From bestselling author Walter Isaacson comes the landmark biography of Apple
co-founder Steve Jobs.
Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years–as
well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends,
adversaries, competitors, and colleagues–Walter Isaacson has written a
riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a
creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive
revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music,
phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.
At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and
when societies around the world are trying to build digital-age economies, Jobs
stood as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew
that the best way to create value in the twenty-first century was to connect
creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination
were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.
Although Jobs cooperated with this book, he asked for no control over what
was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. He put
nothing off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs
speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and
competed against. His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view
of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion
for control that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products
that resulted.
Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But
his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple's hardware and
software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system. His tale is
instructive and cautionary, filled with lessons about innovation, character,
leadership, and values.
About the author:
Walter Isaacson, the CEO of the Aspen Institute, has been chairman of CNN and
the managing editor of “Time” magazine. He is the author of “Benjamin
Franklin: An American Life” and of “Kissinger: A Biography”, and the
co-author of “The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made”.
He lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife and daughter.