p2p news / p2pnet: “After being all but written off by the tech industry in the mid ‘90s, Apple Computer Inc. has made a startling resurgence,” says Peter Nowak in a Globe & Mail special. “But that doesn’t mean its latest strategies sit well with Woz.”

Woz?

That’s Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak who, “made his fortune as the inventor of the Apple II computer more than 25 years ago. Being super rich often results in the acquisition of some strange hobbies, and Mr. Wozniak was in New Zealand recently for a four-on-four polo tournament played on two-wheeled, self-balancing Segway gyroscopic scooters.”

The “normally media-shy” Wozniak and Steve Jobs used to build blue boxes, which allowed users to avoid paying for calls. These days Steve J is, of course, whiter than white.

Anyway, “By 1980, the company had gone public and the two Steves had struck it rich,” says Nowak. “But Mr. Jobs and Mr. Wozniak left Apple in 1985 after an internal power struggle. Mr. Jobs returned to the company as chief executive officer in 1997 and has since led the company to new heights, but Mr. Wozniak has stayed away. His dealings with Apple are minor, he said, although he’s still on the payroll ‘just out of loyalty’.”

But, “Apple’s recent embrace of Intel processors, for one, is something Mr. Wozniak says he never imagined,” the article continues.

“It’s like consorting with the enemy. We’ve had this long history of saying the enemy is the big black-hatted guys, and they kind of represent evil. We are different, and by being different we’re better.” But, “All of a sudden we’re the same in this hardware regard, so it’s a little hard to swallow your words from the past.”

Wozniak has mixed feelings about the iPod, too.

They’re, “distracting Apple from its focus on computing, he said, and the company might be better served by spinning off the business”.

Meanwhile, “Like Apple, Microsoft is also changing by moving more toward on-line delivery of services, and Mr. Wozniak couldn’t resist taking a shot at his long-time nemesis,” adds the story.

” ‘Microsoft wants to get out of the whole image of the big, black Darth Vader evil guy,’ he [Wozniak] said. ‘Innovation is probably going on within the company, because any time you put smart engineers in places eventually they wind up talking and innovating no matter how much you try to hold them back.’

” ‘I hope Microsoft improves and becomes more like Apple’.”

Also See:
Globe & Mail - What the other Steve is saying about Apple’s striking resurgence, February 23, 2006

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