The Apple Story- I

While growing up Atari was the first TV game my dad bought for me. To me Atari was great and fun. The first game I played in Atari in 1982 was: Combat.

Later on, heard about a computer and that was Commodore 64. Eventually Macintosh and Apple. It was very expensive. That was the 1980’s.

The story of how Steve Jobs founded Apple should be read by people who want to make it big in world of IT.

Who was Steve Jobs?

What is Apple, after all? Apple is about people who think 'outside the box,' people who want to use computers to help them change the world, to help them create things that make a difference, and not just to get a job done.

Steve Jobs was part of the fantastic four’ of Silicon Valley who changed world of Computers.

The fantastic four’ in my opinion are:

• Steve Jobs

• Steve Wozniak

• Bill Gates

• Paul Allen

The four I would consider fantastic four of not just the Silicon Valley but the world. They changed the way normal people interacted with computers.

The earliest personal computers or PC were not so personal. They were really big and expensive. The most famous of the Pre Apple era ENIAC. It was built by University of Pennsylvania. The ENIAC cost 500,000 US$, weighing 30 tons and occupying space of 30 tons.

Steve Jobs.

In words of Steve Jobs:

Most people never pick up the phone and call. Most people never ask, and that's what separates the people who do things from the people who just dream about them.

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Enter the 1970s

An era saw many achievements around the world.

Some of things that happened in 1970s:

• Elvis Presley, King of Rock visits President Nixon at the Oval Office.

• Beatles released their album:” Let It Be”

• Sears Tower Opened.

• Bruce Lee (martial arts king) died in 1973.

• Amitabh Bachan starts in Zanjeer,1st hit film.

• King Faisal of Saudi Arabia is killed

• First laser printer invented

• Atari releases Pong. -1972

• Intel’s microprocessor is introduced.

• Microsoft established by Bill Gates and Paul Allen. First Prime Minister of Bangladesh is Killed. -1975

• Steve develops Apple I and later goes to co -found company called Apple with Steve Jobs. The introduction of Betamax by Sony. -1976.

• Apple II is introduced with color graphics.

• The Floppy disk 5.25” is becomes a standard of IT industry. -1978

Early life of Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs was born in 1955 in San Francisco California. He was placed in adoption since his biological parents could not get married. It was opposition by his maternal grandfather. His real dad who he never intentionally met was Syrian Muslim.

Steve was adopted by Paul and Clara Jobs as a baby. Paul being from Wisconsin taught craftsmanship to Steve. He worked with his adopted dad in their garage. Though his dad repaired cars, Steve got interested in Electronics, that introduced by his adopted dad’ too.

Larry Lang was a neighborhood mentor’ who worked at Hewlett Packard. Larry Lang helped Steve jobs in understanding electronics and introduced an electronic kit called Heathkits.

Steve was kind of person who was intelligent beyond his class and was bored with classroom studies. He joined the Explorer’s club at Hewlett Packard.

Steve wanted build a frequency counter for his own personal project. He needs some parts for it. He calls up Bill Hewlett ,co-founder of Hewlett Packard (HP), who was pleased and not only gave the things Steve wanted. Also, an internship of in Hewlett Packard.

Electronics and computers were something he loved. The love has nothing to do with money or a job. It was like a passion.

Lot of people want to study in the right school, right university to be great technocrat or build the next big thing in world of IT or technology.

“The Love for technology, IT has to be within and not forced’ by some school”-TechKhala.

This love led to idea of TechKhala, a technology aunt for the masses in Bangladesh. Technology. I wonder if Bill Gates or Steve Wozniak would be reading this article. I am not someone from a big IT school but wanted to study in CS in UT Austin. The love for IT and geniuses of Steve Jobs, Bill Gates is not just limited to the United States.

We have many geniuses from Indian subcontinent and China. But most of our Asian geniuses prove their brilliance while going to US.

For example: The person who invented FTP was an Indian named Abahay Bhusan from IIT Kanpur.(60-65 ) batch. My dad was from IIT Kharapur(66 batch).

The point is Mr. Bhusan invented FTP not in India but had to go to USA to that. A reason might be invisible feudalism’ where not your talents are recognized because you do not support so and so. This might be the reason why the sub-continent (with exception of India) is not producing technocrats and just fine tuning or completing production work. The design is already done in the United Sates.

Some inventions in technology by Bangladeshi people:

The people with limited access to resources and funding. They are:

• Leepo” Nizamuddin made the Leemo-bill, his version of Lamborghini Countach. He transformed a Daihatsu Charade into a leepu mobile for $2500. He was an innovator who thought it was possible to make cars in Bangladesh (1996). No car company was in the scene.

• Yamin, he invented Petrol bomb proof glass protection .

• Humayn Kabir. Inventor of Roti’ maker. Roti is kind of tortilla.

Idea is to encourage these innovative inventors but sadly our country does not encourage this. Our countries from Indian sub-continent is like what Richard Fenyman asid about education in Brazil. I loved reading his book: Surely, you are joking Mr. Feynman. I have to read it, it sure is interesting book.

He says in his book;

“ I discovered a very strange phenomenon: I could ask a question, which the students would answer immediately. But the next time I would ask the question – the same subject, and the same question, as far as I could tell – they couldn’t answer it at all! For instance, one time I was talking about polarized light, and I gave them all some strips of polaroid.

Polaroid passes only light whose electric vector is in a certain direction, so I explained how you could tell which way the light is polarized from whether the polaroid is dark or light.

We first took two strips of polaroid and rotated them until they let the most light through. From doing that we could tell that the two strips were now admitting light polarized in the same direction – what passed through one piece of polaroid could also pass through the other. But then I asked them how one could tell the absolute direction of polarization, for a single piece of polaroid.

They hadn’t any idea.

I knew this took a certain amount of ingenuity, so I gave them a hint: “Look at the light reflected from the bay outside.”

Nobody said anything.”

- Feynman, Surely, You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!

Source:

The idea is encouraged innovation and application of science. You have to be a scientist while studying the subject.

The other idea is to give live projects university students and not let them pass until they complete a project.

Name
Name	Bill Gates	Paul Allen	Steve Jobs	Steve Wozniak
Birth	1955	1953	1955	1950
Location	Seattle	Seattle	San Francisco	San Jose
State	WT	WT	CA	CA
School	Lake Side School	Lake Side School	Local school
University	Harvard University (dropout)	Washington State University (dropout)	Reed College	UCLA
Company Founded	Microsoft		Apple