Even though there were several hundred people in attendance, I liked the relaxed nature of the event as everyone filed in. You almost felt like it was a high school group of students, by the way they dressed, and Steve seemed like some nice teacher guy hanging out in the room and was very approachable. Very non-pretentious. I love that about techie-people in general.
He told the brief story of his life from his youth through his present time, with lots of inspirational milestones. I wondered how many times he had told that same story. As an instructor at a university, I get bored doing the same lecture twice in a row for two sections, I can't imagine telling the same story hundreds upon hundreds of times, maybe even thousands of times, and still be cheery and enthusiastic about it.
Some of the things that stood out were these:
-At 9 years old he goofed around with basic electronics. He explained that his first stuff was so simple, anyone could do it, and although I don't recall the exact details, I remember that it really was simple stuff that all of us can do and he was right in presenting it that way. He used that knowledge to have fun with his friends. The key thing was that by always having fun with things and trying to make the next cool thing in a very incremental way, he went from very ordinary knowledge to extraordinary, but the way he explained it made it seem achievable by anyone--just be curious and work on projects for yourself and not for some boss.
-He had a high IQ, but his parents never told him, never had him skip classes or anything. He said he was grateful that he never knew and got to grow up like any other kid. How many parents would do that today? I think this is an interesting choice, because top schools these days push so hard to have students learn as much as possible as fast as possible about things everyone else has already learned, and it takes away the intellectual breathing space to have fun and explore new knowledge. For example, if you have an Internet development course that is so rigorous that the student has no free time (along with other disciplines that take themselves very seriously), there is no chance for students to build stuff that interests them on the side. You have to have some slack time for goofing off and having fun.
-He only applied to one school. He went to Colorado on a trip, liked the snow, and only applied there. But he only attended one year, because his parents didn't have enough money. So he returned home to work for a year. Saved up, went to another year of school. Then worked for a year, and went to another year of school (each time at more local, less expensive schools). It blew me away to read in his bio that he actually started Apple, invented the personal computer, and then stopped working and went back to school a number of years later to finish the final year of his degree. Who does that?
-After making it big, he saw that people working under him hadn't been offered stock options, so he gave them millions from his own funds because he thought it was the fair and decent thing to do.
-He is a joker, and throughout his life pulled a lot of pranks on people, all in good nature. He used his technology skills in particular to mess with people, such as making tv interference broadcasters that he would use to make people repeatedly bang on televisions to make the reception come back in and have it appear that it was doing the trick to bang on the tv.
If I were to sum up what I think would be applicable to my life from what he said, it would be that we should have fun with what we do, compete with ourselves to do better than our last task and not compete with others, not be afraid to read anything that will help us do better with our hobbies, be passionate about our own personal projects, be true to ourselves and be willing to do things like give 10 years to teaching in grade schools and high schools, and live with a clear conscience because we are always honest in our dealings with others. Better to be broke and smiling than wealthy and have regrets.
