Joining Apple 40 years ago
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1. His transformation of the Mac from the non-expandable appliance it was in the original 1984 Macintosh to Macs that supported expansion slots, such as the Macintosh II and the Macintosh SE. The Macintosh II series led to other expandable Macs such as the Quadra, the Power Macintosh, and the Mac Pro. While the Mac Pro would lose its expansion slots when the 2013 Mac Pro was released, the latest Mac Pro has expansion slots again, and I hope Apple keeps them if it releases an ARM version of the Mac Pro.
2. His work at Be, Inc. after his departure from Apple. I never had the chance to use BeOS (I was in elementary school during the heyday of BeOS), but I've read a lot about it. In my opinion, one of BeOS's most interesting features is its searchable file system. Indeed, the creator of BeOS's file system, Dominic Giampaolo (who wrote a well-written, accessible introductory textbook on file system design), moved to Apple after Be's demise and worked on Spotlight, which is macOS's search tool.
https://steve-parker.org/articles/others/stephenson/index.sh...
Don't quote me on this but the another powerful feature was the decoupling of media codecs from programs. Adding support for a new media codec was as simple as dropping a .so lib file into a /lib/codec directory and all your media programs now supported that codec. This applied to all media including audio, video and images. This was all part of the BeOS API.
It also had a decent c++ API and multithreading was a first class concept in the system allowing one to easily write programs to take advantage of multiple processors. That allowed the machine to easily scale as you added more processors, something Windows 98 couldn't do at the time. This was well before the concept of multi-core. Back then you needed more sockets to add more processors and it wasn't cheap.
It would be me living in Los Altos now, instead of the old rich people who I curse for refusing to die or reform Prop 13 and free up some affordable place to raise a new family.
Oh well.
Other areas that are intriguing to me include San Luis Obispo County and some of Southern California's exurbs like the Antelope Valley area and Lake Elsinore, where it's possible to buy a nice single-family house in a safe neighborhood for less than $500,000.
California gets a bad rap in some circles due to its high cost of living and its taxes, but not everywhere in California has the Bay Area's high housing costs. There are many other areas of the state where people can still reasonably make a day trip to the Bay Area to enjoy its amenities while living in a place that is affordable on an average engineer's salary.
In Sacramento, they have what is called 'open enrollment', which allows people to send their kids to school outside of their district, if there is a program there that isn't available locally. I had many classmates from across town, and one who lived halfway to Tahoe.
I personally think that areas like Half Moon Bay and Scott's Valley will benefit from remote work. It's close enough to go into SV when needed, but farther than many people would have wanted to commute daily. And they're beautiful, with good weather. SLO will probably benefit also, and I imagine that schools will change in these areas, to become more like SV/LA. That's probably good for SF/LA families, though locals might not like the changes.
Austin sounds like an up-and-coming Valley, as do a few other really gorgeous locations around the US. The trick is to pick one and settle in early.
The biggest problem is that money can get easily into China, but not so easily out of it.
That will have complications in the future, but that's the next generations issue, not the person making the decision today that wants a nice bonus.
So it's in fact hard to get money out of china.
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/263632/trade-balance-of-...
[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/220041/total-value-of-us...
If your think that surplus is a lot, then 5 times that is definitely not "they don't import much"
Our current president and almost half of the country explicitly doesn't think so.
If you start with the beginning of my comment "this is a lie" and follow along to the end of the sentence, I begin to extrapolate where I believe to be the primary source of this lie, twitter, and make an indirect reference to the perpetuators of the lie, the media.
Pollution is also terrible with no end in sight.
However, if you enjoy that style of living I do agree it might be one of the best places in the nation. If I ever get tired of urban living I plan on moving back.
People didn't think it was cheap at the time. The 70's had seen a boom in real estate prices, especially in California, due to the boomers moving into their home buying years. (And that was before Prop 13, which was a response to high home prices.)
> the old rich people who I curse for refusing to die or reform Prop 13 and free up some affordable place to raise a new family.
Supply & demand economics won't deliver the result you want even if your wish for everyone over 60 to drop dead is fulfilled.
Depends. If building housing were legal it would. Tokyo’s population has increased 50% over the last twenty years and property prices have been flat. If supply is allowed to rise to reach demand property prices don’t go up on a never ending spiral.
Nobody would be complaining about prop 13 or California housing prices if they didn’t desire to live in California more than somewhere else.
That's a quite different scenario.
You could confiscate the homes of everyone over 60, distribute them for free to young people, and the market prices of the homes would remain the same.
That's because most live in glorified living room space, and many in "comfortable elevator" size houses...
Regarding horizontal growth, there are plenty of places in the Tokyo metro area being redeveloped horizontally, such as the Musashi-Kosugi area of Kawasaki, which is just a 20 minute train ride on regular commuter trains like the Tokyu Toyoko Line and the JR Shonan-Shinjuku Line to Shibuya, a major hub in Tokyo. Over the past 15 years there has been a lot of development of high-rise residences in the area. Futako-tamagawa is another area of Tokyo that has seen much horizontal growth, starting with the Rise shopping center and nearby high-rise residences that opened around 2011. Rakuten moved its headquarters from Shinagawa to Futako-tamagawa sometime in the late 2010s, which has further boosted the desirability of Futako-tamagawa and neighboring areas such as Mizonokuchi just across the river in Kawasaki.
Disclaimer: I live near Silicon Valley but I travel to Japan roughly once every other year.
This is the “Brooklyn is boring” problem. It’s temporary. The old city centre (Manhattan) is unlikely to decline rapidly in relative importance but cultural and economic life will happily extend itself from central areas to less central ones given the population and the money to make it worthwhile. Good transport links help enormously too.
In Tokyo, land is extraordinarily expensive but living space is only ordinarily expensive (and not nearly as expensive as many US cities). As a consequence, a quick google search[0] suggests that a new single family home in Tokyo's 23 wards will cost you $600,000 with about 1051 square feet of living space, or roughly $600 per square foot, and in the distant suburbs (with long train commutes, an hour minimum but maybe 90 minutes or more to shinjuku. would be fine for a remote worker though) you can get a house for around $400,000 although this article regrettably does not mention if these houses are the same size on average or not (so $400 per square foot or less, not quite sure).
In terms of the urban form of the streetscape, expensive land coupled with the fact that you can legally subdivide your land, means that houses are very crammed together with almost no space in between in major cities, and especially in Tokyo. That said it's a free market - there are larger lots you can buy, and if you really want a big property I'm sure you could buy neighboring lots and combine them somehow (demolition of existing properties is normal anyways - if you really want a buffer from your neighbors, build a house that's smaller than your lot size!). In contrast, most municipalities in the US mandate a certain space between houses and/or require getting special zoning board approval to subdivide your lot, which means that there's essentially a "minimum" lot size, which turns into a minimum house cost of (minimum lot size * land price).
Additionally there will always be concerns about standard of living. IMO Japanese homes are, in some ways better, but in many ways worse, standard of living than American homes. For example, my impression is that the HVAC situation is typically much worse than the standard american home (although where I live in boston the "AC" is usually nonexistant since most homes are 100+ years old, but atleast the heating is good). On the other hand, Japanese bathrooms are a godsend, if you haven't experienced it you don't know. The biggest concern to me is the sound insulation, which can be poor in many cheap wood-framed Japanese homes (true in many cheap new construction American homes too, as well as some older American constructions. It always depends I suppose! But atleast in sprawling american suburbs you don't hear your neighbor as often through those walls because houses are spread out enough.)
Finally, as a note, while all the above is talking about Tokyo and it's suburbs, there are other big booming cities in Japan (Osaka is popular) which are often 30% or more cheaper but with many of the same big-city amenities like transit, walkability, restaurants and culture, and so on. In terms of price, Tokyo really is like the NYC of Japan, but it's actually affordable for the average family, albeit with either a small home or a long commute.
TL;DR : in Tokyo, land is really expensive, living space is moderately expensive, the free market has converged to fairly small living spaces relative to the US. In the rest of Japan (and distant suburbs to Tokyo), land is moderately expensive and living space is fairly cheap.
[0] https://resources.realestate.co.jp/buy/how-much-does-it-cost...
Addendum: to someone interested in suburban/rural housing in Japan, there's a youtube channel TokyoLlama with a series on his purchasing one of those abandoned houses in a distant tokyo suburb, about 50 minutes out of the city by train. It's an old, beautiful, artisan wood house. At some point in the series he covers all the costs associated with buying the house, as well as various costs and effort to renovate it and make it livable.[1]
Just want to note that this is in part for fire reasons...
require getting special zoning board approval to subdivide your lot
...and this is for traffic and services management.
Prop 13 was already in place in '84 - the only way to get rid of it is to vote it out, it's long past time
That was probably an accidentally smart decision since months later the world imploded, and the company giving the offer went up in even more spectacular fashion that most.
Yeah, you would then be the "rich [person] who others curse for refusing to die or reform Prop 13 and free up some affordable place to raise a new family"
My parents moved us to they east coast where they did finally purchase their own home.
Like, for one, if that was actually your policy goal, the policy would only apply to primary residences, not all real property.
Agreed, especially with how good Prop 13 is at baking existing segregation in forever, since then nothing else makes economic sense on the individual level except to stay put.
My starting salary as a BSEE working for a minicomputer company was $30,000. Two weeks after arriving they had layoffs. They were nice to the new hires and said we'll keep you on for a bit, but you should start looking for new jobs, plus there is a 10% pay cut, so $27K/year ($65.3K in 2020 dollars).
My shared apartment was off Maude and Mathilda was nothing special. It was 700 sq ft and was $750/month, which works out to $1800/month in 2020 dollars. Palo Alto, Los Altos Hills, and Atherton were all expensive addresses, even then.
With all the old rent controlled apartment in San Francisco, it certainly feels like people who moved here a decade or two ago are locked into to paying basically nothing by modern standards. I personally know a couple people who still live with their exes because their rent-controlled apartment is too good a deal to give up.
Housing has gotten relatively more expensive but it hasn't been cheap in much of the Bay Area for a very long time and tech salaries didn't used to be anything special.
Side bar: that is a breathtaking amount of inflation in just 35 years.
Even if wages kept up with inflation, the impact this would have on cash savings is just devastating.
That's under 3% inflation which is a not breathtaking. The Fed targets 2%, which helps avoid deflationary spirals and helps both stability and lowers unemployment, two of their mandates.
>Even if wages kept up with inflation,
Wages have surpassed inflation in just about every income bracket for the past 100 years. And when you factor in total remuneration, returns to workers are even higher. Here's 50+ years of data [1]
>the impact this would have on cash savings is just devastating.
No one in their right mind holds cash savings for 35 years. It's a ludicrously long time to simply hold your savings in a cash pile.
Perhaps it is better to say that I am caught off-guard by the power of compound interest.
> The Fed targets 2%, which helps avoid deflationary spirals and helps both stability and lowers unemployment, two of their mandates.
I am generally skeptical of the Fed, but that's an entirely different discussion, so I'll just nod my head and move along.
> Wages have surpassed inflation in just about every income bracket for the past 100 years. And when you factor in total remuneration, returns to workers are even higher. Here's 50+ years of data [1]
That is good to see, thanks!
> No one in their right mind holds cash savings for 35 years. It's a ludicrously long time to simply hold your savings in a cash pile.
True, but people do usually place their money in a savings account. And while in theory the interest from the savings account should exceed inflation, it seems to me the mere fact of inflation means that people who have primarily cash savings are needlessly penalized.
But while it is absurd to store you money in a coffee can in the shed for 30+ years, I'm not sure it should be.
No, they don't. Some people have some money in saving accounts, but the VAST majority of people's savings are in houses and in retirement plans, which are not cash holdings. Only a very small amount of people have the majority of their savings only in cash for periods long enough that compound inflation kills the savings.
As to things like the Fed, and inflation:
Every single country in the world has chosen to use central banking due to the lessons learned over the past few hundred years, and especially during the Great Depression, that having a politically independent central bank target low inflation results in the most stable, predicable economy. It gives decent ability to balance shocks, lower unemployment, make business smooth and predictable, and avoid deflationary spirals, which are devastating. Compared the period right before the world started understanding how this can work, there is no question that volatility and destructive cycles are now vastly better.
I get the idea that you have not ever studied economics, especially monetary policy, but just like you probably have not studied quantum physics or brain surgery or ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, just know that mankind has put tremendous effort into all of these and has learned some very useful things.
So - given that centuries of good thinkers following centuries and hundreds of countries of evidence have come to the conclusion that low inflation and central banking are wise, and not the product of conspiracy Illuminati nonsense, then you should adjust your beliefs that this is wise, in the same way you'd understand medicine, physics, math, etc., are all studied and the experts do indeed understand them vastly better than the general populace.
Thus, since there will be targeted inflation of around 2%, it is dumb to assume one should simply save all their money as cash. Invest it in broad index funds, or something similar.
>I am caught off-guard by the power of compound interest.
All the more reason to not hold cash, which has zero reason to grow, and has a very solid reason to shrink in buying power, and invest in productive assets with savings. The compound growth of productive assets then works for you, not against you.
>But while it is absurd to store you money in a coffee can in the shed for 30+ years, I'm not sure it should be.
It is absurd given the rest of the evidence around us.
That is one hell of a presumption. Did I offend you?
> but just like you probably have not studied quantum physics or brain surgery or ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, just know that mankind has put tremendous effort into all of these and has learned some very useful things.
This is a complete non-sequitor. It's physics envy and posturing nonsense. The successes of physics and medicine have no bearing on whether mainstream economics is a complete crock. In the soft sciences like economics, the expert doesn't necessarily bring more to the table than the reasonably well-read layman. I'm not saying there is no value in studying these subjects, but the collective "expert opinion" is not in anyway "science".
Maybe you should study some philosophy?
I'm not offended. You've stated how surprised you are about several thing that someone having studied such things would have seen. I didn't mean to offend - but to point out that if you have not studied them, it's not unreasonable to assume those who have worked on them for a lifetime have some knowledge about them you may not.
Did you study them?
>This is a complete non-sequitor. It's physics envy and posturing nonsense.
No, it's putting some context. If you've studied some complex field in depth, you know how detailed and useful the knowledge is, and that it's generally opaque to those who have not put the time in.
>The successes of physics and medicine have no bearing on whether mainstream economics is a complete crock.
Yes, they do, since all rely on the same processes to weed out error over time.
>In the soft sciences like economics, the expert doesn't necessarily bring more to the table than the reasonably well-read layman.
Wow. Ok, now I am sure you have not studied them at any academic or professional level, and I see why you're so mad and believe such fringe things about money. Having met enough people like you that are sure you or people like you bring as much to an econ discussion as experts despite what you've written here is the epitome of Dunning Krueger. And that I did mean directly. I never understand why people that know a lot about some area of knowledge assume they are expert level proficient in others without putting equivalent time in.
Have a nice day.
> [1] https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44705.pdf
This document is 47 pages long. Can you cite the page or section you're referring to?
There's plenty of such studies from the Fed and from CBO, among others.
Twenty years from now, you will be able to tell the same story about wherever high-earning, highly educated young people settle in the meantime. All you have to do is predict and buy in.
Growth in any area will raise prices but here the issue was compounded by a lack of extra land available after the cheap land was sold.
My father worked at HP for 25 years. Solid middle class lifestyle, no complaints.
I moved to the Bay Area in the 90's and Fry's was still a destination for the hardware hacker — selling wire-wrapping sockets and Playboy magazine. (I know - wut?) Disk Drive Depot, Computer Literacy Bookstore, Weirdstuff Warehouse, HSC.... I would do the electronics-surplus run on Saturday morning and see the same HAM's and "home brewers" picking through old alphanumeric LED displays, etc....
It's definitely a different place now. Sigh.
US, Germany and most of western europe in the post war boom till the late 80's.
A factory assembly worker at VW could buy an apartment and feed his family on a single income back then. Fat chance of doing anything like that now.
Must've been nice to physically see the fruits of your labor :)
I’ve been writing Apple software since 1986. Lots of changes, since then.
I remember it as being a fairly “scruffy” little company; especially if you went to MacHack. I worked for GE, at the time, and the corporate culture differences were quite stark. GE was a “shirt and tie” operation, and I was part of a team that had maybe 400 people.
I was constantly being sneered at (literally) for sticking with a “dead” company. It was pretty annoying, and a lot of people did give up on them.
Also are you adding those proper quotation marks by hand?
Nowadays, people sneer at me for "working for The Man."
Being an Apple programmer has meant many years of being sneered at. No way to win...
We're not the only ones using keyboards anymore, and we're in the minority of those who do!
You had close, personal contact with top Apple engineers, for three days. They were quite unpolished. Very different from Apple's presentation, these days.
Quite small; maybe only a couple hundred folks.
Lot of fun.
He's still at Apple, and was actually employee #8, making him its longest-serving employee according to his Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Espinosa
https://www.amazon.com/Third-Apple-Personal-Computers-Revolu...
I love this phrase and looking back on my career see that I too have received this treasure. If you're a self-starter but work inside an established company there's no better situation than having lots of ideas, lots of blank space on the map and very little oversight.
https://medium.com/@marie.gassee/jean-louis-gass%C3%A9es-50-...
Is that not daringfireball? I kid, John.
I love Satya’s Microsoft. But every time Microsoft tries to copy Apple they have failed miserably. I wish they don’t and instead focus on their strengths. But you never know, Satya’s proven us wrong on several occasions. So maybe this time is different?
What would throw the world for a loop would be if MS secured an x86 license from Intel and developed their own chip with the performance/watt of the M1.
Yes - thus "MS's fortunes" is also tied to AMD.
> but they've traditionally been a much smaller outfit
Tradition isn't really the key here. Intel does explore more markets and holds much more market share (specifically desktop and laptop PCs) right now. AMD has been steadily growing in the desktop/laptop space, aside from their semi-custom (console) business, and they have made meaningful strides in performance and efficiency that at least keep Windows (and thus Microsoft) in the game now that Apple Silicon M1 has brought Macs to the table as competitive performers.
But - I'm less convinced Microsoft has to copy Apple and design efficient ARM chips in-house in order to remain competitive, at least in the PC business. I think we'll see some shifts in market share from Windows to MacOS, initially in laptops, and the rest will remain to be seen, but Apple should certainly become competitive in other PC areas as they roll out their new lines of CPUs. There are plenty of areas where AMD's performance CPUs remain very competitive, and Windows is still the preferred "mainstream" and "gamer" platform.
[1]: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/computer.html
https://www.sec.gov/apple-computer-inc-ipo-prospectus-form-s...
https://pando.com/2014/03/27/how-steve-jobs-forced-google-to...
His parents are kind of disappointed in my friend, though, because they don't believe his career is a "real job" (like a lawyer, doctor, financier etc.).
I think this is a contributing factor to why people leave. "Software Engineer", for all our quibbles over what it means, is comparatively well-respected and well-compensated job in the US. People want to live and work where their skills are valued.
Worked along folks from EPFL, the X and Poly. What they told me about their startup ecosystem back home was unbelievable. And compensation was a joke too.
Are French folks... aware their smartest are in California?
* France (and other French speaking countries) produce well qualified engineers.
* As others have pointed out, France can be perceived as a rather inhospitable place for entrepreneurial people.
* On the other hand, Apple may be a little bit more aligned with French values than other Silicon Valley companies: Pride of auteurship, opinionated design, and occasional stubbornness in the face of customer complaints. I think a French engineer will recognize a certain je ne sais quoi in "you're holding it wrong" ;-)