HarryTheSpider

He sure could market.

IPod was not the first 'mp3' player, not by a long chalk. Up until then mp3 players were marketed on a 'geek' basis - mp3, 512 megabytes of FLASH memory (a cool technology back then). Ordinary people didn't know what that meant. He comes along with the iPod, sticks up an ad that says '1000 songs in your pocket', and the rest, as they say, is history.

Apple had 20bn more revenue this last quarter than they had same quarter a year ago.

In a down market.

Despite the bad PR about the manufacturers of Apple's products.

Many people have drunk from the kool aid...

I wonder though if we're soon to reach a point where Apple's cash pile will become a source for bad PR and grumblings? It's just sat there, earning interest, sure. But think what $100 bn could do if employed in other things?

A big '+' to geeky Bill Gates for what he's been doing with his stash.

cindyabs

I'm wondering if Bill Gates' "humanizing" process started when he got married? Sometimes I've noticed that very intelligent people often live in their own little world until someone kind of lassos them into life as a whole, not just their little corner of it. It's not a malicious thing, just a case of being unconnected.

Well that's my amateur psychoanalysis for the day.

Michael

Living in the Silicon Valley for the past 40 years, Steve Jobs wasn't that bad. In a lot of ways he was a lot like Bill Gates where both could be brutal but were also pretty fair to their employees. Jobs was never considered as a greedy capitalist like several others in the Silicon Valley.

Jobs was also lucky since after he was replaced by the Pepsi CEO who ran the company into the ground, Jobs again regained control and was funded by Microsoft to keep Apple from going under and the competition alive. That was Gates way of getting the government off his back but I suspect he eventually regretted that decision.

Bill never thought about charities until Melissa started pushing him.

cindyabs

That was the point of my post........

dakota44

Marriage may very well have had a positive influence on Bill Gates and his charitable ways. I do believe, however, that change can only occur if there is the underlying foundation for it. In Steve Jobs case, there clearly wasn't and marriage did not change his attitude about it a bit. Nor, would it seem, did his wife push him in that direction or at least, if she did, she had little influence.

Giantaxe

Larry Ellison is another example of someone in the Jobs mold.

dakota44

Yep. Likely more of them than we can count.

Michael

I would put Jobs and Gates as much more alike. They were both creators where Ellison is more of a buyer of other companies.

Also not everybody is cut out to run charities.

dakota44

You don't have to run a charity. Just part with some of the gold so others can do the good work. How many other mega rich CEO types kick in to the gates foundation? Not as many as should, given the opportunity they have had to reap massive financial gain. The ones that do, kudos big time.

sir_eccles

There's a bit more to it than that. Indeed, the original ipod was pretty mediocre and not that clever. The innovative thing Apple did was in the software by integrating it with a decent database and retail frontend to make it a piece of piss to fill it with songs (i.e. the itunes store).

caleyjag

My hatred of evangelists, libertarians, Tea-baggers and Republicans in general is so utterly complete that I feel compelled to worship Obama no matter how well he has performed.

Having said that I kinda like him on his own merits. Unless there is a big cock up I can see him winning a second term. Romney, with his on wishy-washy personality, will go for the negative attack ads route again and Obama will take the moral high ground and run a dignified campaign - I can definitely see him gaining a few swing votes that way.

Michael

It is all going to be about the economy. If the economy keeps improving for the next 10 months, it will be difficult for Romney to win. If on the other hand, Europe blows up or China stalls, that will put a lot of pressure on the US economy making it difficult for Obama to get elected to a second term.

Captain Cheesestick

Moral high ground? It's the election - he'll be every bit as craven and dirty as any other politician would be and he has been. Maybe even more so than when he ran versus Hillary for the nomination. Good heavens that was dirty. It's not like his run against McCain was all positivity and substance. Add I think the reason a lot of Democrat/liberal pundits were so unimpressed with the SOTU was that Obama ditched the moral high ground for populist naff. He's entirely abandoned any pretense of being a post-political politician. Which is hardly surprising considering it was all bollocks anyway. You can still like him very much - or at least be able to compare him favorably to Romney - without still believing that he's the altruist and Romney's the nefarious one. They're all egotistical lying wankers.

zargof

Well today's NFP was much better than expected, if the trend continues Romney's argument gets weaker and weaker.

Leslie

And Donald (anus mouth) Trump endorsing Romney was just so jizztastic that the Obama people retweeted the event in case any of their followers missed it.