It’s been ten months since Steve Jobs passed away and still there’s no sign that people are done writing about “what we’re supposed to have learned from him.”
Wired’s Ben Austen brings us “The Story of Steve Jobs: An Inspiration or a Cautionary Tale?”
Or … or … is it neither?!
Indeed, his life story has emerged as an odd sort of holy scripture for…
People looking for excuses to act like jerks.
…entrepreneurs
Close enough.
The Macalope wondered to himself after reading this piece, do these people really exist? More than one scolding scribe has warned us against using Steve Jobs as a role model, but are people really doing that?
His biographer, Walter Isaacson, claims to have met some of these emulators.
Isaacson said: “People have written about this book being a guide for managers. People tell me, ‘I’m like Steve! I push people to perfection.’”
I fire people in an elevators and park my Mercedes in the disabled spots! And yet, somehow, we keep reporting a loss every quarter. How many people, exactly, am I supposed to berate in public every day? Maybe I’m not doing enough.
“But you don’t need to push people to be like Steve, you need know how to be a genius at creating things, not just driving people crazy.”
Ohhhhh. That’s, uh … that’s probably harder to do.
Again, though, the Macalope suspects that people aren’t using Jobs so much as a role model as they are as an excuse. If you’re already an overbearing ass of a manager, holding up Steve Jobs to claim you’re also a creative genius just makes sense.
Remember, you’re already an overbearing ass, so this kind of crap just comes naturally.
So, the Macalope doesn’t really buy the idea that anyone’s changing their habits to trying to emulate Jobs. Oh, you might be able to change a few habits or alter a few life decisions from reading a book about someone’s life or, more likely, an in-flight magazine review of a book about someone’s life. But truly changing a personality is a little more involved.
[Editors’ Note: In addition to being a mythical beast, the Macalope is not an employee of Macworld. As a result, the Macalope is always free to criticize any media organization. Even ours.]