My Steve Jobs Story

While I never got to meet Steve Jobs, I did hear a great story from someone who worked directly with him at NeXT. The individual told me the story over a sushi lunch during a WebObjects training that I took (over 10) years ago. While he was at NeXT he sat in on a sales call to AT&T, and Steve Jobs was at the meeting. Steve was going on and on about the strengths of NeXTSTEP and object oriented programming, and the AT&T representatives had completely lost interest. This individual interrupted Steve, and according to him, he saved the day by bringing the level of conversation back down to the level of the AT&T reps, and regaining their interest. AT&T eventually purchased some NeXTSTATIONs to run custom applications. After the sales meeting the NeXT employees decided to go out and grab some sushi, and Steve tagged along. At one point Steve picked up a piece of Amaebi and used it as a puppet. He was pretending that the Amaebi was crying out to not be eaten. Just thinking about this makes me smile. It shows a different side of the man we often remember as the showman on stage selling us Apple’s latest gadet.

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