Comment by bitwize
5 years ago
Because if he didn't make the deadline, Steve Jobs would get on the horn with any company he applied to and tell them how badly he fucked up, just to spite him.
"You'll never work in this town again" was a real threat in Hollywood if you pissed off (or refused to put out for) the wrong producer. Powerful people wield power indiscriminately to discharge fleeting grudges.
Between that and his ":)" response to the Google recruiter getting fired because they were unaware of the collusion going on between Apple and Google, he will go down as one of the worst, most abusive tech barons in history.
I think he has already gone down in tech history, and it wasn't as "one of the worst, most abusive tech barons".
Pretty sure he's widely acknowledged as a guy who was an insufferable prick to work for (or an asshole Dad in the case of his daughter). Plenty of stories of unpleasant interactions with him.
My personal favorite of the early Apple stories was the one where Jean-Louis Gassée saw him park his big dumb Mercedes in a disabled parking spot and said "I never realized those spaces were for the emotionally handicapped" [0].
[0]: https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&stor...
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Unfortunately so, to the extent that this is true.
> how badly he fucked up
I don't think it's 'fucking up' to give something a good go but not quite make it, is it?
And why would every company in the industry even listen to a rant from Steve Jobs?
That'd depend on exactly how bad the screwup was but Steve Jobs was notoriously unforgiving if you made a promise and didn't have a good reason for missing it. That might not have been the case here, since they clearly slipped it due to the Intel transition, but if he was in an unforgiving mood or someone else was looking for a scapegoat, remember this example of how closed the community was at the time:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/04/23...
I think the "Steve Jobs" part is just a random assumption from the parent.
More likely he'd have problem being hired at that level simply because he would be associated with a major failed project, Jobs or no Jobs.
https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&stor...
"OK, I've seen enough, " Steve interrupted me. "It's great. Apple is going to bundle it with the Mac. Congratulations."
But then he paused, and stared at me for a moment with an incredibly intense gaze, as if he was sizing me up or maybe just trying to scare me.
"But I don't want you taking advantage of this situation. I'm not going to allow you to take advantage of Apple."
"What do you mean?" I asked him, genuinely puzzled.
"There's no way that you could have written that program without confidential information that you learned by working at Apple. You don't have the right to charge whatever you like for it."
I started to get angry. "The program is only half finished, and if I don't think you're paying me fairly, I won't be motivated to finish it."
Steve gave me another intense stare as he paused for a few seconds. Then he stated a single number, without explanation.
"One hundred thousand dollars."
"I don't know," I told him, "I think it's probably worth a lot more than that."
"Don't argue with me. $100,000 is fair, and you know it."
I didn't seem to have any alternative but to capitulate to Steve's price setting,
there are better Steve stories on that site, mostly about abuse and psychological manipulation.
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Not every company would, but the CEOs of the major tech companies that a guy with Terry's impact would have probably liked to work at? I'd buy it. Those guys talked all the time, and I doubt they were gonna let one hire get in the way of a major corporate relationship.
> I don't think it's 'fucking up' to give something a good go but not quite make it, is it?
If I understand correctly,in this particular situation, fucking up would cost Apple at least $200M--so it had to be a total success for him.
I'd put the initial fuck-up on Apple marketing, who used the UNIX trademark without license nor compatibily.
This was an attempt to repair the damage that had already been done, by passing the UNIX compliance required to become an official, paid, licensee.
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> I don't think it's 'fucking up' to give something a good go but not quite make it, is it?
If the CEO sets a goal for the business, and you 'gave it a good goal' but failed, causing the business to miss its goal, with consequences including lost revenue or lawsuits, in that CEO's eyes you fucked up. The CEO was counting on you to take a letter to Garcia, and though you 'gave it a good go' Garcia never got his letter, so why would that CEO consider you someone to count on again?
> And why would every company in the industry even listen to a rant from Steve Jobs?
Because he built this industry.
> If the CEO sets a goal for the business, and you 'gave it a good goal' but failed, causing the business to miss its goal, with consequences including lost revenue or lawsuits, in that CEO's eyes you fucked up.
Are you under the impression that for example lawyers are fired every time they lose a case and a company has to pay out?
It's never been a thing in Silicon Valley. This sounds like someone misunderstanding or inflating the stakes.
I worked at Apple when Steve Jobs was still there and it definitely sounds odd.
I had never heard of project-based profit sharing or being fired and named/shamed for non-delivery. I had personally seen coding mistakes cost tens of millions in lost revenue and the developers were still there and many got promoted.
Surely if he was promised $10 million and Apple didn't pay up there would be grounds for a lawsuit. Especially since that stock would be worth so much more today.