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| I wish to eat all of your cheeese =P | |||
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| '''Stephen Wozniak''' (nickname '''Woz''') (born ], ]) is credited with initiating the entry of computers into private homes. Although his contribution may be seen as a compilation of a few well-known ideas that have perfectly coincided with the technological readiness for a mass-produced computer, Stephen Wozniak's ingenuity and relentless creativity made him uniquely suitable to pick up the credit for starting the ] revolution. | |||
| Wozniak's early inspirations came from his father Jerry who was a ] engineer, and from a fictional wonder-boy: ]. His father infected him with fascination for electronics and would often check over young Woz's creations. Tom Swift, on the other hand, was for Woz an epitome of creative freedom, scientific knowledge, and the ability to find solutions to problems. Tom Swift would also attractively illustrate the big awards that await the inventor. To this day, Wozniak returns to Tom Swift books and reads them to his own kids as a form of inspiration. | |||
| Woz's values were shaped and strengthened over years by his family, Christian philosophy, radio amateur ethics (helping people in emergency), books (Swift's utilitarian and humanitarian attitude) and others. | |||
| As a lasting Swift legacy, throughout his life, Wozniak loved all projects that required heavy thinking. He learned the basics of mathematics and electronics from his father. When Woz was 11, he built his own ] station, and got a ham-radio license. At age 13, he was elected president of his high school electronics club, and won first prize at a science fair for a ]-based calculator. Also at 13, Woz built his first computer that laid the engineering foundation of his later success. | |||
| By ], Woz would drop out of the ] and would come up with a computer that could sweep the nation. However, he was largely working within a scope of the ], a local group of electronics hobbyists. His project had no wider ambition. At the club he met ]. Jobs, 5-years Woz's junior, who himself had dropped out of ] in ], was a perennial starry-eyed visionary. Jobs and Wozniak came to the conclusion that a completely assembled and inexpensive computer would be in demand. They sold some of their prized possessions (e.g. Woz's scientific calculator), raised $1300, and assembled the first prototype in Jobs' garage. Their first computer was quite unimpressive by today's standards, but in ] it was an engineering marvel. In simplicity of use it went years ahead of the ], which was introduced earlier in 1975. Altair had no display and no true storage. It received commands via a series of switches and a single program would require thousands of toggles without an error. Altair output was presented in the form of flashing lights. Altair was great for true geeks (] and ] were among the first), but it was not usable for a wider public. It would not even come assembled. Woz's computer, on the other hand, named ], was a fully assembled and functional unit that contained a $25 ] on a single-circuit board with ]. On ], ], Jobs and Wozniak formed ]. Wozniak quit his job at ] and became the vice president in charge of research and development at Apple. Apple I was priced at $666.66. Jobs and Wozniak sold their first 25 computers to a local dealer. | |||
| Wozniak could now focus full-time on fixing the shortcomings of Apple I and adding new functionality. Apple I earned the company close to a million dollars. His new design was to retain the most important characteristics: simplicity and usability. Woz introduced high-resolution graphics in ]. His computer could now display pictures instead of just letters: "I threw in high-res. It was only two chips. I didn't know if people would use it." By ], he also designed an inexpensive ]. He and Randy Wigginton wrote a simple disk operating system. In addition to his hardware skills, Wozniak wrote most of software that ran Apple. He wrote a ] interpreter, a ] game (which was also a reason to add sound to Apple), the code needed to control the disk drive, and more. On the software side, the Apple II was also made more attractive to a business user by the famous pioneering ]: ] and ]'s ]. In ], the Apple company went public and made Jobs and Wozniak millionaires. At the age of 27, Jobs was the youngest ] man in ] -- a rare case before the dot-com era. Incidentally, in ], when the company cut the price of Apple II, it helped to launch yet another meteoric software career, that of ]. Kapor scraped enough money to buy his own Apple. Inspired by ] and a meeting with its inventors, he went on to develop ] and swept the spreadsheet market place for years to follow. | |||
| For years the Apple II was the main source of profit at Apple, and it assured the company's survival when its management undertook much less profitable ventures like the ill fated ] and the short lived ]. It was because of the reliable profits from the Apple II that Apple was able to develop the Mac, market it, and gradually make it evolve into a machine which is now at the center of all Apple products. In a sense then, Wozniak can be considered as the financial godfather of the Mac. | |||
| Woz became less enthusiastic about his work for Apple. He got married and returned to the university under the name "Rocky Clark" to get his degrees in ] in computer science as well as in electrical engineering. In ] he decided to return to mainstream Apple development. However, he wanted to be no more than just an engineer and a motivational factor for the Apple workforce. Woz left Apple for good on ], ], nine years after setting up the company. Jobs was also forced to leave Apple as a result of a power struggle. Wozniak and Jobs were proud to have originated an anti-corporate ethic among big players of computer market. Jobs focused on not always practical innovation with his ] vision, while Woz went into teaching and charitable activities in the field of education. In September ], Steve Wozniak was inducted into the ]. | |||
| Since leaving ], Woz has provided all the money, as well as a good amount of on-site technical support of the local ] School district. In 2001, Woz founded ], a company that provides wireless solutions. | |||
| == External links == | |||
| * Steve Wozniak's Web site | |||
| * | |||
Revision as of 17:38, 15 March 2004
I wish to eat all of your cheeese =P