In what appears to be a backhanded compliment, Apple CEO and co-founder has been named a “Classic Geek” by The Geek Factory, a Silicon Alley PR Firm.
In presenting their “Geek 100” list of those who made a difference in 2000, Jobs is in such company as Bill Gates (Microsoft founder), Albert Einstein (scientist), George Lucas (director, producer; “Star Wars”), and Janet Reno (US Attorney General). These five are dubbed “Classic Geeks.”
“The digital age favors geeks — those people who have such a brilliantly thorough knowledge of a subject that it interferes with their ability to schmooze,” said The Geek Factory. “There are a few people in this world who seem to have no problem keeping up with these fast changing times, no matter what the cost to their personal lives. They sit in front of their computers for hours, if not days, staring at their screens.”
The PR firms said the geeks on its list are the “backbone of the new economy.” Peter Shankman, founder and president of the Geek 100 said, “Oxymoronic as it may sound, geeks are the coolest. Not only do they provide the services we need, but they provide the market as well. Could a movie like ‘X-Men’ make over $100 million in a world without geeks?”
The entire Geek 100 list can be found online.