Make Something Wonderful

Sous titré “Steve Jobs, selon ses propres mots”, Make Something Wonderful est un recueil de discours, d’interviews et d’emails de Steve Jobs, agrémenté de nombreuses photos, disponible sur une très belle archive en ligne, mais également sur Apple Books ou en fichier EPUB à télécharger.

Make Something Wonderful

Je ne résiste pas à partager quelques morceaux choisis, parmi les plus inspirants :

There’s lots of ways to be, as a person. And some people express their deep appreciation in different ways. But one of the ways that I believe people express their appreciation to the rest of humanity is to make something wonderful and put it out there.

— Steve, 2007

How many of you are over thirty-six years old? You were born pre-computer. Computers are thirty-six years old. I think there’s going to be a little slice in the timeline of history as we look back, a pretty meaningful slice right there. A lot of you are products of the television generation. I’m pretty much a product of the television generation, but to some extent starting to be a product of the computer generation.

But the kids growing up now are definitely products of the computer generation, and in their lifetimes the computer will become the predominant medium of communication, just as the television took over from the radio, took over from even the book.

— Steve, Speech at the International Design Conference, 1983

You’d better have great people, or you won’t get your product to market as fast as possible. Or you might get a product to market really fast, but it will be really clunky and nobody will buy it. There are no shortcuts around quality, and quality starts with people. Maybe shortcuts exist, but I’m not smart enough to have ever found any.

— Steve, Interview for In the Company of Giants

Please continue to challenge me. It’s the way we get to the right decisions, and I enjoy it too.

— Steve, Email Exchange with Avie Tevanian, 1997

Some people are understandably upset that Apple has decided to stop developing future Newton OS based computers, especially the MessagePad. Today some of them are coming to Apple to protest our decision. This is OK. We are reserving a space for them on our campus and will provide them with coffee and other hot drinks (it may be cold out there!).

— Steve, Email to Apple Employees, 1998

Apple is the world’s premier company at building high technology products that are easy to learn and use by mere mortals. Beginning over 20 years ago, Apple has consistently set the standard for easy to use computer systems and software. Why do we do this? Because we are in love with the potential for personal computers to enhance and enrich the lives of regular people – not just with spreadsheets and databases, but with creative

— Email from Steve to Himself, 2000

When I was seventeen, I read a quote that went something like, “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past thirty-three years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself, “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

— Steve, Commencement Address at Stanford University, 2005

I grow little of the food I eat, and of the little I do grow I did not breed or perfect the seeds.
I do not make any of my own clothing.
I speak a language I did not invent or refine.
I did not discover the mathematics I use.
I am protected by freedoms and laws I did not conceive of or legislate, and do not enforce or adjudicate.
I am moved by music I did not create myself.
When I needed medical attention, I was helpless to help myself survive.
I did not invent the transistor, the microprocessor, object oriented programming, or most of the technology I work with.
I love and admire my species, living and dead, and am totally dependent on them for my life and well being.

— Email from Steve to Himself, 2010

Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact—and that is: everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you.
[…]
And the minute you can understand that you can poke life, and if you push in, then something will pop out the other side; that you can change it, you can mold it—that’s maybe the most important thing: to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there, and you’re just going to live in it versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it.

— Steve, 1994

At work on an Apple I, 1976. Photo by Joe Melena