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Tuesday 22 May 2012

The Cult of Jobs

Thursday, 6th October 2011

The immediate beatification of Steve Jobs, the visionary Apple chief who has been killed by pancreatic cancer aged 56, fulfills all the criteria for mass delusion and is evidence of some kind of quasi-religious quackery. The Book of Jobs, indeed. Sky News report that Apple-obsessives are "flocking" to Apple stores, presumably to "pay tribute" to the man behind the iBook, iPod, IPhone and iPad. Here again we may pause and wonder at the Mania of Crowds. There are live-blogs and vigils and everyone is iSad and all the rest of it. Strewth!

To say this does not diminish Mr Jobs' achievements. It merely asks that we keep them in some kind of perspective and by doing so might better honour his life, work and legacy. But to listen to some of the weeping and wailing you might think that prior to the inventions of the iPod, iPhone and iPad no-one had ever previously listened to music, endured a telephone conversation or read anything on a screen. Apple improved each of those experiences; it did not create them.

Again, pointing this out does not deny Jobs' entrepreneurial genius. Starting with the GUI, Apple's products have consistently delivered for consumers. Or, rather, they have delivered for those consumers who can afford their products. In computers at least, Apple remains an elite and niche product. Say what you will about Microsoft or IBM or HP, they - and others - made computing affordable for the masses. (Jobs & Co made it elegant for the wealthy, which is not quite the same thing.)

But making people happy is not a small thing. iPhones and iPods and iPads do that. They offer great possibilities for publishing and have played a huge part in making it easier for anyone, anywhere, to produce content - writing, music, film, video or whatever - of their own and share it with everyone else. But, again, making things easier (while useful) is not the same as making things in the first place. How is not the same as What and not, in the end, worth quite as much.

Steve Jobs was some kind of gorgeous genius and his products have, incrementally, helped make like nicer, prettier and happier for millions of people. That's no tiny achievement and one well worth celebrating sensibly. That does not require one to rush to an Apple Store to hang around with depressed hipsters and make a fool of oneself. Those that do so reveal themselves as members of a cult that's just as stupid as any other and equally deserving of scorn and pity. Making an iReligion is even dafter than other faiths which at least had the excuse of being invented in older, simpler times.

This post was written, like pretty much everything else I've typed this century, on a Mac.

Filed under: Apple (6 more articles) , Computing (7 more articles) , Religion (158 more articles)

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Mark Attwater

October 6th, 2011 12:17pm Report this comment

Excellent article, and you do allude to one thing that has always troubled me about the Apple cult. Sure, iphones, ipods, macbooks and ipads etc. made some people happy, but it equally it often made them develop a completely irrational/addictive desire to own the next version. In the genius case of the ipad, I think Jobs even created the pinnacle of a fetishist product. I still won’t buy the notion that this is a good thing. Plus Jobs gave us itunes – the crappest thing ever to inhabit the earth!

Simon Mason

October 6th, 2011 12:45pm Report this comment

Steve Jobs became very rich by making products that made people's lives better and he was a true hero of capitalism.

As the economist Steven Horwitz says on his blog:

"Unlike the political and military heroes of war we too often celebrate, Jobs is a hero of peace. He made his money through persuasion not at the point of a gun, and through mutual benefit not oppression and exploitation. Those of us who really desire a peaceful society should not celebrate those who were victorious in war, but those who created value through peaceful, voluntary, mutually beneficial exchange"

Typed on my iMac while listening to music on iTunes

OpnSrcCons

October 6th, 2011 1:39pm Report this comment

Let's also not forget, like so many from his tech generation, his seeming pathelogical desire to lock-in users, abuse the US patent system and deny others the freedom that enabled him to achieve what he did.

A good old fashioned rent-seeking capitalist, no icon.

(however, 56 is too young)

Greg

October 6th, 2011 3:03pm Report this comment

Steve Jobs was also a driving force of Pixar, the animation studio that has produced some of the most enduring films of the last 15 years. He does not get enough credit for this, if you ask me.

Archibald

October 6th, 2011 4:43pm Report this comment

He gets no credit at all for BBC's iPlayer. I suppose this is correct, as the BBC just nicked the naming convention, but it was funny that the BBC didn't know that themselves and had to apologize on Breakfast earlier after saying in a previous tribute that he had. Those cuts are clearly hitting the beeb hard; I wonder if anyone at Apple was watching and now intends to use the footage of this as part of a copyright battle, as if even the beeb doesn't know it's trading on the success of others, how can anyone else know?

Steven Drace

October 6th, 2011 6:34pm Report this comment

is Alex Massie a second rate Christopher Hitchens? Or is it just me?

I S

October 6th, 2011 11:55pm Report this comment

His 'back story' is utterly compelling - orphan, adopted by loving working class parents, poverty stricken student who dropped out. I quite like his products, but I wholeheartedly admire his drive and ambition and his beneficial reshaping of the world.

Herbert Thornton

October 7th, 2011 1:04am Report this comment

Steven Drace - No it isn't just you. Massie simply couldn't miss the chance to lace his reluctant praise with a streak of spite.

Versus

October 7th, 2011 1:13am Report this comment

With all due respect to Steve Jobs as visionary, designer, sociologist, marketer....these toys do not actually make people "happier". Is our generation with all these toys happier than the previous without?

shockwaver

October 7th, 2011 2:19am Report this comment

petty massie

peaches

October 7th, 2011 2:32am Report this comment

Your dig at Apple computers indicates you are ignorant of the facts in the history of the personal computer. There was no such thing as a personal computer until Jobs and Wozniak created one. The idea of a computer in the home, owned by an ordinary person, seemed ludicrous in the 1970s when Jobs committed to making it a reality. Microsoft or IBM or HP made more affordable PCs, true, but they all got the very idea by copying Jobs's work and ideas.

Stever

October 7th, 2011 4:37pm Report this comment

Peaches,

It appears you may not know your computer history quite as well as you suggest. Apple did NOT release the first consumer/personal computer - IBM did with the 5100 in 1975 (after two years of development), along with Scelbi and the Mark-8 Altair. The 5100 was terribly expensive and doomed to fail, while the other two were could be purchased for <$1000. Granted the Scelbi and Altair were kits, but that's no different from me buying the parts to build my own PC today.

The Apple I was introduced in April 1976, with the TRS-80 and Commodore PET following less than a year later. The IBM PC wasn't released until 1981.

All that being said, to say that Apple created the personal computer market is untrue. Were they the most successful of the early PC manufactures, I would say yes, but they were not first.

Even if you argue that the IBM 5100 and the two kits introduced in 1974/75 were not "personal computers", then fine, Apple was first with the Apple I but the TRS-80 and PET were hot on its heels, so it's not as if Apple was enormously ahead of the curve.

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