Steve Jobs: The Man Who Thought Different: A Biography

This biography traces the life of Steve Jobs, cofounder of Apple Computer, from his birth and adoption through his rise as a technology pioneer, his fall and comeback, and his death from cancer at age 56. The book is structured around a 2005 Stanford University commencement speech in which Jobs shared three stories about connecting dots, love and loss, and death.

Steven Paul Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, to Joanne Schieble, a graduate student in Wisconsin who arranged an adoption after becoming pregnant by a Syrian-born graduate student. When the first prospective parents backed out, Clara and Paul Jobs, a couple without college degrees, adopted the newborn, promising that Steve would attend college. In Mountain View, in California's Santa Clara Valley, Paul taught Steve to build and disassemble things in the family garage, instilling a lifelong commitment to craftsmanship.

Steve learned to read before school but resisted classroom structure. When a neighbor's question about adoption made him feel unwanted, his parents reassured him that they had chosen him specifically. In fourth grade, teacher Imogene Hill provided attention during a period of family financial hardship. Steve tested so high that officials recommended skipping grades, but bullying in seventh grade prompted a move to Los Altos.

In the electronics hub of Silicon Valley, Steve found mentors and cold-called Hewlett-Packard cofounder Bill Hewlett for spare parts and a summer job. A friend introduced him to Steve Wozniak, an older electronics enthusiast. Wozniak designed a "blue box," a device for making free long-distance calls, and Jobs proposed selling them, establishing their dynamic: Wozniak built and Jobs sold.

Jobs insisted on attending Reed College in Portland, Oregon, despite his parents' limited means. He dropped out after one semester but stayed on campus for another year, sleeping on floors and collecting bottle deposits for food. He pursued Zen Buddhism, experimented with LSD, and dropped into a calligraphy class on fonts and letter spacing, knowledge he later called a key example of "connecting dots" that could not be foreseen.

In early 1974, Jobs took a job at Atari, the video-game maker, and traveled to India seeking spiritual enlightenment. Back at Atari, he recruited Wozniak to design the game Breakout, promising to split a $700 fee but keeping a reported $5,000 bonus for himself. Wozniak received only $350, a betrayal that wounded him when it surfaced years later.

In 1975, Wozniak attended the first meeting of the Homebrew Computer Club, a hobbyist group dedicated to personal computing, and began designing his own computer. On April 1, 1976, Jobs, Wozniak, and colleague Ron Wayne formally created Apple Computer. Wayne quickly withdrew, and Jobs secured a $25,000 order from a local store for 50 assembled computers despite having no parts, money, or workspace.

Wozniak designed the Apple II with color graphics, sound, and a built-in programming language, while Jobs obsessed over its appearance. Retired Intel millionaire Mike Markkula offered a $250,000 credit line, and Apple was incorporated in January 1977. Sales exploded, fueled by a floppy disk drive Wozniak engineered and the VisiCalc spreadsheet program. In 1980, Apple went public in the largest stock offering since Ford Motor Company in 1956, and Jobs's stake was worth about $220 million. His ex-girlfriend Chrisann Brennan gave birth to a daughter, Lisa, but Jobs denied paternity until a DNA test and a lawsuit from the county of San Mateo compelled him to pay child support.

After visiting Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center, where he saw a graphical user interface that replaced typed commands with visual icons, Jobs became convinced all computers would work this way. Removed from the Lisa computer project, he took over the small Macintosh project. Drawing on his calligraphy class, he insisted the Mac offer multiple typefaces. He drove the team through what a colleague termed his "reality distortion field," an ability to convince people that nearly anything was possible.

Jobs courted Pepsi-Cola president John Sculley to become Apple's CEO, winning him with the challenge: "Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?" The Macintosh launched on January 24, 1984, preceded by the iconic "1984" Super Bowl commercial. Sales soon declined due to the Mac's limited memory and missing features. The board sided with Sculley, and in May 1985, Jobs was removed from his division. He resigned in September, selling his stock for over $100 million.

Jobs founded NeXT and bought Pixar, a computer graphics firm, from filmmaker George Lucas. Both ventures struggled. The NeXT computer was overpriced and undersold, and Pixar accumulated tens of millions in losses. NeXT abandoned hardware in 1993, and the press called Jobs a "flameout." Yet NeXT's software proved significant: Physicist Tim Berners-Lee used a NeXT machine to create the World Wide Web in 1990.

During these years, Jobs built his first real family life. He married Laurene Powell in March 1991, and their son Reed was born that September. He reconnected with his daughter Lisa, tracked down his birth mother, and met his biological sister, novelist Mona Simpson. Paul Jobs died in 1993. Two more daughters, Erin and Eve, followed.

Pixar's fortunes turned with Toy Story, which opened Thanksgiving 1995 to enthusiastic reviews and earned $192 million domestically. A Pixar stock offering briefly made Jobs's stake worth over $1 billion. Meanwhile, Apple had stumbled, and in December 1996 it bought NeXT for over $400 million, bringing Jobs back. By July 1997, the board ousted CEO Gil Amelio, and Jobs took charge. He called Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates to negotiate continued Mac support, slashed Apple's product line to four computers, and launched the "Think Different" ad campaign.

Working with designer Jonathan Ive, Jobs developed the translucent, candy-colored iMac, unveiled in May 1998, which sold nearly 300,000 units in six weeks. After realizing Apple had missed the digital music revolution, Jobs declared the personal computer would become "the digital hub of our emerging digital lifestyle." Apple developed iTunes software and the iPod, a pocket-sized music player that could hold a thousand songs. The iPod launched in October 2001, and the iTunes store opened in April 2003, selling a million songs in six days.

In October 2003, a scan revealed a rare, slow-growing tumor on Jobs's pancreas, treatable with surgery. Jobs refused the operation for nine months, pursuing alternative remedies while his family begged him to reconsider. He agreed to surgery in July 2004, but doctors found the cancer had spread to his liver. At the Stanford commencement in June 2005, Jobs told graduates: "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life."

In 2006, Disney bought Pixar for $7.4 billion, making Jobs Disney's largest single shareholder. He drove development of the iPhone, harnessing multi-touch screen technology to combine an iPod, a phone, and an internet browser in one device. The iPhone debuted in January 2007, and the App Store launched a year later. As the cancer spread, Jobs received a liver transplant in March 2009, but doctors found cancer throughout the organ. He introduced the iPad in January 2010, and Apple surpassed Microsoft as the world's most valuable technology company.

On August 24, 2011, Jobs resigned as CEO, recommending Tim Cook as his successor. On October 5, 2011, with his wife, children, and sisters nearby, Jobs died. His sister Mona reported his final words: "OH WOW. OH WOW. OH WOW." The author concludes that Jobs did not invent the personal computer, animated movies, music players, or smartphones, but revolutionized each through relentless refinement and a belief that technology and art belong together. His favorite motto, shared at Stanford, captures his philosophy: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish."