The best quotes from arguably America's greatest entrepreneur and ex-CEO...

[Dien Rice]

Originally Posted by Phil

Dien,

Definitely correct...

You and Gordon should [Hookup] with Steve Jobs (Or) an ''Imaginary'' and Start Spinning misc. Versions of Copyright and Trademark {safe} Steve Jobs related HOTSHEETS...

How Jobs sold Conformity to the Hipsters...

Good stuff Worth Applying into Everyday businesses! ....
http://news.google.com/news/story?q=...ed=0CB4QqgIwAA

Hi Phil,

Great article! Thanks for pointing it out...

I have a Macbook... It's about 5 years old now. But it still works! I'm typing on it right now...

Every laptop I've had before that was a Windows laptop (mostly Dells or Toshibas). But the thing is, none of them lasted beyond about two years!

(By the way, I installed Windows on my Macbook too, so I have both Windows and Mac OS X on my laptop.)

In most cases with my previous laptops, something went wrong with the screen after about 2 years. I'd get it fixed, but then a month or two later, it would happen again. After spending a few hundred bucks on constantly repairing the screen, I'd figure - it's probably time for a new laptop.

Now, my Macbook isn't perfect. My hard drive died once (luckily I had just backed it up) - and I replaced it with a bigger hard drive. My wi-fi connector (called "Airport" in Apple lingo) died, but I have a replacement. The thing is, it was fixable. And, it was simple enough that I did it myself. (For the wi-fi, I just bought an external wi-fi device I plug in my USB port, which works. For the hard drive, it was no longer under warranty, but the "Apple Genius" guy at the Apple store told me how to do it, and it wasn't hard to replace myself...)

So, I agree with this quote from the article Phil linked to...

"As The Economist pointed out in an editorial a few years ago, the most salient feature of Apple products is that they work."

I can say my Macbook "works" better than any of my previous (non-Apple) laptops.

Of course, Apple's designs are nice too. But the attraction of Apple products is more than just how "pretty" they are. There is "substance" behind it too.

I like this quote from Steve Jobs, from 1985...

"We think the Mac will sell zillions, but we didn’t build the Mac for anybody else. We built it for ourselves. We were the group of people who were going to judge whether it was great or not. We weren’t going to go out and do market research. We just wanted to build the best thing we could build.

"When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through."

I find it fascinating that he seems to look at technology the way an old fashioned craftsman (or craftswoman) would look at producing "beauty" along with functionality and quality in their craft.

It makes me think of the "beauty" of Shaker furniture, or of the designs of Frank Lloyd Wright. They combine functionality with beauty and quality.

Why not do the same with technology? Apple has managed to do so - and reaped the financial rewards as a result!

(They also made things "easy". MP3 players were complicated to use - until the iPod, with iTunes software, came along. The fact I could replace my own Macbook hard drive is only because Apple designed it in a way so it was easier to do, compared to other computers.)

I think there are probably HUGE opportunities in applying these kinds of ideas to other areas too...

(Okay - I'll climb down off my soap box now! )

Best wishes,

Dien