(Editor's Note: This article was written two weeks before the death of Steve Jobs for Tech Decisions as a tribute to what Jobs has meant for the business world and for people in general.)

I was scheduled to speak at a conference in San Francisco two weeks after September 11, 2001. I half expected it to be cancelled, but it wasn't. It was an interesting flight across the country with about a dozen people in a 757.

I got in the evening before the conference was to begin and I was supposed to present mid-morning. So I walked over to the Moscone Center a little early to register, pick up my speaker swag, and maybe find some free food for breakfast. I stepped outside for a moment and as I did I heard the familiar wump, wump, wump of an approaching helicopter. At the same time I noticed a large number of people lined up outside one of the entrances to the auditorium.

I asked someone walking past what the big deal was and after giving me a very strange look he explained that Steve Jobs was delivering the keynote in a few minutes. It was a toss-up between snagging that free breakfast and Jobs but fortune dictated that I go hungry that morning.

I almost didn't make it into the hall. As I approached, security was already turning people away. Just then I spied another, closed entrance marked "Press". Having registered both as a speaker and with my Tech Decisions press pass I banged on the press door. Security started to wave me away but I held up my press credentials and I was miraculously escorted to the second row directly in front of the podium.

Now I really began to panic. I was seated in an area where I would have to pay attention and where I couldn't sneak out if my hunger got the better of me. I accepted my fate and settled in for the duration.

After about 10 minutes, Jobs was announced and he strolled out to center stage dressed in his usual black mock turtleneck and jeans. A hush fell over the crowd. The woman on my right grabbed my wrist and said to no one in particular, "My god, it is really is him."

The woman on my left gasped as she inhaled deeply. The silent crowd leaped to their feet as one and began a tumultuous applause. No way could I remain seated without deeply offending those around me, so I too stood and offered polite clapping.

This was amazing. I had been to a lot of rock concerts in small venues and seen other industry leaders and politicians. Never before had I witnessed anything like the adoration these people had for Steve Jobs. And keep in mind this was when Apple was still just a computer company. The products they offered in 2001 were kind of cool but not amazingly different from the better Wintel machines. No, this was not about Macintoshes or Lisas, this was about Steve Jobs.

He spoke softly but commanded the stage. He came across as very arrogant but not in an offensive way. A few years earlier I had watched the guy who had earlier given Jobs the boot deliver a keynote. Now John Sculley was arrogant, but you sensed he didn't have the chops to back up his arrogance. Watching Sculley was like watching some little martinet prancing around the stage and the same thought was on everyone's mind: This is the guy that fired Steve Jobs? Seeing Jobs back on the job commanding the audience by his very presence was an awesome experience.

The presentation that day was dead solid boring. Jobs was essentially shilling for some video editing software by showing how it ran better on a Macintosh than on a "comparable" Windows machine. Not a big surprise considering how the software advertized itself as being optimized for the Macintosh. I was fully prepared to walk away and write 500 words about what a jerk Steve Jobs was. But I didn't.

In 2001 Apple wasn't all that impressive to the average computer nerd. They had some cool stuff and some very cool advertising but they hadn't really broken any new ground. The general consensus was that Apple Computer had made a very bad decision when they decided early on not to license their software. After all, Bill Gates created the Microsoft money machine when he licensed the software that he had just purchased from Seattle Computer to IBM.

The cognoscenti "knew" that Jobs' arrogance had forced him into a making the bad decision to not license Apple operating systems. But was it really a mistake? Bill Gates did make a brilliant decision, but it was a brilliant business decision. The net effect of licensing MS-DOS and ultimately Windows has created a cash cow, but it has also commoditized Microsoft products.

And that defines one difference that Steve Jobs has made in the world of technology. He has always been driven to make products that are superior and unique. In order to accomplish that he needed to have complete control over the operating system and the machine it runs on. Microsoft has placed itself in a position of making software that is generic enough to operate successfully on a broad range of platforms. There is a big difference between those two philosophies.

There was another "truth" about Jobs in the early day. Everyone knew that Steve Wozniak was the real brains behind Apple and that Jobs was just a front man. After all, when Job's worked for Atari didn't he get Wozniak to design circuit boards for Jobs who then represented them as his own work? Or something like that. Didn't Wozniak actually design and build the Apple I and II? Yet the Woz left Apple for the final time in 1987—long before the Apple golden years.

There is no doubt that Steve Wozniak is a better programmer and engineer than Steve Jobs. He may even be a better dancer but I doubt we will ever know for certain. I don't think that his sense of style would permit the other Steve to make an appearance on Dancing With the Stars. Yet Jobs, not Wozniak, is and has been the constant thread that runs throughout the history of Apple.

So what's up with that? Bill Gates and John Sculley are better business men. Steve Wozniak is smarter. And Steve Jobs just stepped down as CEO of the company with the highest market capitalization in the world. The reason he has been able to lead Apple to its present stature is because he hasn't focused on the technology or the bottom line or the marketing. He has focused on creating systems that encourage people to interact with technology in a way that is intellectually, emotionally and spiritually satisfying. OK, I know that sounds a little over the top, but it is the truth.

Steve Jobs grew up in San Francisco in the 1960's. He was 11 or 12 during the "Summer of Love." He briefly attended Reed College, an institute renowned for its brilliant students as well as its wacky academic offerings. Jobs claims a course in calligraphy that he audited at Reed led to his idea for different fonts on a computer.

He travelled to India and dabbled in eastern mysticism. He experimented with psychedelics. He was also intensely interested in the new technologies of personal computing. The spiritual side of Steve Jobs—that desire to achieve oneness with the universe—is truly what allows him to stand out from other technology leaders. It isn't about the technology; it's about how we can interact with technology and how technology is able to improve our experience of the world. Growing up in all that hipness allowed him to develop an attitude that disdains a traditional business culture while embracing success on his own terms.

Companies that Steve Jobs has created and managed have designed and built at least as many unprofitable devices as they have successful ones. The Lisa was an early PC (1983) that was so far ahead of the competition that everyone had to have one. Unfortunately it was also priced well beyond the budget of any geek I knew. After he was forced out of Apple he created NeXT and the NeXT computer—once again a fantastic machine, but not affordable.

Even some of his successes were not elegant. The original iMac (introduced in 1998 after his return to Apple) was a strange little self contained plastic computer with a built in handle. Yet the concept—the excitement of the Internet with the simplicity of the Macintosh—foreshadowed present day netbooks by a decade. That first iMac was ugly but it was profitable. The lessons learned from the Lisa and the NeXT computer (which provided the kernel of the operating system) provided the basis for the Macintosh line today.

Even while driving innovation and excellence in design Jobs has been a savvy enough businessman to generate enough revenue to finance his innovative products. Back in the day, he promoted Apple II's and Macintosh's as educational machines and during that time you could hardly find a PC in a school building. Building on the high-end graphics his machines possessed, he forged relationships with firms that made graphic, video, and publishing software. I used to work for a publishing company. Every personal computer in the building was a PC, unless you worked in a creative area. That earned you a high-end Macintosh with a killer monitor.

In 2001 Apple introduced the iPod. Once again the pundits were shaking their heads. This time it was, "Jobs can't make any money selling Mac's to artists and loyalists so he is going to start selling gadgets." Many thought this was an act of desperation for a failing company. Not only that, the entire iPod concept was flawed. They weren't the first portable media players on the market, they required special software to load media (iTunes), and they used proprietary media formats. Three reasons for certain failure.

You know the rest. iTunes has completely turned the recording industry on its head, changing the way music is distributed and sold and putting thousands of music stores out of business. The downloadable app has transformed the consumer software industry. No product in their market has been able to approach the iPod/iPhone/iPad line of products in popularity. I call those three reasons for success.

Steve Jobs developed an unerring sense for making electronic devices simple, efficient, easy to use, and stylish. He is always striving to make his products better. Consider the first iPad: simple, user friendly, long battery life, thousands of apps, beautifully elegant, etc. But wait, the first iPad is only beautiful without its cover—when that sleek aluminum back is revealed. Yet every iPad 1 I see has a cover that hides that snazzy back. So when Apple released the iPad 2 it was thinner and featured a "smart cover." I know that was Jobs—he couldn't stand to see his sleek design hidden under bulky covers. Steve Jobs has consistently and constantly refined his vision. And his vision is what has made Apple what it is today.

I spend my entire day working on business servers and Windows laptops and desktops and my Blackberry. When I come home in the evening I look forward to sitting down to my iMac G5 or if I am lucky, sneaking off with my wife's MacBook Air.

There is a Zen-like quality about interacting with these machines. They are elegant, beautifully designed and proportioned, and perform flawlessly. The colors and screen resolution are immaculate. They even run my favorite Microsoft productivity software. They are fun to use. They are costly but the pleasure of using them proves their value.

An old saying goes something like this: "If you can build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to your door." Steve Jobs has built a few dozen better mousetraps and the world has surely beaten a path to Cupertino.

Footnote:

The sad truth is I wrote most of this piece on a ThinkPad. I am not sure if it is just because I am so used to the ergonomics and keyboard of that machine when I am "working" or what. Yet I will do my final proof and email from my Mac. Not sure why but I will.

Special Reports /

Steve Jobs: Building Better Mousetraps

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