Detailed item info | Size | | Length: | 368 pages | | Height: | 9.5 in. | | Width: | 6.5 in. | | Thickness: | 1.2 in. | | Weight: | 23.4 oz. |
| | Publisher's Note | iCon takes a look at the most astounding figure in a business era noted for its mavericks, oddballs, and iconoclasts. Drawing on a wide range of sources, Jeffrey Young and William Simon provide new perspectives on the legendary creation of Apple, detail Jobs's meteoric rise, and the devastating plunge that left him not only out of Apple, but out of the computer-making business entirely. This unflinching and completely unauthorized portrait reveals both sides of Jobs's role in the remarkable rise of the Pixar animation studio, also re-creates the acrimony between Jobs and Disney's Michael Eisner, and examines Jobs's dramatic his rise from the ashes with his recapture of Apple. The authors examine the takeover and Jobs's reinvention of the company with the popular iMac and his transformation of the industry with the revolutionary iPod. iCon is must reading for anyone who wants to understand how the modern digital age has been formed, shaped, and refined by the most influential figure of the age–a master of three industries: movies, music, and computers.
Lightning never strikes twice, but Steve Jobs has, transforming modern culture first with the Macintosh and more recently with the iPod. He has dazzled and delighted audiences with his Pixar movies. And he has bedeviled, destroyed, and demoralized hundreds of people along the way. Steve Jobs is the most interesting character of the digital age.
What a long, strange journey it has been. With the mainstream success of the iPod, Pixar's string of hits and subsequent divorce from Disney, and Steve's triumphant return to Apple, his story is better than any fiction. Ten years after the leading maverick of the computer age and the king of digital cool crashed from the height of Apple's meteoric rise, Steve Jobs rose from the ashes in a Machiavellian coup that only he could have orchestrated--and has now become more famous than ever.
In this encore to his classic 1987 unauthorized biography of Steve Jobs--a major bestseller--Jeffrey Young examines Jobs' remarkable resurgence, one of the most amazing business comeback stories in recent years. Drawing on a wide range of sources in Silicon Valley and Hollywood, he details how Jobs put Apple back on track, first with the iMac and then with the iPod, and traces Jobs' role in the remarkable rise of the Pixar animation studio, including his rancorous feud with Disney's Michael Eisner.
| | Industry reviews | "…<i>getAbstract.com</i>…recommends it highly to all business readers…" (<i>Financial Times</i>, 16<sup>th</sup> January 2006)
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"...the writing is savvy and lively...even readers with a scant interest in computers, technology or animated movies will find the tale entertaining..." (<i>www.getabstract.com</i>, 29 Aug. 2005)
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"...a story of the personalities behind the facts and figures...includes some interesting personal touches..." (<i>Liverpool Daily Post</i>, 22<sup>nd</sup> June 2005)
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"…rich in anecdotes and retellings of turning points in the lives of Jobs, Apple and Pixar…" (<i>Information Age, 1<sup>st</sup> August 2005)</i>
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"...the authors paint a vivid picture of Jobs as an occasional genius and a regular jerk. All of which makes for gripping reading for any Mac fan..." (<i>icreate</i>, July-December 2005)
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"…Young and Simon are particularly good at telling the inside story…" (<i>Belfast Sunday Life</i>, 3 July 2005)
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"…new perspectives on the creation of Apple…details Jobs's meteoric rise, fall and rise again…" (<i>Moneywise</i>, June 2005)
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"…a well-balanced look at an incredible life. The achievements are all catalogued in full, as are the personal idiosyncrasies and shortcomings…" (<i>Glasgow Sunday Herald</i>, June 19 2005)
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"Provides insight into inner businer business strategies and power plays between larger-than-life personalities such as Disney boss Michael Eisner." (<i>USA Today</i>)
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Apparently, this book hit a nerve. Or several.<br>
According to media reports, Apple Computer removed all of the titles published by John Wiley & Sons from its retail stores to protest this book. Included were the successful Dummies series, as well as computer-related volumes from popular authors Andy Ihnatko and Bob LeVitus.<br>
So what's the fuss?<br>
This biography of Apple's co-founder is fairly well balanced. The authors keenly admire Jobs despite the many personal shortcomings they catalog, gleefully referring to sundry over-the-top idiosyncrasies as examples of Jobs' ''Stevian'' hubris.<br>
But there's much to admire about Jobs. An adopted child of a northern California working class couple, he parlayed rabid curiosity about electronics, preternatural entrepreneurial zeal and a fierce sense of self into a partnership with the brilliant Steve Wozniak and created the revolutionary Apple II, the first popular personal computer.<br>
The pair became multimillionaires, though Wozniak eventually left the company to pursue other interests -- including flying small airplanes -- after nearly dying in a plane crash.<br>
Jobs subsequently latched onto and took over a wayward project at Apple to develop the next generation machine, and the resulting Macintosh became the computer of choice for artists and other creative folks.<br>
Jobs' prickly personality and immense ambition may have helped drive his success but also fueled clashes with executives, board members and others, and led to his forced departure from the company he co-founded.<br>
That was Jobs' wild first act.<br>
But authors Jeffrey Young and William Simon also chronicle what came next.<br>
After leaving Apple, Jobs' new computer company, NeXT, was a near-disaster. Though technologically advanced, the box was expensive and ill suited for its intended market, universities. Still, the operating system held great promise and the possibility for Jobs' return to the spotlight.<br>
When divorce forced Star Wars auteur George Lucas to sell off his nascent computer animation company, Pixar, Jobs scooped it up at a fraction of the asking price. Soon, the production company allied with Disney and became a creative powerhouse in its own right, with smash films, <i>Toy Story</i> and <i>Finding Nemo</i>.<br>
When Pixar went public, Jobs became a billionaire. At the same time, Apple was having a rough time with its latest CEO, Gil Amelio, who ...
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