Isaacson writes fluidly, put in the research and reporting (also rehashed a lot of other people's), but doesn't know the technology or the tech business. In fact I don't get a sense he likes them or 'got' Steve Jobs.
Hatchet job might be strong. But he dwells a lot on the charismatic and narcissistic and mercurial personality and not on why so many great people loved Jobs and worked so hard for him. Or what his insights about products and the business were (besides being a control freak and perfectionist).
The book is a good read, it's a creditable first draft of history, contains some first-hand stuff I never saw before about the genesis of the iPod and iPhone and iPad.
Isaacson gives the who, what, when, where, but doesn't really explain why. To his credit, he lets the people speak for themselves.
Jobs could have picked a lot of other people, but he picked a non-tech, non-business writer. I guess he wanted someone to just tell the story, not the strategy or product vision that makes Apple great.
Maybe Gruber should interview a bunch of people and give it a shot. It's not what Isaacson set out for or was in a position to do.
> Isaacson gives the who, what, when, where, but doesn't really explain why.
Most of the time. But sometimes he tries to explain and fails miserably.
It wasn't a newspaper article, it was a book that everyone knew would sell tens of millions of copies (even if the subject hasn't died a few weeks before). If he had sought council of one Apple observer (about his explanations, and whether they were right or catastrophically wrong) before wrapping up the book and sending it to the publisher, the book wouldn't be such a mess.
> Jobs could have picked a lot of other people, but he picked a non-tech, non-business writer. I guess he wanted someone to just tell the story, not the strategy or product vision that makes Apple great.
Or, as John Siracusa said, he might've chosen the wrong guy.
Perhaps Isaacson does not explain why because it is rather impossible to do so. The most honest type of journalism is to let people speak for themselves.
On the other hand, someone like Gruber would be the absolute worst person to write a biography. He idolizes Jobs and Apple and is the farthest thing you can get from an unbiased observer. The only truth you would find in a Gruber biography of Jobs is the truth of how Gruber himself sees the world.
The only person who could really answer the Why was Jobs himself, and even though this was an authorized bio, I never really felt that there was much personal insight from Jobs himself. Did Isaacson really not ask the questions, or did Jobs not know the answers himself?
or maybe Jobs was a control freak and didn't want to give them, and wanted to get everyone to read a somewhat shallow historical treatment and suck all the air out of the mass market for books about him, before someone wrote something more serious.
Isaacson writes fluidly, put in the research and reporting (also rehashed a lot of other people's), but doesn't know the technology or the tech business. In fact I don't get a sense he likes them or 'got' Steve Jobs.
Hatchet job might be strong. But he dwells a lot on the charismatic and narcissistic and mercurial personality and not on why so many great people loved Jobs and worked so hard for him. Or what his insights about products and the business were (besides being a control freak and perfectionist).
The book is a good read, it's a creditable first draft of history, contains some first-hand stuff I never saw before about the genesis of the iPod and iPhone and iPad.
Isaacson gives the who, what, when, where, but doesn't really explain why. To his credit, he lets the people speak for themselves.
Jobs could have picked a lot of other people, but he picked a non-tech, non-business writer. I guess he wanted someone to just tell the story, not the strategy or product vision that makes Apple great.
Maybe Gruber should interview a bunch of people and give it a shot. It's not what Isaacson set out for or was in a position to do.