A Celebration of Steve Jobs' Life | Hacker News Reader

A Celebration of Steve Jobs' Life

events.apple.com.edgesuite.net

97 pointsdkasper29 comments

I found this somewhat uncomfortable to watch. I like Apple products, Steve Jobs is interesting, and I was bummed to hear when he got sick and of course when he died. But I didn't know him, and he definitely didn't know me. I bought products that his company made, and that's it. I like the products a hell of a lot better than, say, than 10 gallons of gas I just bought from Shell, but still the relationship between me and the company CEO was pretty distant.

Back to the video... Many of the Apple people probably didn't know Steve either, but they sure knew more about him and the idea of an Apple family and Steve as the patriarch is pretty clear. I've been in corporate "families" before and there can be real emotion between colleagues with shared passion in a company. I think it's great that they had a celebration like they did, but I felt like I shouldn't be there, even through a web video. I felt somehow like an intruder, spying in on their private event, and that the heartfelt speeches from one Apple employee to the others should have just stayed in their family.

I'm not saying it was necessarily bad to post or was in poor taste. In fact many others may be heartened to watch it. I, to my own surprise, wasn't.

But that's just the thing. A lot of the stuff that many people have an emotional connection with, those products were driven by Steve, so people feel a connection with Apple and Steve.

There's only a couple of inanimate objects I've really ever loved. One was my Peugeot 205Gti, and the other was my first Mac, a Aluminum Powerbook G4 12", though I think my iPhone 4 has a chance of getting on that list.

I too got the feeling that this should have been reserved for the Apple "family".

I agree completely, and I find the way Hacker News has become the 'Cult of Jobs' to be a bit weird really.

I can only dream of achieving so much such that when I die, I can have popular bands play at a memorial event for me. That aside, I strongly suggest everyone watch the segment where Ive spoke. It's quite touching.

Dammit, Steve. You really had to make it so hard for non Apple users to watch it...

After some digging, I made Totem open http://qthttp.apple.com.edgesuite.net/11ajdjnvkjnd10weoihf23... but it doesn't preload the smaller sequences and forces a pause every 10 seconds...

edit:

  $ for i in $(seq 0 486) ; do curl http://qthttp.apple.com.edgesuite.net/11ajdjnvkjnd10weoihf23ohfoihqw/0640/fileSequence$i.ts >> celebrating_steve.mov ; done

may do the trick. Hope it works.

I believe VLC has support for HTTP Live Streaming since version 1.2 or so.

Still pauses to catch up with every piece.

On a sidenote, I am somewhat proud my curl hack produced a video file Totem can play (provided you don't try to skip parts of it) but that confuses VLC.

My previous experience with VLC is that if I stick a piece of wood into the USB slot, VLC will be able to play it flawlessly.

On a Mac, you can have the QuickTime app open this URL:

http://qthttp.apple.com.edgesuite.net/11ajdjnvkjnd10weoihf23...

Preference is given oddly to Snow Leopard and iOS devices.

From page source: /snowLeopard url/ var slURL = "http://qthttp.apple.com.edgesuite.net/11ajdjnvkjnd10weoihf23...;

/* non-snowLeopard url/ var nonSlURL='http://stream.qtv.apple.com/events/oct/10oiuhfvojb23/checkba...;

/Windows url/ var windowsURL = 'http://stream.qtv.apple.com/events/oct/10oiuhfvojb23/checkba...;

/iphone url / var iphoneURL = "http://stream.qtv.apple.com/events/oct/10oiuhfvojb23/memoria...;

/ipad url*/ var ipadURL= "http://stream.qtv.apple.com/events/oct/10oiuhfvojb23/memoria...;

Audio link which will also work on Linux - http://stream.qtv.apple.com/events/oct/10oiuhfvojb23/memoria...

"The old king is dead, long live the king"

interesting song choice by Coldplay.

Damn those onions. Again.

On YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPUsuY8JZJI

When will the video be available?

Use Safari. The video doesn't seem to be loadable in any other browser. It WFM in Safari and iOS Safari. Other browsers say "Check back soon."

I just tried to play from Safari on my Mini. Check back later. Was working great on my iPhone 4.

The wife doesn't care anyway. Oh well.

Just a quick thank-you to Apple for covering the replacement motherboard for my 17" MacBook Pro, and kudos to the online folks who spent a good 20 minutes checking up on the Nvidia bug for me.

If you watch it from an iOS device and you have Apple TV, you can Airplay it to your Apple TV.

I think it's time to stop the crocodile tears.

Could we stop with the retarded cult of personality already? Seriously, celebrating the life of Steve Jobs? That's the most stupid thing since... I don't even know. This guy sold computers, nothing more. It's beyond me why people revere him like some sort of computer Jesus. Sigh...

Edit: Aaand downvotes proving my point. Thanks.

Tell me more. Do you think that everyone that does is delusional?

Quite. There's no grounds for the amount of reverence a mere businessman - albeit very successful - is receiving. Delusion might be a very good word to describe what I think of this sentiment.

Then who would it be ok to revere (in your opinion)?

I'm not sure how the downvotes prove your point. Your post was poorly worded, lacking support and derogatory.

tell us how you really feel slowpoke.

Couldn't agree more. Sorry about the delusional down votes.

By this logic you cannot admire anyone: because each and everyone was just the guy or girl who did [some mundane stuff there]. Newton? The guy just did some math. Armstrong? He was just stuffed into a tin and sent to walk some dust ball. Why some people refer him like some sort of computer Jesus? Because of the influence: the stuff coming from Apple influenced a lot of people, users and makers alike. Take a look at the phone market before and after iPhone, take a look at the tablet market before and after iPad, observer the influence of MacBook Air… Not to mention ITMS. Of course you can easily dismiss each and any of these for whatever reason and then indeed indeed there will be nothing do admire. But I guess that would say more about you, not the Jobs.

(I don't get how down voting proves your point).

But there is a huge difference in admiring someone and worshiping someone. Some seem to worship Jobs.

(I think you got downvotes for your tone of voice, not the content)

Watching all this stuff about Jobs also makes asking questions like yours. Did Jobs change the world? Did he help the poor and the sick? Which achievements do matter in life?

The celebrating of Jobs life has a lot in common with the celebration of some religious leaders. It shows that people need a leader, some guidance. Some people just pick a leader for his charisma, not his wisdom.

What's up with this massive chip in your shoulder?

For fucks sake, why don't we get rid of those anti-Apple (slowpoke) and anti-Google (chugger) types? This is getting ridiculous...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com