, he convinced Wozniak to assist him and started a company to market the computer. Apple Computer Co. was founded as a partnership on April 1, 1976. Though their initial plan was to sell just printed circuit boards, Jobs and Wozniak ended up creating a batch of completely assembled computers and thus entered the personal computer business. The first personal computer Jobs and Wozniak introduced, the Apple I, sold for US$666.66, a number Wozniak came up with because he liked repeating digits.[18] Its successor, the Apple II, was introduced the following year and became a huge success, turning Apple into an important player in the nascent personal computer industry. In December 1980, with a successful IPO, Apple Computer became a publicly traded corporation, making Jobs a multi-millionaire.
As Apple continued to expand, the company began looking for an experienced executive to help manage its expansion. In 1983, Jobs lured John Sculley away from Pepsi-Cola, to serve as Apple's CEO, challenging him, "Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water, or do you want a chance to change the world?"[22][23] The following year, Apple set out to do just that, starting with a Super Bowl television commercial titled, "1984." Two days later at Apple's annual shareholders meeting on January 24, 1984, an emotional Jobs introduced the Macintosh to a wildly enthusiastic audience; Andy Hertzfeld described the scene as "pandemonium."[24] The Macintosh became the first commercially successful computer with a graphical user interface, although it was heavily influenced by Xerox PARC. The development of the Mac was started by Jef Raskin, and eventually taken over by Jobs.
While Jobs was a persuasive and charismatic evangelist for Apple, some of his employees from that time had described him as an erratic and tempestuous manager. An industry-wide sales slump towards the end of 1984 caused a deterioration in Jobs' working relationship with Sculley, and at the end of May 1985 – following an internal power struggle and an announcement of significant layoffs – Sculley relieved Jobs of his duties as head of the Macintosh division.[25]
NeXT
In 1986, finding himself sidelined by the company he had founded, Jobs sold all but one of his shares in Apple. Around the same time, Jobs founded another computer company, NeXT Computer. Like the Apple Lisa, the NeXT workstation was technologically advanced, but was never able to break into the mainstream mainly owing to its high cost. Among those who could afford it, however, the NeXT workstation garnered a strong following because of its technical strengths, chief among them its object-oriented software development system. Jobs marketed NeXT products to the scientific and academic fields because of the innovative, experimental new technologies it incorporated (such as the Mach kernel, the digital signal processor chip, and the built-in Ethernet port).
The NeXT Cube was described by Jobs as an "interpersonal" computer, which he believed was the next step after "personal" computing. That is, if computers could allow people to communicate and collaborate together in an easy way, it would solve a lot of the problems that "personal" computing had come up against. Jobs had been criticized for not including built-in networking features on the original Macintosh (calling it an "umbilical cord to the company"), and he was determined not to repeat the mistake. During a time when e-mail for most people was plain text, Jobs loved to demo the NeXT's e-mail system, NeXTMail, as an example of his "interpersonal" philosophy. NeXTMail was one of the first to support universally visible, clickable embedded graphics and audio within e-mail.
Jobs ran NeXT with an obsession for aesthetic perfection, as evidenced by such things as the NeXT Cube's magnesium case. This put considerable strain on NeXT's hardware division, and in 1993, after having sold only 50,000 machines, NeXT transitioned fully to software development with the release of NeXTSTEP/Intel.
NeXT technology played a large role in catalyzing three unrelated events:
The World Wide Web. Tim Berners-Lee developed the original World Wide Web system at CERN on a NeXT workstation. Jobs' insistence that average people should be able to write custom "mission-critical" applications formed the basis of Interface Builder, which Berners-Lee utilized to do just that — by writing a program entitled "WorldWideWeb 1.0".
NeXT computers were used in the development of the computer game Doom.
The return of Apple Computer. Apple's reliance on ancient software and internal mismanagement, particularly its inability to release a major operating system upgrade, had brought it near bankruptcy in the early-to-mid 1990s. Jobs' progressive stance on Unix underpinnings was considered overly ambitious and somewhat backward in the 1980s, but his choice ultimately became an expandable, solid foundation for an operating system. Apple would later acquire this software and, under Jobs' leadership, experience a renaissance.
Return to Apple
See also: "1998 to 2005: New beginnings" in Apple Inc.
In 1996, Apple bought NeXT for US$402 million, bringing Jobs back to the company he founded. In 1997 he became Apple's interim CEO after the directors lost confidence in and ousted then-CEO Gil Amelio in a boardroom coup. In March of 1998, in order to concentrate Apple's efforts on returning to profitability, Jobs immediately terminated a number of projects such as Newton, Cyberdog, and OpenDoc. In the coming months, many employees developed a fear of encountering Jobs while riding in the elevator, "afraid that they might not have a job when the doors opened." The reality was that Jobs' summary executions were rare, but a handful of victims was enough to terrorize a whole company.[26] This practice became known as "getting Steved."[citation needed]
With the purchase of NeXT, much of the company's technology found its way into Apple products, notably NeXTSTEP, which evolved into Mac OS X. Under Jobs' guidance the company increased sales significantly with the introduction of the iMac and other new products; since then, appealing designs and powerful branding have worked well for Apple. At the 2000 Macworld Expo, Jobs officially dropped the "interim" modifier from his title at Apple and became permanent CEO, a job he still holds today.
In recent years, the company has branched out. With the introduction of the iPod portable music player, iTunes digital music software, and the iTunes Store, the company is making forays into consumer electronics and music distribution. Most recently, Apple entered the cellular phone business with the introduction of the iPhone, a multi-touch display cell phone, iPod, and internet device. While stimulating innovation, Jobs also reminds his employees that "real artists ship,"[27] by which he means that delivering working products on time is as important as innovation and attractive design.
Jobs works at Apple for an annual salary of US$1,[3] and this earned him a listing in Guinness World Records as the "Lowest Paid Chief Executive Officer." His current salary at Apple officially remains US$1 per year, although he has traditionally been the recipient of a number of lucrative "executive gifts" from the board, including a US$46 million jet in 1999 and just under 30 million shares of restricted stock in 2000-2002. As such, Jobs is well compensated for his efforts at Apple despite the nominal one-dollar salary. This approach reduces his personal tax liability because, under current U.S. tax law, salary income is taxed at a significantly higher rate (currently up to 35%) than the capital gains tax (currently a maximum of 15%) applied to profits arising from the sale of stock grants. Obtaining remuneration through stock instead of salary is a common extrinsic rewarding technique which ties management performance to financial benefits. Furthermore, it acts as a tax minimization strategy.
Jobs is both admired and criticized for his consummate skill at persuasion and salesmanship, which has been dubbed the "reality distortion field" and is particularly evident during his keynote speeches (colloquially known as "Stevenotes") at Macworld Expos.
In 2005, Jobs responded to criticism of Apple's poor recycling programs for e-waste in the U.S. by lashing out at environmental and other advocates at Apple's Annual Meeting in Cupertino in April. When asked by a representative of a liberal investment fund why Apple's programs lagged behind Dell's and HP's, Jobs wound up his critic by calling the advocates' complaints "bullshit." However, a few weeks later, Apple announced it would take back iPods for free at its retail stores. The Computer TakeBack Campaign responded by flying a banner from a plane over the Stanford University graduation at which Jobs was the commencement speaker. The banner read "Steve — Don't be a mini-player recycle all e-waste". In 2006 he further expanded Apple's recycling programs to any U.S. customer who buys a new Mac. This program includes shipping and "environmentally friendly disposal" of their old systems.[28]
Jobs kicked off 2007 with Macworld Expo at Moscone Center in San Francisco. He began the episodic keynote address by reviewing Apple's music business through iTunes music and video highlights, mentioning that rumors of the decline in Internet music business were bogus. Highlights included the long-awaited iPhone mobile device as well as the rebranding and official introduction of Apple TV. After the long-awaited introduction of these two products, Jobs announced on January 9, 2007 that "Apple Computer, Inc" would be now known as "Apple Inc."
Jobs was also involved in 2007 in an attempt to persuade former Vice President of the United States Al Gore, a member of Apple's board of directors, to run for President in 2008.[29]
Stock options scandal
In 2001, Steve Jobs was granted stock options in the amount of 7,500,000 shares of Apple with an exercise price of US$18.30, which allegedly should have been US$21.10, thereby incurring taxable income of $20,000,000 that he did not report as income. Apple overstated its earnings by that same amount. If found liable, Jobs may face a number of criminal charges and civil penalties. Apple claimed that the options were originally granted at a special board meeting that may never have taken place. Furthermore, the investigation is focusing on false dating of the options resulting in a retroactive US$20 million increase in the exercise price. The case is the subject of active criminal and civil government investigations,[30] though an independent internal Apple investigation completed on December 29, 2006 found that Jobs was unaware of these issues and that the options granted to him were returned without being exercised in 2003.[31]
Pixar and Disney
In 1986 Steve Jobs bought The Graphics Group (later renamed Pixar) from Lucasfilm's computer graphics division for US$10 million, US$5 million of which was given to the company as capital.[32] The new company, which was originally based in Point Richmond, California, but has since relocated to Emeryville, California, contracted with Disney to produce a number of computer-animated feature films, which Disney would co-finance and distribute.
The first film produced by the partnership, Toy Story, brought fame and critical acclaim to the studio when it was released in 1995. Over the next ten years, under Pixar's creative chief John Lasseter, the company would produce the box-office hits A Bug's Life (1998), Toy Story 2 (1999), Monsters, Inc. (2001), Finding Nemo (2003), The Incredibles (2004), and Cars (2006). Both Finding Nemo and The Incredibles received the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, an award introduced in 2001.
In the years 2003 and 2004, as Pixar's contract with Disney was running out, Jobs and Disney chief executive Michael Eisner tried but failed to negotiate a new partnership, and in early 2004 Jobs announced that Pixar would seek a new partner to distribute its films once its contract with Disney expired. Personal animosity between the two executives was largely blamed for the companies' failure to renew their partnership.
In October 2005, Bob Iger replaced Eisner at Disney, and Iger quickly worked to patch up relations with Jobs and Pixar. On January 24, 2006, Jobs and Iger announced that Disney had agreed to purchase Pixar in an all-stock transaction worth US$7.4 billion. Once the deal closed, Jobs became The Walt Disney Company's largest single shareholder with approximately 7% of the company's stock.[33] Jobs' holdings in Disney far exceed those of Eisner, who holds 1.7%, and Disney family member Roy E. Disney, who holds about 1% of the company's stock and whose criticisms of Eisner included the soured Pixar relationship and accelerated his ousting. Jobs joined the company's board of directors upon completion of the merger.
Wikinews has related news:
Disney buys PixarJobs also helps oversee Disney and Pixar's combined animation businesses with a seat on a special six-man steering committee. One of the committee's first decisions was to discontinue the production of so-called "cheapquels" (cheap direct-to-video sequels). Many also see Jobs as a valuable and influential advisor to Iger and Disney on technology matters. Pixar's latest film, Ratatouille, was released on June 29, 2007.
Managerial style
Much has been made of Jobs' aggressive and demanding personality. Fortune noted that he "is considered one of Silicon Valley's leading egomaniacs."[34] Commentaries on his temperamental style can be found in Mike Moritz’s The Little Kingdom, one of the few authorized biographies of Jobs; Jeffrey S. Young’s unauthorized Steve Jobs: The Journey Is the Reward; The Second Coming of Steve Jobs, by Alan Deutschman; and iCon: Steve Jobs, by Jeffrey S. Young & William L. Simon.
In iCon: Steve Jobs the authors point out that Paul Jobs, his father by adoption, was also known for his aggressive side: "Paul was soon hired as a kind of strongarm man by a finance company that sought help collecting on auto loans—an early repo man. Both his bulk and his aggressive personality were well suited to this somewhat dangerous pursuit, and his mechanical bent enabled him to pick the locks of the cars he had to repossess and hot-wire them if necessary."