Steve Jobs (book)
| Company type | Biography |
|---|---|
| Industry | Publishing |
| Founded | October 24, 2011 |
| Founder | Walter Isaacson |
| Headquarters | United States |
| Products | Book |
| Website | www |
Steve Jobs is the officially sanctioned biography of Apple’s co-founder Steve Jobs, authored by Walter Isaacson, a former executive at CNN and Time magazine, known for his bestselling biographies of Benjamin Franklin and Albert Einstein.
Over a period of two years, Isaacson conducted more than 40 interviews directly with Jobs, in addition to conversations with over 100 relatives, friends, rivals, and coworkers, granting him exceptional insight into Jobs’s life. Jobs encouraged openness among those interviewed and participated without imposing restrictions on the content, notably relinquishing any rights to preview the manuscript before it was published. Isaacson sought to provide a nuanced portrait that acknowledged Jobs’s imperfections alongside his achievements.
The book was released by Simon & Schuster on October 24, 2011, just 19 days following Jobs’s passing, delivering an in-depth examination of his business philosophies and technological influence.
A cinematic rendition of the biography, scripted by Aaron Sorkin, directed by Danny Boyle, and featuring Michael Fassbender as Jobs, premiered on October 9, 2015.
Front cover
The cover image is a photograph taken in 2006 by Albert Watson for Fortune magazine. Watson invested three hours preparing for the shoot to ensure efficiency. Upon arrival, Jobs expressed fascination with Watson’s 4×5 camera, commenting, "wow, you're shooting film."
Jobs dedicated an hour to the session—longer than typical portrait sittings. Watson directed Jobs to maintain almost direct eye contact with the lens while contemplating forthcoming projects and challenges.
The title is set in the Helvetica typeface.
Back cover
The reverse side displays a photograph captured in February 1984 by Norman Seeff inside Jobs’s living room in Woodside, California. Seeff recalls them casually seated on the floor discussing creativity and everyday matters when Jobs returned holding a Macintosh 128K computer on his lap as the photo was taken.
Title
Initially, the publisher Simon & Schuster’s marketing team proposed the working title iSteve: The Book of Jobs. While Isaacson felt uncertain about this choice and his wife and daughter found it overly playful, he convinced the publisher to select a more straightforward and refined title.
The finalized title, Steve Jobs, aligns with Jobs’s minimalist aesthetic and reinforces the biography’s legitimacy. It also differentiates it from unauthorized publications such as iCon Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business by Jeffrey Young.
Chapters
The book contains 42 primary chapters supplemented by numerous sub-headings. In audiobook editions, these sub-sections can appear as over 150 distinct chapters. Notably, the audiobook incorrectly labels Chapter 41 as "Round Three, A Never-ending Struggle" instead of its proper title "Round Three, Twilight Struggle."
| Chapter number | Chapter title | Sub-heading number | Sub-heading title | Approximate audiobook timestamp | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Introduction | How this book came to be | 00:00:00 | ||||||
| Chapter 1 | Childhood, Abandoned and Chosen | 1.1 | The Adoption | 00:13:02 | ||||
| 1.2 | Silicon Valley | 00:25:21 | ||||||
| 1.3 | School | 00:42:39 | ||||||
| Chapter 2 | Odd Couple, The Two Steves | 2.1 | Woz | 01:05:56 | ||||
| 2.2 | The Blue Box | 01:21:37 | ||||||
| Chapter 3 | The Dropout, Turn On, Tune in... | 3.1 | Chrisann Brennan | 01:30:36 | ||||
| 3.2 | Reed College | 01:35:05 | ||||||
| 3.3 | Robert Friedland | 01:46:22 | ||||||
| 3.4 | ...Drop Out | 01:54:33 | ||||||
| Chapter 4 | Atari and India, Zen and the Art of Game Design | 4.1 | Atari | 01:59:40 | ||||
| 4.2 | India | 02:06:39 | ||||||
| 4.3 | The Search | 02:15:38 | ||||||
| Chapter 5 | The Apple I, Turn On, Boot Up, Jack In... | 5.1 | Machines of Loving Grace | 02:33:32 | ||||
| 5.2 | The Homebrew Computer Club | 02:42:29 | ||||||
| 5.3 | Apple is Born | 02:51:56 | ||||||
| Chapter 6 | The Apple II, Dawn of a New Age | 6.1 | An Integrated Package | 03:13:27 | ||||
| 6.2 | Mike Markkula | 03:23:38 | ||||||
| Chapter 7 | Chrisann and Lisa, He Who Is Abandoned... | 03:51:29 | ||||||
| Chapter 8 | Xerox and Lisa, Graphical User Interface | 8.1 | A New Baby | 04:06:51 | ||||
| Chapter 9 | Going Public, A Man of Wealth and Fame | 9.1 | Options | 04:32:45 | ||||
| Chapter 10 | The Mac is Born, You Say You Want a Revolution | 10.1 | Jef Raskin's Baby | 04:46:11 | ||||
| Chapter 11 | The Reality Distortion Field, Playing by His Own Set of Rules | 05:06:51 | ||||||
| Chapter 12 | The Design, Real Artists Simplify | 12.1 | A Bauhaus Aesthetic | 05:26:42 | ||||
| Chapter 13 | Building The Mac, The Journey Is The Reward | 13.1 | Competition | 05:52:12 | ||||
| Chapter 14 | Enter Sculley, The Pepsi Challenge | 14.1 | The Courtship | 06:26:07 | ||||
| Chapter 15 | The Launch, A Dent in the Universe | 15.1 | Real Artists Ship | 06:52:32 | ||||
| Chapter 16 | Gates And Jobs, When Orbits Intersect | 16.1 | The Macintosh Partnership | 07:24:56 | ||||
| Chapter 17 | Icarus, What goes up... | 17.1 | Flying High | 07:47:33 | ||||
| Chapter 18 | NeXT, Prometheus Unbound | 18.1 | The Pirates Abandon Ship | 09:08:55 | ||||
| Chapter 19 | Pixar, Technology Meets Art | 19.1 | Lucasfilm's Computer Division | 10:18:42 | ||||
| Chapter 20 | A Regular Guy, Love Is Just a Four-Letter Word | 20.1 | Joan Baez | 10:48:26 | ||||
| Chapter 21 | Family Man, At Home with the Jobs Clan | 21.1 | Laurene Powell | 11:31:43 | ||||
| Chapter 22 | Toy Story, Buzz and Woody to the Rescue | 22.1 | Jeffrey Katzenberg | 12:16:46 | ||||
| Chapter 23 | The Second Coming, What Rough Beast... | 23.1 | Things Fall Apart | 12:42:10 | ||||
| Chapter 24 | The Restoration, The Loser Now Will Be Later to Win | 24.1 | Hovering Backstage | 13:14:44 | ||||
| Chapter 25 | Think Different, Jobs as iCEO | 25.1 | Here's to the Crazy Ones | 14 16 28 | ||||
| Chapter 26 | Design Principles, The Studio of Jobs and Ive | 26.1 | Jony Ive | 14 49 26 | ||||
| Chapter 27 | The iMac, Hello (Again) | 27.1 | Back to the Future | 15 09 53 | ||||
| Chapter 28 | CEO, Still Crazy after All These Years | 28.1 | Tim Cook | 15 34 11 | ||||
| Chapter 29 | Apple Stores, Genius Bars and Siena Sandstone | 29.1 | The Customer Experience | 15 59 31 | ||||
| Chapter 30 | The Digital Hub, From iTunes to the iPod | 30.1 | Connecting the Dots | 16 24 58 | ||||
| Chapter 31 | The iTunes Store, I'm the Pied Piper | 31.1 | Warner Music | 17 06 39 | ||||
| Chapter 32 | Music Man, The Sound Track of His Life | 32.1 | On His iPod | 17 53 26 | ||||
| Chapter 33 | Pixar's Friends, ...and Foes | 33.1 | A Bug's Life | 18 32 46 | ||||
| Chapter 34 | Twenty-First-Century Macs, Setting Apple Apart | 34.1 | Clams, Ice Cubes, and Sunflowers | 19 20 24 | ||||
| Chapter 35 | Round One, Memento Mori | 35.1 | Cancer | 19 41 35 | ||||
| Chapter 36 | The iPhone, Three Revolutionary Products in One | 36.1 | An iPod That Makes Calls | 20 16 05 | ||||
| Chapter 37 | Round Two, The Cancer Recurs | 37.1 | The Battles of 2008 | 20 43 19 | ||||
| Chapter 38 | The iPad, Into the Post-PC Era | 38.1 | You Say You Want a Revolution | 21 22 39 | ||||
| Chapter 39 | New Battles, And Echoes of Old Ones | 39.1 | Google vs Open/Closed Ecosystems | 22 18 13 | ||||
| Chapter40 | To Infinity, The Cloud and Beyond | 40.1 | The iPad2 | 22 57 34 | ||||
| Chapter41 | Round Three, The Twilight Struggle | 41.1 | Family Ties | 23 32 37 | ||||
| Chapter42 | Legacy, The Brightest Heaven of Invention | 42.1 | FireWire | 24 32 27 |
Reception
In her review for The New York Times, Janet Maslin offered a balanced perspective, blending gentle critique with commendation, describing Isaacson's biography as "a comprehensive overview of Mr. Jobs's achievements, filled with the enthusiasm and intensity they warrant."
Several individuals close to Jobs, including family members like Laurene Powell Jobs and key associates such as Tim Cook and Jony Ive, voiced their dissatisfaction. Cook remarked that the biography did a "great disservice" to Jobs by not truly reflecting the man he personally knew. Ive expressed his low opinion of the book, stating his regard "could not be any lower."
From a commercial standpoint, the biography achieved remarkable success, with sales exceeding three million copies in the United States by 2015.
Film adaptation
Steve Jobs is a dramatic film portraying the life of Apple's co-founder Steve Jobs, featuring Michael Fassbender in the lead role. The movie was directed by Danny Boyle, produced by Scott Rudin, and penned by Aaron Sorkin. The screenplay is inspired by Isaacson's biography as well as interviews conducted by Sorkin.
Other media
Portions of the biography were published in various magazines, accompanied by interviews with author Walter Isaacson.
Following Jobs's passing on October 5, 2011, TIME released a special edition on October 8 showcasing a cover image of Jobs holding the original Macintosh computer. This was his eighth feature on TIME's front page. The issue included a photographic essay by Diana Walker, retrospectives on Apple authored by Harry McCracken and Lev Grossman, along with a six-page preview essay from Isaacson about the forthcoming biography.
Additionally, Bloomberg Businessweek issued an ad-free tribute edition, featuring a stark black-and-white portrait of Jobs on the cover and essays written by Steve Jurvetson, John Sculley, Sean Wisely, William Gibson, and Walter Isaacson.
On October 24, 2011, Fortune published an exclusive excerpt highlighting Jobs's intricate relationship with Bill Gates.
Awards and honors
Despite being released late in 2011, the book secured Amazon's top bestseller position for that year.
- Shortlisted for the 2012 Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award
- Appeared on The New York Times bestseller list in 2011
- Named Best Nonfiction Book of 2011 by Christian Science Monitor
- Included in Time Magazine's Best Books of 2011