I stumbled upon this gem today (via this article). It’s a video of a 45-minute long raw Q&A session with Steve Jobs by developers at WWDC 1997, when he was still an advisor to Apple and Gil Amelio was CEO. In it, Steve gives pretty clear answers to some tough questions, and gives us a glimpse into what it was like to turnaround Apple from the brink of disaster into the powerhouse it is today.

Though slightly dated, this video is a great case study for what great leadership looks like, especially in times of crisis. Keep in mind that this was before there was any indication that Steve Jobs would be the next CEO of Apple, and the fate of the company was hanging by a thread. There’s irony, given Apple’s reputation for secrecy, in how candid Steve is to this audience of 3rd party developers. There’s no question that Steve totally gets it about the industry. He doesn’t mince words, or try to BS his way out of hard questions. Equally remarkable is how clear and consistent his vision for success was, and how you can now trace much of what Apple has since accomplished back to the points he made 14 years ago.

A few of my favorite takeaways and snippets:

1. On focus: “Focusing is about saying no.” The very first question out of the gate was a hardball one about why Steve and the new management cut so many seemingly promising projects like OpenDoc. Steve’s response was that due to bad engineering management, too many projects had been started and allowed to continue in multiple directions without coherence. The result of which was less than the sum of the parts. The solution was to cut things, even locally promising things, that did not contribute to the larger goal.

2. On Better vs. Different: “It’s important that Apple be perceived as Much Better, not Different.” The key is to focus on the 10-20% of stuff that you can make much better, and reuse the rest. It’s a failed strategy to try to reinvent the wheel in every case.

3. On the stock price: “[focus on executing and] the press and stock price will take care of themselves… if people are selling Apple stock short, go out and buy some, that’s what I’ve done.”

4. On “Cloud computing”: Although he never used the word “Cloud”, here’s a segment where Steve Jobs gives a pretty spot-on description of what Cloud computing should be. 14 years later, you’ll find this eerily similar to what iCloud is now trying to do.

5. On where great products come from: “Every good product is because a group of people cared deeply about making something wonderful that they and their friends wanted.”

6. On the customer experience: “You need to start with the customer experience and work backwards to the technology.”

7. On the future of mobile communication: “What I want is a little thing with a keyboard that’s connected to the net… I don’t want a little scribble thing”.

After watching this, I only wish all companies were run by people with even half this level of candor and get-it-ness.

Quote from Paul Graham (of Y Incubator) during the Google I/O conference:

“I’m very afraid of a world in which we are all Steve Jobs’ slaves,” Graham said. “If anything can save us, it might be Chrome.” When Costolo asked whether he would invest in a company building for the iPhone versus Google’s Android platform, Graham answered, “Of course iPhone. I’m talking about what I hope will set us free, not what will generate opportunities.”

It’s every journalists dream to get into a flame war with a top CEO. Looks like one guy from Gawker got more than he bargained for when he tried to flame Steve Jobs, who fired back remarkably open and level-headed responses at 2 in the morning.

My favorite line is the last one from Steve (after a long series of flames from the Gawker guy):

“… You can disagree with us, but our motives are pure.

By the way, what have you done that’s so great? Do you create anything, or just criticize others work and belittle their motivations?”

I may not fully agree with Apple’s or Steve’s position on everything, but the fact that Steve Jobs is dishing out personal and lucid responses at 2 in the morning to a third rate journalist cements the fact that there’s good reason why Steve Jobs is the #1 CEO in the world.

Steve Jobs: **Respect** +10.

Gawker: Credibility -10.

Here’s a link to the full thread.

This brings to mind Teddy Roosevelt’s famous quote, which I can’t resist adding here:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

After Mac vs. PC, the iPhone and iPad ads seem to be missing the usual Apple mojo.

Check out the latest iPad Ad. It’s little more than the usual “Our new product is so great, check out all these features.” type of ad we expect from every other company but Apple. Watch the HTC Ad right after to see the similarities.

Maybe it’s just me, but I expect more from the company that brought us Think Different.

With only a day before launch, the iPad press machine has hit a fever pitch. Virtually all the major news organizations have produced glowing reviews. And yet, the closed and limited nature of the device has its share of detractors. David Pogue put it best: Techies are skeptical, and everyone else loves it.

I think the techies are totally missing the point, and the boat.

Take a good thorough look at the iPad page on the Apple website. Read the descriptions carefully:

“iPad – A magical and revolutionary product at an unbelievable price.”

“…you can do things with these apps that you can’t do on any other device.”

“…iPad isn’t just the best device of its kind. It’s a whole new kind of device.”

What don’t you see? There’s lots of hyperbole, but the one obvious word that is completely missing is “computer”. It’s clear that the Apple PR team took great pains not to mention this word even once in all the marketing literature. At yet, clearly a lot of people are comparing the iPad to their traditional notebook and personal computers. What’s going on?

It would have been quite natural for Steve Jobs to refer to the coming of the iPad as the next computer revolution. This is how most techies naturally look at it anyway. But this would have been a great marketing mistake. In the original personal computer revolution, hackers were the early adopters. They were the only ones willing to forgive poor ergonomics, limited input devices, and laborious instructions in order to use those new computers. Catering to them was necessary for a new product in order to build enough momentum to cross the chasm and get to the mainstream.

Today, hackers have been displaced by technophiles as the early adopters. These are people with gobs of disposable income who like to buy bright shiny gadgets. They aren’t interested in writing the next open source web server or cool video game. They just want to watch HD movies, stream music to their $2,000 stereo systems, and veg out on Facebook. Oh, and read a couple of academic articles to justify the expense. Technophiles aren’t terribly interested in buying a new personal computer. They are looking to buy a better iPod.

Apple seems to intrinsicly get this new demographic, as evidenced when they dropped the word “Computer” from their name. They are going lock stock and barrel for this group. It seems that the rest of the technology world has yet to wake up.

The hackers are no longer the gatekeepers or the trendsetters in technology. The technophiles are. The irony is that the hard-core hackers will end up being the late adopters. More and more developers will write apps for the Apple App Store simply because that’s where the audience is. For those who insist that they cannot on principle develop for a closed platform, there’s always the JooJoo.

Since the rest of the web is still stuck in the mire of debating the success of the iPad launch, I thought I’d get ahead and issue some bold, baseless, predictions on its future.

The rollout will be successful. In 55 days, the debates about Flash and built-in cameras will have been exhausted, and everyone will be focused on the restricted availability and long lines at the Apple store. All engineered of course. There will be a new media blitz, with celebrity endorsements, ads, and buzz. Apple will have sold 4-5 million iPads by the end of 2010.

Business apps will be a sleeper hit. By rollout time, all essential iPhone apps would have been ported over to the iPad. The new crop of iPad-optimized apps that developers are cramming on over the next 2 months will take center stage. There will be a surprising number of new business applications, centered around communication and collaboration. You will be able to work with your existing PC documents with iWork or some OpenOffice port. The iPad will be better than a notebook for attending meetings (especially boring ones). By the end of the year, every collar-propping CEO will be sporting an iPad.

In 2011, Apple will launch the MacTouch line. Think of an iMac as an angled multi-touch surface. No more keyboard or mouse; A truly one-piece device. What could possibly be more elegant than that? The MacTouch OS will be based on OSX (OSXI?) and can run OSX apps, but it has a built-in iPad emulator, so it runs all native iPad software. It will also have new APIs that make it easy to port existing OSX apps (i.e. Photoshop) to the new multi-touch platform.

Thus will complete Apple’s dominance in multi-touch technology, with which they would have made some inroads into the business space.

* Disclaimer: I probably already own some Apple stock in some mutual fund, so you would be foolish to base any investment decisions just on this blog, or any other.

Like most other self-proclaimed commentators, I had pretty mixed feelings after watching the iPad launch. The good news is that Apple delivered on pretty much everything that was hyped about: A marathon 10 hour battery life, eBook reader, great built-in apps, and an aggressive $499 price tag for the base model. The problem is… Apple delivered pretty much everything that was hyped about. They failed to exceed expectations, and that’s why there’s so much fan-boy moping going on right now.

After a few days of contemplation, I’m sold. I believe the iPad is going to be a game-changer, but it’s going to take a while. The reason is, as Walt Mossberg puts it: “It’s about the software, stupid.” Right now, the iPad isn’t much more than a super-sized iPod Touch. In fact, it is much worse at being a video iPod than the iPod Touch: You can’t put it in your pocket, nor operate it with one hand. It is also much worse compared to a notebook computer at being a computer: The keyboard sucks, it’s less powerful, and you can’t run desktop-style apps on it. The only thing it is better than anything else at, of course, is being a tablet. The billion-dollar question then is, what are tablets going to be great at?

Steve Jobs pitched the iPad at excelling at browsing, email, photos, video, music, games, and eBooks over smartphones and PCs. I find this list hard to believe (RDF notwithstanding). I can’t imagine listening to music while tethered to a tablet, nor holding a tablet through a whole movie vs. just connecting it to my TV. Reading emails is probably fine on a tablet, but probably adequate on an iPhone. Writing long emails on a tablet sounds painful. eBooks are still arguably better served by the Kindle (although I haven’t jumped on that bandwagon yet, still preferring audiobooks myself). There will certainly be plenty of revolutionary games written for the iPad, but I don’t believe Nintendo or XBox has much to worry about in the short term. It’s never going to replace console or portable gaming.

Casual browsing is the one experience I can see the tablet excelling at, but the lack of Flash support prevents it from being a full replacement for a PC. The photo demo is likewise the best-in-class, but I consider that a minority feature on a $499 device.

Here’s the problem: The list represents current activities. The tablet form factor, in order to be successful, is going to ultimately excel at things people can’t yet do well on existing platforms. But it’s impossible to pitch it that way. Apple is facing a chicken-and-egg problem: They need to sell plenty of iPads so developers will build revolutionary apps for it, but it will be hard to do this until there are more revolutionary apps. I believe they made a tactical error in not having more launch-day showcase apps: The un-ported iPhone apps weren’t as impressive on the larger screen. It’s like showing DOS apps in a window during the Windows launch.

However, there was one new and exciting thing in the whole launch keynote that surprised me: The new iWorks apps. Building these was a great move, as is pricing them at $10 each. It shows everyone that the iPad can (one day) run serious productivity apps. Strangely enough, most of the blogosphere seems to have completely missed this. I believe that this is where the promised next app gold-rush will be: Multi-touch productivity apps. Established companies are going to ignore this at their own peril. Using Photoshop with a mouse is one day going to sound insane, as will any other kind of graphics-heavy wysiwyg app. Heavy text entry is probably still less-than-ideal on a tablet (although I may change my mind after actually trying it), but alternatives could bridge that gap (voice recognition perhaps?).

The other thing Apple did most brilliantly with this launch is the pricing: $499 guarantees that no competitor will gain a foothold. ASUS, MSI, and HP might as well cancel their tablets now. They cannot possibly out-do Apple in terms of features and software in the consumer space, and they cannot go low enough on price to be competitive. If they were smart, they would re-think the whole tablet proposition, e.g. focus on larger productivity tablets for businesses, where performance and a full OS is more important than portability and battery-life.

So, my take is that the initial iPad will be a modest success – there will probably be lines on first-availability-day, but not as long as that for the iPhone. Like the first iPod, the naysayers will outnumber the faithful for a year or two. Then once a couple of killer apps emerge, and Apple fixes the bugs in the next iterations, v3 will be the breakthrough people hoped V1 would be.

I’m in new-year-resolution mode now, and have started compiling the list of books I want to read in 2010. There are a number of sequels from my favorite authors due out in the next couple of months that I’m excited about.

First up is Unfolding the Napkin, by Dan Roam, the follow-up to The Back of the Napkin. Using simple sketches to help articulate and solve complex problems is a simple yet powerful tool. I find the techniques presented very useful and use them regularly. This new book goes into more detail on the framework from the first one.

Here’s Dan’s blog.

I’m a huge fan of Seth Godin, and have read all his books. His next one is Linchpin, due out in January. His last couple of books were pretty short (but sweet). This one appears to be longer. I’ll probably get the audio version.

Here’s Seth’s blog.

Switch is a new book from sibling authors Chip and Dan Heath, who wrote Made to Stick. It’s due out in February. They also have a regular column in Fast Company.

Here’s their blog.

If you’re looking for an engaging and interesting way to learn new things, I highly recommend these authors.

This is what I saw on CNN.com’s homepage this morning:

First, take a close look at the picture of the guy on a cell phone. It looks a little out of place right? Does that look like a citizen complaining about potholes? Looks more like a cell-phone ad to me. The tiny label in the top right says “Jupiter Images”. It’s a stock photo, on CNN? Somehow this just smacks me as plain wrong. When faceless corporate websites use stock images, they come across as inauthentic and soulless. When a top news channel uses them they come across the same way, and it looks amateurish. How is CNN different from a blog now?

Ok, so it was a slow news day, no big deal right? What really shocked me is when I took a closer look at the picture on the left: It looks like a really serious story about important geo-political issues. A protester throwing rocks at police. Iconic. But look at the upper right of that picture, and it says “Getty Images”. It’s a stock photo as well! Now, that throws the whole validity of the story into question. Did people actually clash with police? Is that picture even from Iran? Did protests actually happen? (Well, I’m sure they did, but showing a fake picture doesn’t inspire confidence).

This is a sad trend. I get it that news organizations need to find ways to save money, but I think they are getting close to the line. The foundation of good journalism is trust, and fake pictures erode that trust. They are better off not showing pictures at all.

When Steve Jobs keynoted the iPod launch, he claimed that Apple would ultimately win against other mp3 makers largely because no one “markets like Apple”. Given that Apple spent half a billion dollars last year on marketing, that’s pretty much true, with the exception of Microsoft and Dell.

The fact that Dell spent more on marketing than Apple, and yet doesn’t have a single memorable ad speaks volumes. However, the problem isn’t in being able to out-muscle Apple with ad budget, rather it’s in more fundamental things. The issue here is mindset.

Just look at the product websites for Apple, Dell, and HP:

Notice something? Apple’s website is the only one that seems to actually try to sell their computers. There are big sumptuous photos, with highlights on key features, and superlative descriptions of every aspect of their products. Their site is one big ad.

In comparison, Dell and HP’s sites appear to be for people who have already decided to buy one of their computers. They work like ordering forms. This is a terrible assumption. Dell practically invented the idea of selling direct to customers, yet their website hasn’t really changed much over the last 10 years. They assume that their products are commodities, and that customers are looking for the best deal (i.e. lowest price) when they visit. Look at their page: The biggest letters are for the (low low) price. Well, no wonder they are stuck at the low-end of the market.

HP’s website is far worse. It’s appears to be inspired by one of those dense B2B part catalogues, meant to be used by secretaries ordering hardware for their departments rather than people for themselves. Good luck trying to get an idea what the actual product is like, or why you might want to buy one. That screenshot above is for the new ENVY 13, HP’s top of the line notebook. Does the page scream “top of the line” to you?

Using a website to sell a product seems like a pretty obvious idea. Yet somehow, Dell and HP are stuck in the mindset that “eCommerce” means order and fulfillment. In the meantime, I’m sure the folks at Apple are just shaking their heads in disbelief, and laughing all the way to the bank.