Comment by wilsonnb
8 years ago
Jobs was not deeply technical.
If I remember correctly, Steve Jobs got hired at Atari because he showed them a board for some arcade game that Steve Wozniak had designed and conveniently forgot to tell them that he didn't actually design the thing.
I also think I read that Steve Jobs lied to Woz about how much Atari paid him for it so he could cheat Woz out of the money.
I'm pretty sure I read about this in a book called "The Ultimate History of Video Games". [1]
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-History-Video-Games-Pokemon/...
I've heard both of those stories from multiple places. I don't know exactly how you'd define "technical," he clearly wasn't a strong engineer, but I have heard multiple examples of him managing technical things. I remember around the same time he was known for memorizing chips and vendors very very well that he could source them very cheaply.
I think a good firsthand example is a one hour q&a with developers he did in 1997 soon after returning to Apple: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQ16_YxLbB8
He doesn't necessarily show off deep technical knowledge, but he is able to discuss strategy about technology directly with developers. Managing technology is his competitive advantage.
Not the OP but I don't define "technical" as "being able to manage technical things".
It's absurd that anyone would.