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

Financial Times
came up to the stage afterward and asked Jobs, sounding almost 
accusatory, whether he was going to end up taking over Apple. “Oh no, Louise,” he said. “There 
are a lot of other things going on in my life now. I have a family. I am involved at Pixar. My time 
is limited, but I hope I can share some ideas.”
The next day Jobs drove to Pixar. He had fallen increasingly in love with the place, and he 
wanted to let the crew there know he was still going to be president and deeply involved. But the 
Pixar people were happy to see him go back to Apple part-time; a little less of Jobs’s focus would 
be a good thing. He was useful when there were big negotiations, but he could be dangerous when 
he had too much time on his hands. When he arrived at Pixar that day, he went to Lasseter’s office 
and explained that even just being an advisor at Apple would take up a lot of his time. He said he 
wanted Lasseter’s blessing. “I keep thinking about all the time away from my family this will 
cause, and the time away from the other family at Pixar,” Jobs said. “But the only reason I want to 
do it is that the world will be a better place with Apple in it.”
Lasseter smiled gently. “You have my blessing,” he said.

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CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
THE RESTORATION
The Loser Now Will Be Later to Win
Amelio calling up Wozniak as Jobs hangs back, 1997
Hovering Backstage
“It’s rare that you see an artist in his thirties or forties able to really contribute something 
amazing,” Jobs declared as he was about to turn thirty.
That held true for Jobs in his thirties, during the decade that began with his ouster from Apple 
in 1985. But after turning forty in 1995, he flourished. 
Toy Story
was released that year, and the 
following year Apple’s purchase of NeXT offered him reentry into the company he had founded. 
In returning to Apple, Jobs would show that even people over forty could be great innovators. 
Having transformed personal computers in his twenties, he would now help to do the same for 
music players, the recording industry’s business model, mobile phones, apps, tablet computers, 
books, and journalism.
He had told Larry Ellison that his return strategy was to sell NeXT to Apple, get appointed to 
the board, and be there ready when CEO Gil Amelio stumbled. Ellison may have been baffled 
when Jobs insisted that he was not motivated by money, but it was partly true. He had neither 
Ellison’s conspicuous consumption needs nor Gates’s philanthropic impulses nor the competitive 
urge to see how high on the 
Forbes
list he could get. Instead his ego needs and personal drives led 
him to seek fulfillment by creating a legacy that would awe people. A dual legacy, actually: 
building innovative products and building a lasting company. He wanted to be in the pantheon 
with, indeed a notch above, people like Edwin Land, Bill Hewlett, and David Packard. And the 
best way to achieve all this was to return to Apple and reclaim his kingdom.
And yet when the cup of power neared his lips, he became strangely hesitant, reluctant, perhaps 
coy.
He returned to Apple officially in January 1997 as a part-time advisor, as he had told Amelio he 
would. He began to assert himself in some personnel areas, especially in protecting his people 
who had made the transition from NeXT. But in most other ways he was unusually passive. The 
decision not to ask him to join the board offended him, and he felt demeaned by the suggestion 
that he run the company’s operating system division. Amelio was thus able to create a situation in 

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which Jobs was both inside the tent and outside the tent, which was not a prescription for 
tranquillity. Jobs later recalled:
Gil didn’t want me around. And I thought he was a bozo. I knew that before I sold him the company. I 
thought I was just going to be trotted out now and then for events like Macworld, mainly for show. That 
was fine, because I was working at Pixar. I rented an office in downtown Palo Alto where I could work 
a few days a week, and I drove up to Pixar for one or two days. It was a nice life. I could slow down, 
spend time with my family.
Jobs was, in fact, trotted out for Macworld right at the beginning of January, and this reaffirmed 
his opinion that Amelio was a bozo. Close to four thousand of the faithful fought for seats in the 
ballroom of the San Francisco Marriott to hear Amelio’s keynote address. He was introduced by 
the actor Jeff Goldblum. “I play an expert in chaos theory in