ID remembers Steve Jobs
Who at ID (or Stuart, for that matter) hasn’t discussed Apple’s design, strategy, marketing, or business model in one (or probably, many more) of their classes? Steve had a profound impact on our community and we are truly sad to see him go.
Here’s what people at ID have to say about the passing of a true design legend:
I feel I owe my career to Steve Jobs. Not because his technologies have made the thinking and doing aspects of my work relatively seamless, although that’s true, but because he put design at the strategy table. And his products demonstrated the wisdom of that decision every time they launched. Apple shed light on the power of design and user experience, and that gave design a platform in the business world that didn’t exist before. I’ve been standing on that platform for 18 years. And while it’s true that when I bought my first iPhone, I was so delighted and persuaded that the future had (finally) arrived, it has been the access to problems and opportunities that didn’t have obvious links to design, and to executives who would not have considered giving designers a voice in their business that has really transformed my life. So, yes, iSad about says it all.
The following is on display at Gensler, the architecture firm:
As a recent alumna of ID, l remember how every “best practice” example, every innovation framework, and every seminar held up the “Apple example,” to the point where people went, “oh please! We know Apple’s done it all.” Steve Jobs, as unschooled, untrained as he was, was a design thinker of our times, who in many instances articulated the unimaginable, achieving incredible finesse and skill in “conceiving the fog” and then cutting cubes out of it! The latter we all strive for. I haven’t felt this sad, for a long time. A loss for the design community.
Jobs had a hero’s journey - a unique birth, an apprenticeship (at the young age of 12 at Hewitt Packard), a quest, and the return. I just wish he was here a little longer.
As designers who rely so often on technology, where might we be today without Steve?
Slogging around in DOS 10.7? Hopefully not, though it is hard to imagine what our world would be like, had Apple’s (and Pixar’s) visionary leader not taken the path he did.
He brought a human side to technology, opening the door for mere mortals to more easily create, innovate, and inspire.
My favorite tribute was David Pogue’s column in the New York Times.
I had the opportunity to meet Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple in college. He is an amazing guy. Here is his tearful remembrance of his friend.
I’ve been an Apple geek for life. Jobs was a large part of why I fell in love technology and design and why I am at ID today—hoping to learn what was simply so intuitive to him.
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” - From his inspiring Stanford graduation speech.
We’ll update as we receive more.
Have something to add? E-mail thenewidiom@gmail.com
RecruitID Reception 2011
Thanks to Brian, Gladys & Russell for putting all the student works together!
Photo courtesy of Hiro Iwasaki
NICE TO MEET YOU GEOFF SUVALKO
Where are you from?
The beach. Ruakaka, Northland, about 2 hours north of the city of Auckland
How did you end up at ID? Where were you before?
For the last 10 years I’ve run my own design firm in New Zealand and Australia. Over the last 4 years I got involved with one client in particular - Air New Zealand, in product and service innovation. It was within that project I worked alongside Ideo and got introduced to human centered design.
Tell us quickly about a project that you’re working on now that you’re really excited about.
A museum at home that I worked with before I came over and still work with while I’ve been at ID. I have been given the opportunity to help redesign the entire customer experience - and I love it.
What do you do in your spare time?
I love standing on the beach at dusk with not a soul around casting into the surf and waiting for something to bite. Generally i’m waiting a long time.
What would you do with 20 million dollars?
Develop an innovation design think tank downunder to address economic, social and evironmental progress. If I had the money, i’d do it tomorrow.
What super-power would you most like to have, and why?
Persuasion, because as designers that’s what we tend to spend so much of our time doing, persuading organisations that design can make a difference, and persuading them to pay for it!
What are the websites you could not live without?
Right now - Seeid! apart from that I sleep around.
Is there anything you would like to say to ID?
Apart from thanks for giving me a great year, I would suggest the more ‘real client’ project work amalgamated into the program the better.
To accompany this week’s scores, here’s a highlight video with some of the participants crushing their cans:) Watch till the end to see danimal’s beast-like can-crushing prowess!
