The Lint Screen

Tag: IBM

  • He Was “For The Rest of Us”

    Steve Jobs has left the building. He is no longer Mr. Apple. While this day had to eventually come, it doesn’t make it any easier to take.

    No other business leader has been such a visionary, and no other company is such a reflection of its inspirational leader. Jobs is Apple, Apple is Jobs, and we will see if the great company can continue going forward without him at the helm.

    I suspect it will. After all, Jobs stocked the pond.

    In its early days, back when IBM ruled the PC world, Apple was positioned as “the computer for the rest of us.” Us were those who could care less how the damn thing worked. Us were the technophobic crowd who merely wanted the magic without knowing how the trick was done. Us were the ones who wanted to do a task with one keystroke instead of three, and wanted to make it possible for typography to be beautiful.

    That’s what Jobs and Apple gave us: easy to use computers and devices that did what needed to be done, while doing some other cool things, all while looking pretty cool.

    I spend most days hunched over an Apple laptop. I listen to an iPod on foot, in the car and on the plane. I talk on an iPhone and surf the web with it, too. I rarely resist the siren call of an Apple store and lust for all the goodies within (MacBook Air, I’m stalking you). And, of course, I’ve been a fan of Apple’s advertising from the start.

    Aside from those couple years when Jobs got das boot from Apple and created NeXT and turbo-boosted Pixar, the company was a reflection of the man in jeans and a black turtleneck. A man who is sick, but still generously shared his wisdom a few years back with this inspiring commencement address.

    A man who was our modern day Edison with his name listed on 313 Apple patents. A man who thought differently, and asked us to think different. A true American legend, this Steve Jobs. He will be missed. Enjoy.

  • Watson Talking Trash

    Watson, before he became a loudmouth jerk dickwad creep.
    IBM’s brainiac monster Webster, who humiliated humanity with its awesome display of brainpower on Jeopardy, is reported to be talking more trash than found in a New Jersey landfill.

    Many people confirmed they’ve seen the mega computer in numerous Manhattan watering holes slurping oceans of loudmouth soup and dishing major league trash talk.

    “He seemed so nice on Jeopardy,” said one eyewitness, “but he acted like a pompous drunk jerk at the bar shouting crap like– ‘humans got nothing, I could beat your race with a 386-chip and a motherboard on the fritz! Jennings and Rutter’s the best you meat puppets got? Gimme a break, they’re crap! You want to de-throne the king, you better bring some stronger playas! Unbelievable, you people with your puny brains and slow fingers. ‘”

    “The poor bastard’s on a bender,” said one bartender who served Watson. “He’s drinking to drown some deeply-seeded problem, but he’ll probably drown himself first. It’s tragic.”

    Jeopardy host Alex Trebeck said he hopes the computer superstar can deal with his newfound celebrity. “It’s tough to deal with the spotlight,” said Trebeck, “especially when you start saying everything in the form of a question, and doing it with a heavily slurred voice that stinks of stale beer and bourbon.”