Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been named to TIME Magazine’s 2010 list of The World’s Most Influential People and is also featured onTIME’s extended cover.

The 2010 TIME 100 list is divided into the following categories:
[Read more →]

Bob Cringely has republished a quote from an interview he did with Bill Gates from June, 1998 for a never-published piece for Vanity Fair:

“What I can’t figure out is why he (Steve Jobs) is even trying (to be the CEO of Apple)? He knows he can’t win.” – Bill Gates, June 1998

Cringely writes, “Look at the two companies today. Jobs is still running Apple despite cancer and a liver transplant while Gates has moved on to saving the world at the Gates Foundation. Microsoft is worth $240 billion, a tiny drop from 12 years ago, with the shares now around $27 (down from $29). Nothing gained in more than a decade. Apple shares, on the other hand, have gone from $7.25 to almost $240, Apple’s market cap has risen more than 33X from $6 billion to $220 billion. And Cupertino’s cash hoard today is almost exactly the same as Microsoft’s at around $40 billion.”

“It’s pretty easy to argue that Jobs did win. Certainly Apple has the mojo lately with its string of home run products like the iMac, iPod, iPhone, and now the iPad. Even Mac market share is up in the double digits and Apple’s profit margins are the best in the industry,” Cringely writes. “The trend line is definitely up for Apple and mildly down for Microsoft.”

Cringely writes, “What Bill Gates didn’t count on when he declared Jobs a loser back in 1998, was the Californian’s tenacity. It took 12 years to do it, but Apple is well positioned now to take Microsoft’s crown.”

Full article here

Source: MacDailyNews

“Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs said his company has to ‘think big’ and its $40 billion cash hoard offers flexibility, suggesting that he had no immediate plans to spend the money on a share buyback or dividend,” Gabriel Madway and Alexei Oreskovic report for Reuters.

“Faced with questions at the annual shareholders meeting over what Apple would do with its cash — which stands at about one-fifth of its market capitalization — Jobs said having the money at hand offers security for the company,” Madway and Oreskovic report. “‘When you take risks, it’s like jumping in the air. When they don’t work out, it’s nice to know the ground is always there,’ the chief executive said.”
[Read more →]

“Steve Jobs was reportedly wearing a top hat when he visited New York publishers last week. It’s a fitting lid for the Apple CEO, who can be as tricky as a magician,” Brian X. Chen writes for Wired. “Jobs has a knack for throwing off Apple watchers with his masterful misdirections.”

“Ever wonder why analysts and journalists grossly overestimated the price of the Apple tablet prior to its official announcement? Part of the reason is that Jobs had said during a 2008 earnings call that Apple could not make a $500 computer that was not a ‘piece of junk.’ That assertion lent credence to rumors that the tablet would cost $1,000,” Chen writes. “Oops. The entry-level iPad announced in January will cost: $500, at least at the low end of scale. Presumably Jobs doesn’t consider it a piece of junk.”

Chen writes, “What follows is a list of five more famously misleading quotes that Jobs pulled from his bag of tricks.”

• No Plans to Make a Tablet (iPad)
• Not Interested in the Cellphone Business (iPhone)
• People Don’t Read Any More (e-reader)
• No Movies on a Tiny Little Screen (video iPods)
• We Don’t Need to Add New Stuff (camera in iPod touch)

Full article here.

Source: MacDailyNews

“Publishers joining Apple’s iBooks store [sic] are turning their back on Amazon and its vision of the flat $US9.99 ebook,” Matt Buchanan writes for Gizmodo.

Buchanan continues, “Apple forced the music industry to charge 99 US cents per song, so why are they helping publishers set their own prices? To screw Amazon.”

“The difference between Amazon and Apple is this: Amazon is very much in the ebook business to sell ebooks.. Apple, on the other hand, sells content in order to sell hardware,” Buchanan writes.

“At this moment, Amazon owns ebooks. The book publishers’ fears are the same as the record labels with iTunes: They’re paranoid about losing control over pricing, and their own digital destiny. They’re worried that books are being undervalued, and that once people have the mindset that the price of an ebook is $US9.99, and not a penny more, they’re doomed,” Buchanan explains. “They needed an insurgent player: Apple.”

[Read more →]

On October 6, 1997, in response to the question of what he’d do if he was in charge of Apple, Dell founder and CEO Michael Dell stood before a crowd of several thousand IT executives and answered flippantly, “What would I do? I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.”

A little more than a month later, on November 10, 1997, new Apple Interim CEO (iCEO) Steve Jobs responded, speaking in front of an image of Michael Dell’s bulls-eye covered face, “We’re coming after you, you’re in our sights.”

On January 13, 2006, after a little more than eight years of hard work, Apple Inc. passed Dell, Inc. in market value, $72.13 billion vs. $71.97 billion at market close, respectively.

• 2X: On July 27, 2007, Apple’s value doubled that of Dell’s, $127.81 billion vs. $63.65 billion, respectively.

• 3X:On December 6, 2007, Apple’s market value passed 3 times that of Dell’s, $165.66 billion vs. $54.42 billion, respectively.

• 4X:On May 01, 2008, Apple’s market value quadrupled that of Dell’s, $158.66 billion vs. $38.97 billion, respectively.

[Read more →]

“Fueling expectations some more, a new tip today [via TechCrunch] hints that even Apple chief Steve Jobs has high expectations for the tablet rumored to be launching at Wednesday’s special event,” Electronista reports.

Electronista reports, “Several eyewitnesses, allegedly including Apple executives and Jobs’ friends, say they’ve heard Jobs state that the project is the ‘most important thing I’ve ever done.’”

“Jobs has long been rumored as having devoted full attention to the tablet, especially since his return from medical leave in June,” Electronista reports. “Most believe he last gave a similar level of care during the development of the iPhone.”

Full article here.

Source: MacDailyNews