Benjamin franklin and albert einstein, this is the exclusive biography of steve jobs

The Launch, May 6, 1998

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With the launch of the original Macintosh in 1984, Jobs had created a new kind of theater: the 
product debut as an epochal event, climaxed by a let-there-be-light moment in which the skies 
part, a light shines down, the angels sing, and a chorus of the chosen faithful sings “Hallelujah.” 
For the grand unveiling of the product that he hoped would save Apple and again transform 
personal computing, Jobs symbolically chose the Flint Auditorium of De Anza Community 
College in Cupertino, the same venue he had used in 1984. He would be pulling out all the stops 
in order to dispel doubts, rally the troops, enlist support in the developers’ community, and jump-
start the marketing of the new machine. But he was also doing it because he enjoyed playing 
impresario. Putting on a great show piqued his passions in the same way as putting out a great 
product.
Displaying his sentimental side, he began with a graceful shout-out to three people he had 
invited to be up front in the audience. He had become estranged from all of them, but now he 
wanted them rejoined. “I started the company with Steve Wozniak in my parents’ garage, and 
Steve is here today,” he said, pointing him out and prompting applause. “We were joined by Mike 
Markkula and soon after that our first president, Mike Scott,” he continued. “Both of those folks 
are in the audience today. And none of us would be here without these three guys.” His eyes 
misted for a moment as the applause again built. Also in the audience were Andy Hertzfeld and 
most of the original Mac team. Jobs gave them a smile. He believed he was about to do them 
proud.
After showing the grid of Apple’s new product strategy and going through some slides about 
the new computer’s performance, he was ready to unveil his new baby. “This is what computers 
look like today,” he said as a picture of a beige set of boxy components and monitor was projected 
on the big screen behind him. “And I’d like to take the privilege of showing you what they are 
going to look like from today on.” He pulled the cloth from the table at center stage to reveal the 
new iMac, which gleamed and sparkled as the lights came up on cue. He pressed the mouse, and 
as at the launch of the original Macintosh, the screen flashed with fast-paced images of all the 
wondrous things the computer could do. At the end, the word “hello” appeared in the same playful 
script that had adorned the 1984 Macintosh, this time with the word “again” below it in 
parentheses: 
Hello (again).
There was thunderous applause. Jobs stood back and proudly gazed at 
his new Macintosh. “It looks like it’s from another planet,” he said, as the audience laughed. “A 
good planet. A planet with better designers.”
Once again Jobs had produced an iconic new product, this one a harbinger of a new 
millennium. It fulfilled the promise of “Think Different.” Instead of beige boxes and monitors 
with a welter of cables and a bulky setup manual, here was a friendly and spunky appliance, 
smooth to the touch and as pleasing to the eye as a robin’s egg. You could grab its cute little 
handle and lift it out of the elegant white box and plug it right into a wall socket. People who had 
been afraid of computers now wanted one, and they wanted to put it in a room where others could 
admire and perhaps covet it. “A piece of hardware that blends sci-fi shimmer with the kitsch 
whimsy of a cocktail umbrella,” Steven Levy wrote in 
Newsweek
, “it is not only the coolest-
looking computer introduced in years, but a chest-thumping statement that Silicon Valley’s 
original dream company is no longer somnambulant.” 
Forbes
called it “an industry-altering 
success,” and John Sculley later came out of exile to gush, “He has implemented the same simple 
strategy that made Apple so successful 15 years ago: make hit products and promote them with 
terrific marketing.”
Carping was heard from only one familiar corner. As the iMac garnered kudos, Bill Gates 
assured a gathering of financial analysts visiting Microsoft that this would be a passing fad. “The 
one thing Apple’s providing now is leadership in colors,” Gates said as he pointed to a Windows-
based PC that he jokingly had painted red. “It won’t take long for us to catch up with that, I don’t 
think.” Jobs was furious, and he told a reporter that Gates, the man he had publicly decried for 
being completely devoid of taste, was clueless about what made the iMac so much more appealing 
than other computers. “The thing that our competitors are missing is that they think it’s about 
fashion, and they think it’s about surface appearance,” he said. “They say, We’ll slap a little color 
on this piece of junk computer, and we’ll have one, too.”
The iMac went on sale in August 1998 for $1,299. It sold 278,000 units in its first six weeks, 
and would sell 800,000 by the end of the year, making it the fastest-selling computer in Apple 

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history. Most notably, 32% of the sales went to people who were buying a computer for the first 
time, and another 12% to people who had been using Windows machines.
Ive soon came up with four new juicy-looking colors, in addition to bondi blue, for the iMacs. 
Offering the same computer in five colors would of course create huge challenges for 
manufacturing, inventory, and distribution. At most companies, including even the old Apple, 
there would have been studies and meetings to look at the costs and benefits. But when Jobs 
looked at the new colors, he got totally psyched and summoned other executives over to the 
design studio. “We’re going to do all sorts of colors!” he told them excitedly. When they left, Ive 
looked at his team in amazement. “In most places that decision would have taken months,” Ive 
recalled. “Steve did it in a half hour.”
There was one other important refinement that Jobs wanted for the iMac: getting rid of that 
detested CD tray. “I’d seen a slot-load drive on a very high-end Sony stereo,” he said, “so I went 
to the drive manufacturers and got them to do a slot-load drive for us for the version of the iMac 
we did nine months later.” Rubinstein tried to argue him out of the change. He predicted that new 
drives would come along that could burn music onto CDs rather than merely play them, and they 
would be available in tray form before they were made to work in slots. “If you go to slots, you 
will always be behind on the technology,” Rubinstein argued.
“I don’t care, that’s what I want,” Jobs snapped back. They were having lunch at a sushi bar in 
San Francisco, and Jobs insisted that they continue the conversation over a walk. “I want you to 
do the slot-load drive for me as a personal favor,” Jobs asked. Rubinstein agreed, of course, but he 
turned out to be right. Panasonic came out with a CD drive that could rip and burn music, and it 
was available first for computers that had old-fashioned tray loaders. The effects of this would 
ripple over the next few years: It would cause Apple to be slow in catering to users who wanted to 
rip and burn their own music, but that would then force Apple to be imaginative and bold in 
finding a way to leapfrog over its competitors when Jobs finally realized that he had to get into the 
music market.

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