News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

April 9, 2008

steve_jobs

Book Review (original cut): Inside Steve’s Brain

Posted Apr. 9, ’08, 1:30 PM PT by Dan Pourhadi
Category | Apple » Steve Jobs

insideStevesBrain.jpgThis morning, the Mothership posted my review of Leander Kahney’s new book, Inside Steve’s Brain, an insightful look at the genius of Steve Jobs.

Of course, as with all fancy high-profile publications, they have to think about brevity when it comes to their content, and thus had to edit my original draft to shorten it.

Well, MacUser is by no means “fancy” or “high-profile” — length and brevity are obviously no concern to us. So I’m posting here the full, un-cut review, in all its longwinded and corny-joke-filled glory.

Check it out after the break.

Review: Inside Steve’s Brain, by Leander Kahney
Available April 17, 2008

I once pitched a book idea to a publisher: Inside Dan’s Brain, an engaging, in-depth analysis of the wonderment and genius of my ideas and thought processes.

Of course, they turned down the idea, saying they didn’t think they’d be able to sell a book with 200 blank pages.

Their loss, because if Inside Dan’s Brain was just half as insightful as Leander Kahney’s Inside Steve’s Brain…well, they probably would’ve sold at least a few.

Inside Steve’s Brain’s pages are by no means blank: It’s a detailed, concept-oriented, blow-by-blow look at Apple Super-CEO Steve Jobs and what makes him tick — his history, his ideas, his ideals, his reasoning, his behavior, his relationships, his footwear choices…everything.

Mac users tend to look at Jobs as though he’s some Holy Being from another world. He created the Mac, and preached it more as a romantic lifestyle, a noble way of being, than as simple new technology. He transformed the computer from a boring business tool to a sleek and sexy consumer appliance. He conceived the iPod, a device that some argue (like, say, me) single-handedly pushed the music industry into the modern world. And now there’s the iPhone, which for the first time is forcing other device-makers to create cell phones that don’t suck, and is bringing the Real Internet to new mobile extremes with MobileSafari.

Oh, and don’t forget Pixar and the success of movies like “Toy Story,” which brought about a new era of animated films that forever changed Hollywood.

But these are all things the astute Apple follower probably already knows; in fact, these are all things anyone who keeps up with tech news — and even some who don’t — probably already knows. Jobs’s influence in tech has affected almost everyone’s life. We all know that.

What we don’t know is how this one man could do so much — and that’s where Kahney steps up, and attempts to analyze Jobs’s life and figure out what characteristics of this unique hippie businessman contributed to his ascension from College Dropout to Billionaire Super Genius.

Kahney’s the right person for the job, too: He has an extensive history covering Apple and Steve Jobs (since the early 1990’s, according to the book), and has been running Wired’s Cult of Mac blog for ages. Inside Steve’s Brain isn’t written by some generic journalist basing the entire premise of his book on secondhand information found through Google; it’s written by a man who knows Steve Jobs better than most, who has been around to study Jobs, who has the connections to talk to the people he needs to talk to, and who has the resources at his disposal to document and analyze Jobs’s actions — both big and small.

It’s important to remember this about Kahney while reading Inside Steve’s Brain. It isn’t like reading a biography by an invisible author, with every source credited and every piece of information the result of traceable scholarly research. He often speaks from firsthand knowledge or insight, and writes about Jobs’s actions and thoughts as if Jobs himself told him what to write — which, of course, breads some skepticism about Kahney’s credibility.

Then you remind yourself: the man knows his stuff. And the more you read, the more things seem to make sense, the more trusting you become of Kahney, and the easier it is to start embracing the words on the page instead of worrying about the author’s validity.

But the whole book isn’t just Kahney’s own observations and insight: It’s full of Jobs’s own words, from interviews and media events since he founded Apple. It’s also stuffed with interviews and quotes from Apple and Pixar employees, and others close to Jobs — like Jobs’s personal assistant after he returned to Apple in 1997 — who recount his actions and behaviors, as well as share their own unique observations and insights on what makes him tick.

Kahney’s method of analyzing Jobs is pretty effective: He mentions tons of tiny, often-overlooked events in Jobs’s life, as well as relatively miniscule quirky behaviors and actions that demonstrate his unique character. How he went on an all-apple diet when he was young to see if it meant he didn’t have to shower, for example, or how he spent two weeks debating with his family the features and pros and cons of which washing machine they were going to buy for their house.

The book also reveals some juicy nuggets about the origins and elements of Apple products — to figure out how to make the personal computer a packaged, consumer device, for example, Kahney describes how Jobs went to a department store to look at and get inspiration from other household appliances (like the Cuisinart). Then there’s the original Mac’s mouse, which Jobs designed to reflect the dimensions of the Mac itself — a detail many never noticed.

Kahney explores every aspect of Jobs’s genius: his business sense (hiring Tim Cook to cut inventory and fix manufacturing); his marketing sense (bringing on John Sculley to turn Apple into a “lifestyle company” a la PepsiCo); and his design sense (how he ran across the parking lot one day examining the cars’ designs for inspiration for the Mac, or often took his design teams to art exhibits).

Inside Steve’s Brain goes beyond Steve, too. Examples: The book dives into the creative mind of Jonathan Ive, Apple’s brilliant chief industrial designer-with-an-accent, and examines the corporate cultures of Apple and Pixar, and how they’re able to output innovation and creativity in a near-unprecendented manner.

But every word in the book doesn’t inspire revelation. It’s insightful, sure, but some sections are loosely packed, periodically repetitively regurgitating observations and conclusions mentioned in the previous paragraphs and chapters. There’s a lot of exploration in the abstract, and a lot of quote-elaboration of the kind your English teacher used to tell you to avoid because “readers can figure that out from the quote itself.” Kahney spends a lot of time explaining simple observations the reader could figure out himself just by reading Kahney’s examples.

But those are nothing more than minor annoyances. The overall content, the stories and interviews and quotes, and Kahney’s insight in general make Inside Steve’s Brain a worthwhile and informative read for most anybody looking to learn more about His Steveness and the genius behind Apple and Pixar. It’s a quick and easy read, too: Kahney writes in simple prose, and his explanations are clear and concise. And bonus: At the end of every chapter, Kahney presents a bullet list of “Lessons from Steve,” recapping the important Jobsian wisdoms of the previous pages — such as “Don’t listen to your customers. They don’t know what they want.”

You don’t have to be an avid Apple follower to understand it, but even veteran Macworld-attendees will get something out of it.

Unlike Inside Dan’s Brain, which I’ve decided to market to middle shoolers as a sketchbook, Kahney’s Inside Steve’s Brain has good, solid content, and is a great “dummies guide” to the life and mind of a genius.


1 Comments

Philippe said:

Thanks!

April 9, 2008 6:43 PM

Leave a comment

 



IDG IDG NETWORK:   CIO   Computerworld   CSO   GamePro   GamerHelp   IDG Connect   Infoworld  
   JavaWorld   LinuxWorld   Macworld   Network World   PC World   PC World Canada   Playlist   Techworld