Briefly: Steve Jobs' 1996 return to Apple depicted in rare set of photos
The photos were taken on Dec. 20, 1996, the night when late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs returned to the company he created after being forced out by the board eleven years earlier.
Captured by Mac OS Evangelist Tim Holmes on an Apple QuickTake camera and posted to Flickr (via Daring Fireball), the photos show Jobs' first night back at Apple HQ, which took place at the company's theater dubbed the Town Hall.
"I called Mitch, my wife who also worked there at the time, and told her meet me there," Holmes recalls. "We had no idea what was about to happen?"
Jobs claimed he was ousted from Apple by former Apple CEO John Sculley, who supposedly conspired with the company's board to force the tech guru out after the two had a "falling out." Sculley in 2012 said he never fired Jobs, and admitted that his positioning as Apple chief executive was a "big mistake."
In a commencement speech at Stanford in 2005, Jobs said that "getting fired" from Apple was "the best thing that could have ever happened" to him.
Captured by Mac OS Evangelist Tim Holmes on an Apple QuickTake camera and posted to Flickr (via Daring Fireball), the photos show Jobs' first night back at Apple HQ, which took place at the company's theater dubbed the Town Hall.
"I called Mitch, my wife who also worked there at the time, and told her meet me there," Holmes recalls. "We had no idea what was about to happen?"
Jobs claimed he was ousted from Apple by former Apple CEO John Sculley, who supposedly conspired with the company's board to force the tech guru out after the two had a "falling out." Sculley in 2012 said he never fired Jobs, and admitted that his positioning as Apple chief executive was a "big mistake."
In a commencement speech at Stanford in 2005, Jobs said that "getting fired" from Apple was "the best thing that could have ever happened" to him.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheUnfetteredMind
Gil Amelio probably had no idea what was about to happen either.
From what I've read, Gil seemed to have a pretty reasonable idea what would happen if Steve came back. Steve never played "second fiddle" to anyone. Bringing him back was effectively Gil "falling on his sword" for the good of the company. Thankfully they had a leader at the time willing to make that sacrifice, or at least take that gamble...
Quote:
"I tend to take a camera everywhere, so I had my Apple QuickTake camera, which Steve Jobs killed within the year. The colors are way off due to the poor quality of digital cameras in 1996, Steve's jacket was black in real life."
I wonder why Steve Jobs would've killed off a digital camera that rendered black as bright purple... Hmm...
Is that Steve on the left? eeehhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by tylerk36
Is that Steve on the left? eeehhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!
On the right in purple. I can't tell whether you're trying to be hilarious or just being dense.
In this picture, Gil is on the left, Steve on the right: Should anyone at AppleInsider.com already know that?
Quote:
Originally Posted by PhilBoogie
I read the bio, and IIRC there was no mention of Steve being fired. There was no hard line, saying this or that had happened. It was more about feelings, assumptions and such. I'll try to find the paragraph in question, where its detailed, but it might have been scattered throughout a whole chapter. If I have time tomorrow I'll post it.
What they did was take away his power to make strategic decisions on behalf of the company. He then quit on his own. Which, as he's widely reported as saying in hindsight, was the best thing to ever happen to him.
Originally Posted by Jony0
I'll have to check the bio.
Because that's absolutely accurate¡
It must have been devastating for Steve to be ousted from the company he started...what was it? 10 years. What strength of character and what a comeback.
Me, I would have gone to bed and pulled the covers over my head.
Stevo, what an inspiration.
P.S. I wonder what Forestall is up to? And I mean that in a kind sense.
Thank you Gil, thank you.
(We had that QuickTake camera at that time but it never captured such auspicious images lol.)
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
Steve was fired. The board voted him out. Sculley is delusional.
Not the way history sees it. Jobs was demoted in May of 1985 and then Jobs resigned 5 months later. Jobs retained his position as Chairman during those 5 months. If he had been fired as you state then there would have been no need for him to write a resignation later to Mike Markula at the end of those 5 months.
He's dressed all low-key and smiling, and inside he's thinking "In 3 months I'll be running this place."
Sixteen replies so far and not one of them wondering why the guy's wife was named Mitch?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Casey
Sixteen replies so far and not one of them wondering why the guy's wife was named Mitch?
Well, it doesn't matter... for one.
For two... my buddy went with a gal name Michelle, but the only name I ever heard her being called was Mitch.
Quote:
Originally Posted by John.B
I wonder why Steve Jobs would've killed off a digital camera that rendered black as bright purple... Hmm...
There were reasons for killing the line, but this wasn't one of them. Remember that digital sensors from 1994-5 were very different from what we take for granted now, particularly in low-light performance. CCD (mostly what was available back then) and CMOS sensors don't have the same spectral response as the human eye; it takes a lot of design tweaks, and a lot of software processing to get the results you expect now.
The old QuickTake 100 does surprisingly well when you consider the available tech at the time, especially given the price at introduction ($750, about $1175 in todays dollars), compared to a contemporaneous professional DSLR like the Kodak DCS-1, which sported 6 megapixel resolution and an introductory price in 1995 of $28,000 ($42,650 adjusted).
The QuickTake line suffered the fate of Steve's strategy of stripping non-core/excess/unfocused products to stop losses and refocus Apple on what it should be doing, it would have been an OK product for any number of other companies at the time, and in fact some models were sold/developed by Fuji and Samsun. It just didn't fit where it was.