Steve Jobs Quotes

"I want to put a ding in the universe."

"Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower."

"We used to dream about this stuff. Now we get to build it."

"Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."

"No one wants to die. Even people who wanna go to heaven don't wanna die to get there."

"It's rare that you see an artist in his 30s or 40s able to really contribute something amazing."

"Nobody has tried to swallow us since I've been here. I think they are afraid how we would taste."

"I'm the only person I know that's lost a quarter of a billion dollars in one year.... It's very character-building."

"Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?"

"It is hard to think that a $2 billion company with 4,300-plus people couldn't compete with six people in blue jeans."

"I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me."

"It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them."

"You can't just ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they'll want something new."

"What a computer is to me is the most remarkable tool that we have ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds."

To turn really interesting ideas and fledgling technologies into a company that can continue to innovate for years, it requires a lot of disciplines.

"Death is the destination we all share, no one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be because death is very likely the single best invention of life."

"Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me ... Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful... that's what matters to me."

"We're gambling on our vision, and we would rather do that than make "me too" products. Let some other companies do that. For us, it's always the next dream."

"The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it."

"The people who are doing the work are the moving force behind the Macintosh. My job is to create a space for them, to clear out the rest of the organization and keep it at bay."

"I was worth about over a million dollars when I was twenty-three and over ten million dollars when I was twenty-four, and over a hundred million dollars when I was twenty-five and it wasn't that important because I never did it for the money."

"Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It's not about money. It's about the people you have, how you're led, and how much you get it."

"I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life."

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

"When you're young, you look at television and think, There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth."

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart."

Compiled by Thomas George
editor@Wisdom-of-the-Wise.com