Considering all that has been written about Steve Jobs, he is still something of an enigma. His financial success, however, is no mystery: despite an annual cash salary of about $50 ($1 from Apple and $52 from Pixar), he’s pretty well off; his 50% stake in Pixar (originally purchased from George Lucas for $10 million) is now worth about $3.5 billion (he travels in style, also; in 1999 Apple gave Jobs a Gulfstream G5 worth about $90 million).

However, money isn’t what makes Jobs interesting.

To me, Jobs symbolizes passion–about quality experiences, in general, and about great products, in particular. To understand Jobs, though, I think it’s best to go directly to the source. A few worthwhile examples:

• Video of Jobs introducing the original Macintosh, dated 1/3/1984.
• Original “1984″ commercial, produced for $900,000 by Ridley Scott (director of Aliens and Blade Runner). Scroll to bottom to see the video.
• BusinessWeek’s overview of Jobs’s management style.
• “Insider’s take” on Jobs from xApple Board Member Edgar Woolard.
• Text and audio from Job’s 6/12/2005 Stanford Commencement speech.
• Mike Evangelist’s thoughts on preparing for a Steve Jobs Keynote address.
• Slashdot’s post on the above mentioned Mike Evangelist column. The comments are worth reading.
• ArsTechnica’s comparison of Steve Jobs vs Bill Gates.
• Photos of Pixar’s office complex in Emeryville.
• The Steve Jobs dress-up game.
• Wikipedia’s entry on Steve Jobs.
• Interview in Rolling Stone magazine from 12/03/2003.
• Interview with ABC News from 6/29/2005.
• Interview in Wired magazine from 2/1996.
• Profile in The Guardian.
• Steve Jobs’s resume (compare it to Sergey Brin’s).
• Stories about the original Macintosh computer and the people who created it (including, but not limited to Jobs).
• Preview for Pixar’s upcoming movie, “Cars”.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Jobs’s story (and personality) is how he has consistently bounced back from perceived failure and other problems–not opening up Apple’s original software or hardware, getting fired from Apple, being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, etc. He demonstrates something that most of us know intellectually but have a hard time internalizing: you can be great at what you do without always making great decisions or operating under great circumstances. In fact, if you’re doing anything remotely interesting or risky, it’s probably necessary to make a few huge mistakes along the way.

Posted by Dan Grossman on Monday, January 30th, 2006 at 7:18 pm.