Apple's “1984” Macintosh Commercial
youtube.com
youtube.com
Probably this Camus quote has a bunch of context that I could understand if I googled it.
I suppose the point is there are many revolutionaries that gained power through the gun but vanishingly few of those that lost it through the ballot box, or even risked doing so.
Apple really have always thought different and sought revolutionary change. The technology industry and press in general were predicting their imminent demise and the impossibility of their business model continuously since the 70s. Their unofficial motto is "Apple, proudly going out of business since 1976".
The flip side of that is to keep going in the face of such persistent skepticism takes enormous discipline and confidence. When you win, that just reinforces that confidence that you are right. This makes it very difficult to see the flaws in your own reasoning or accept it when you are wrong. Hence the "My way or the highway" attitude.
Damn I really dislike this watered down definition of the word revolution, e.g. "The iPhone was revolutionary."
Companies like Apple / leaders like Steve Jobs are great at misrepresenting where innovation in technology has taken place. As economist M. Mazzucato has shown, all of the technologies inside the iPhone were made possible by public spending on R&D [1].
We fetishize the intellect of supposed 'lone geniuses' [2] when really those people have succeeded in telling lies and stories that discredit the real innovators and risk-takers (hence why one of her books is called 'The Entrepreneurial State', since it is mostly due to taxpayer funded grants to private companies that have lead to major innovations and breakthroughs. Btw this means they also have their fair share of failures as well (Solyndra)).
> The flip side of that is to keep going in the face of such persistent skepticism takes enormous discipline and confidence.
Really? I think it's more a case of big tech co's rushing to create monopolies (as Thiel's 'Zero to One' lays out in plain English) and using the US' Intellectual Property system to hold back innovation globally. [3]
To be clear, I am incredibly grateful for the advanced tech we have available today, which was developed by members of the working class. I think it's wonderful to be able to video call with someone on the other side of the world. My complaint is that not enough people are 'allowed' to be technically proficient as they cannot tinker and take things apart because everything has been turned into a black box.
It also isn't access to Google search and Wikipedia that made the best scientists and engineers, it was access to commoditized knowledge which is enclosed, re-enclosed and then rented out in small amounts to the highest bidders (i.e. the so called 'prestigious' universities in the global north). In other words, it's held hostage behind corporate firewalls.
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17987621-the-entrepreneu...
[2] https://www.technologyreview.com/2015/08/04/166593/techs-end...
That's a classic case of not seeing the wood for the trees. You're looking at all the individual components and failing to see the significance of the composition. That's exactly the mistake Apple's competitors made at the time (except the Android team).
All the iPhone's competitors contained all the same technologies you're talking about. There were even phones out there before them with capacitive touch screens. None of them changed things the way the iPhone did.
>those people have succeeded in telling lies and stories that discredit the real innovators
There are hours and hours of footage on Youtube of Steve Jobs talking as long as his voice held out about where individual ideas came from, who developed specific technologies and who in his team thought up this or that. Also many interviews with former Apple engineers and execs talking about his personal contributions.
I truly, genuinely have no clue where you got this idea from. It's like you've invented a cartoon fantasy caricature of the world in you head populated by pulp novel villains. The reality is a lot more complicated and a lot more human.
Give "world is businsess clip" from the movie Network a look..