steve_jobsHave to say like many of you I was saddened more than words can say by the news that Steven Jobs has passed away.

While I never met him, I did see the genius of his shadow from close up. I came on board Apple to work on an ancillary project the very same week he was ousted from Apple. In fact I toured Apple headquarters the very next day and I have never walked by some many hundreds of people so eerily quite.

I ran into his shadow again in Ann Arbor when I got to play with the Genius that was the Next computer when it first came out. I remember I was the only one standing around the table with this wonderful machine.  I lost myself playing with just some of what it could do. The software back then was decades ahead of it’s time.  I could not believe what it was capable of…

Much of that software is the basis of all that is Apple today.

Then I was yet again astounded with what came out of Pixar.  I was taken to a magical place of animation that seemed as real as real life.

Then as the iPod and iPhone and finally the iPad came out, there could be no denying that he was one of a kind that only came along so very rarely.

You will be missed by millions of course and by this one man who got to see your shadow up close.

And you will touch even those who don’t appreciate how you have changed their lives for the better, made them happier, brighter, and eased their day as your shadow does indeed cover nearly the whole world.

May you live on in bits and bytes everywhere.

Andrew Easy Anderson