Steve Jobs by Walter Issacson

     Walter Issacson's penultimate portrayal of the life of Steve Jobs chronicles the late visionary fouder of Apple's life from his childhood to his death in 2011. Based on a series of interviews Issacson conducted with Jobs in the last years of his life, the book is an eye-opening foray into the life and mind of the Jobs as he goes through the fouding of Apple, his firing from the company he started and subsequent return in 1996. What really was fantasic about this book was that it not only described the processes of how Apple first became a company and grew into the most-influential company of the past 20 years, but the relationships that he formed and deteriorated over the course of his life. Did you know that he was a former hippie, and spent time in India, all while expiramentibg with pot and LSD. lIt was only after he came back that he teamed up with Steve Wozniak to create the Apple I in 1976, thus creating the company we know and love and spend billions on each year today. 

     When Jobs came back in 1996, Apple had gone through a phase where it had lost the creative touch, something that he had always wanted the company to have. His return brought along a new company slogan..."Think Different". When I finished reading this book (I got it as a Christmas gift) the first thing I thought about was the day after Steve Jobs died. I got on my phone, and went to Apple's website. All there was was a picture of Jobs, staring back at you, hand on his chin, as if he was thinking about you, and   the words "Steve Jobs 1955-2011". It was at that moment when I realized the scope of this man's influence on our whole world. His whole life, he has been able to bring forth ideas of innovation, new technology and thinking differntly in a time where the social norm was to do the opposite. And even now, 3 1/4 years after his death, his legacy on the world will prolong his shortened life for generations to come. I think that without him and his drive to create change in the world for creativity and simplicity, our world would be much different. And his legacy will live on in every iPhone, iPad and Mac sold.