“I hope I don’t get killed by the studio for giving too much away,” Sorkin said, “but this entire movie is going to be three scenes, and three scenes only, that all take place in real time.”

OH WOW. OH WOW. OH WOW.

Steve Jobs’s final words.

In the end he was an inspiring person. He inspired loyalty and real love. So you judge him by that.

Walter Isaacson, author of ‘Steve Jobs,’ reflecting on the media’s latching onto anecdotes about the Apple co-founder behaving like a monster.

SPD writes:

We caught up with the art directors of Time, Bloomberg Businessweek, and Newsweek, and asked them to describe the process they each went through to create their special Jobs covers and issues. Here’s a behind-the-scenes look at one of the most exciting magazine-making moments in recent history.

Top photo is Wednesday night, “the wall” at Newsweek. Bottom photo is Friday night. Click through to see ‘em super-sized.

Presenting the cover of our special commemorative Steve Jobs issue. Dirk Barnett, Newsweek’s Creative Director, describes the choice:

We found this amazing photo in the Newsweek archives—famed fashion photographer Hiro photographed Steve Jobs for Newsweek in 1983 1984. We felt this was a timeless ode to a business and cultural icon.

What do you think?

It’s incredible how interactive we’re getting with technology, quite scary too. But if you have a crazy idea, stick with it. If people call you fckin crazy, they’ll soon realize you were just being innovative.

KHLEANG: Newsweek: Steve Jobs Basically Introduces ‘Siri’ in 1984 Interview

In another of the many amazing quotes in that 3,500-word NEWSWEEK interview with Steve Jobs, which appeared in a 1984 special issue of the magazine, the Apple co-founder totally envisions Siri—the virtual personal assistant the company announced earlier this week.

Look!

I’ve always thought it would be really wonderful to have a little box, a sort of slate that you could carry along with you. You’d get one of these things maybe when you were 10 years old, and somehow you’d turn it on and it would say, you know, “Where am I?” And you’d somehow tell it you were in California and it would say, “Oh, who are you?”

“My name’s Steven.”

“Really? How old are you?”

“I’m 10.”

“What are we doing here?”

“Well, we’re in recess and we have to go back to class.”

“What’s class?”

You’d start to teach it about yourself. And it would just keep storing all this information about you and maybe it would recognize that every Friday afternoon you like to do something special, and maybe you’d like it to help you with this routine. So about the third time it asks you: “Well, would you like me to do this for you every Friday?” You say, “Yes,” and before long it becomes an incredibly powerful helper. It goes with you everywhere you go. It knows most of the raw information in your life that you’d like to keep, but then starts to make connections between things, and one day when you’re 18 and you’ve just split up with your girlfriend it says: “You know, Steve, the same thing has happened three times in a row.”

Here’s how Apple pitches Siri on its site today: 

It understands what you say.

Talk to Siri as you would to a person. Say something like “Tell my wife I’m running late.” “Remind me to call the vet.” “Any good burger joints around here?” And Siri answers you. It does what you say and finds the information you need. And then it hits you. You’re actually having a conversation with your iPhone.

Also: 

It knows what you mean.

Siri not only understands what you say, it’s smart enough to know what you mean. So when you ask “Any good burger joints around here?” Siri will reply “I found a number of burger restaurants near you.” Then you can say “Hmm. How about tacos?” Siri remembers that you just asked about restaurants, so it will look for Mexican restaurants in the neighborhood. And Siri is proactive, so it will question you until it finds what you’re looking for.

We’re talking a difference of 27, 28 years here, but Steve finally got his wish. The world finally got its “incredibly powerful helper,” one day before he died.

The types of computers we have today are tools. They’re responders: you ask a computer to do something and it will do it. The next stage is going to be computers as “agents.” In other words, it will be as if there’s a little person inside that box who starts to anticipate what you want. Rather than help you, it will start to guide you through large amounts of information. It will almost be like you have a little friend inside that box.

One of many amazing quotes in this 3,500-word NEWSWEEK interview with Steve Jobs, which appeared in a 1984 special issue of the magazine. Jobs was 29 at the time.

fuckyeahnewsweekarchives:

“iPod Nation,” NEWSWEEK, July 26, 2004.

“From early on we wanted a product that would seem so natural and so inevitable and so simple you almost wouldn’t think of it as having been designed,” says Apple’s industrial designer. This austerity extended to the whiteness of the iPod, a double-crystal polymer Antarctica, a blankness that screams in brilliant colors across a crowded subway. “It’s neutral, but it is a bold neutral, just shockingly neutral,” says Ive.

Assessing the final product, Jobs bestows, for him, the ultimate accolade: “It’s as Apple as anything Apple has ever done.”

[link]

The year the lowercase i became a way of life.