Happy Diwali

Saturday Sunrise

Steve Jobs

It might sound strange, especially when someone has died that the one thing that struck me as odd in all flurry of articles on Steve Jobs was his net worth.  According to Forbes, Steve jobs’ net worth is $8.9 bn, I found that strange for the man who created and re-created the world’s third largest company Apple (by market cap). Bill Gates’s net worth is almost seven-times, while his company Microsoft is only the 10^th largest company by market share. Even more astounding is the fact that most of Steve jobs wealth came from Disney where he is the largest shareholder ($4.47bn of stocks) not Apple!

 

Source: Forbes The World’s Billionaires, as of March 2011

I saw a similar pattern in all the other rich fellows excluding Steve Jobs; they all had better individual ranks then their main or key companies. But the difference in the individual ranking and company ranking is most startling in Steve Jobs case- 110 individual rank and third company rank. I guess he was too busy doing what he loved than be bothered about making money. Too busy making products that make you smile before you even put them on.

Rank by individual net worth	Name	Net worth (Bn$)	Age	Source of income	Key company	Market value of company (Bn$)	Rank by mkt value
1	Carlos Slim Helu & family	74	71	Telecom	América Móvil	110	47*
2	Bill Gates	56	55	Microsoft	Microsoft	213.34	10
3	Warren Buffett	50	81	Berkshire Hathaway	Berkshire Hathaway	206.67	12
4	Bernard Arnault	41	62	LVMH	LVMH	77.61	84
5	Larry Ellison	39.5	67	Oracle	Oracle	169.19	22
6	Lakshmi Mittal	31.1	61	Steel	ArcelorMittal	56.54	124
7	Amancio Ortega	31	75	Zara	Inditex	50.08	153
8	Eike Batista	30	54	Mining, oil	Ogx Petroleo	39.06	210
9	Mukesh Ambani	27	54	Petrochemicals, oil & gas	Reliance Industries	76.91	86
10	Christy Walton & family	26.5	56	Walmart	Walmart	181.72	19
24	Larry Page	19.8	38	Google	Google	147.20	28
24	Sergey Brin	19.8	38	Google	Google	147.20	28
52	Mark Zuckerberg	13.5	27	Facebook	Facebook	50	155*
110	Steve Jobs	8.3	56	Apple, Pixar	Apple	321.07	3

Individual ranking and net worth according to Forbes

Company ranking and market value according to FT Global 100

* Ranking of companies proxy rank of companies with similar market share in FT Global 500

Market value of face book from Bloomberg and of América Móvil from Forbes

The numbers don’t tell you everything, just like a person’s grades don’t tell you everything (I hope).  Its how you do what you do, that needs to be measured. Mr. Jobs got that, he focused less on the numbers more on the reactions, making people emotional about a computer sounds insane, irrational, but it works. In the end of the day its not really the RAM, or the hard-drive or the processor, that was important, it was important that the person who is going to spend a considerable amount of his or her time using that product, felt it was worth the while.  

I love the way Apple markets its products, its always has simple ads, with main focus on the product, no pretty girl standing in the frame, wondering what she is doing here. Despite the size of Apple, they made a large company feel like a small open source company, making new stuff. It didn’t seem to have the big corporate feel they kept it simple. Even the keyboard of an IMAC embodies that, no odd buttons like num-lock, scroll lock, which you end up pressing by mistake only. No clutter, no stupid extra button. They even took away the backspace key, which I must admit I want it put back. Despite the simplicity, you ended-up looking forward to the new product, they made it an experience. Tell me, has anybody gone and told people around they got a Microsoft, if it’s a vista you may not want to tell other people. Obviously there are drawbacks; products that invest a lot in simplicity end-up being inflexible they give you a few readymade range of options, just like Steve Jobs. Either his way or the iway, but then its his dream that we bought into.

Here’s to the crazy ones.

“You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.”

--- Steve Jobs (1955 – 2011)

The problem with the Future

Tomorrow is a mystery
Yesterday is history
Today is a gift, that is why it's called the present


- Kung Fu Panda

Even a cartoon can make more sense, then my mind or my surroundings. Everyone is obsessed with the future, Investment banks try to see if there is a recession ahead or an upswing, Doctors try to give an estimate of how much life is left, Astrologers try to see what lies in your stars, Tarot card readers shuffle a deck of your life, we try, when we start each day thinking how it will unfold.

So busy trying to see what lies ahead, we miss out on what we have, we miss today. I don't want my youth to go wondering about my life ahead and I don't want why old age to go wondering about the end.  Today is a present, open it.

Apple

If you plan to buy an Imac (desktop from apple), you will go through the following thought process -

1st go through all the other all in one desktops and you will read how they are all value for money, same specification or even better specifications for half the price (ok for Rs 20 thousand less). But then you will tell yourself, "but i will never be happy with anything else!, its a once in a lifetime thing"

Then you will go on to worry about the compatibility issues, will it work with everything, can I play my movies, will my wireless plugin work (it doesn't, but thats for later :)).

Then you will go on to worry about the new operating system, how will I get use to it, I only know windows (if you are using a windows vista even thats not a given).

Finally you will worry about the price, especially if you are in India, as its easily Rs 12 thousand bucks more than its in the US. How one could rationally justify still buying it, is well inexplicable.

But just assume you still go ahead thinking, "I have been staring at it in shops for 3 years, i think its about time (yes parents will kill me but thats how I thought after 2 weeks of digging up information + 3 years of staring)".

So you go to the shop and blow a hole in your pocket, which is the size of the base of Mount Everest while the pocket is as big as, say a small pond. Do you regret it, do you feel stupid to spend so much money especially when it seems like 2011 will not just be like 2008 but even worse. Incredibly no because Steve Jobs is a very bright man, he realized that as human beings we lose our thinking when faced with a beautiful thing or person and the Imac is stunning. So even though after digging for 2 weeks seeing that everything else was practically more value for money and I am a normal person who needs a computer for a few things only, you go ahead. But ex-post buying does it live up to expectations, or do you still feel like a donkey. Well it not only lives up to expectation but exceeds them (thankfully). It's operating system might seem a bit jarring at first, but thats because we are all hardwired to use windows which is not at all intuitive, so we got use to that. We see a computer taking 3 mins to start as a normal thing with the word 'loading' as omnipresent as it's in widows and we think that is normal! It takes about a week to get use to it, but thats it and it does everything easily, your downloads are saved in downloads, your documents in documents, your movies in movies. The screen resolution makes everything look better and the sound quality is as good as an ipod. It has no wires except one power cord and it starts up in an instant. The safari browser is awesome, even better than firefox.

The following points no one will ever tell you in any review-

1) there is no backspace key in the keyboard (at least I couldn't find one), only a delete key, you will get use to it.

2) The screen tends to fog up in humid climates (something to do with the tube in the screen, not a big problem)

3) as its made of aluminum, if the earthing in your house is not good, it tends to give little socks, but you can buy a surge protector and it will stop.

4) tends to get hot and let out a plastic smell ( I have been told its normal and will reduce as you use it more, I really hope it does)

5) dont ever buy a plugin as a net connection, as they may not have drivers for the new os versions, best to stick to landline net connection.

6) many people complained about the keys being too hard, its actually has soft keys like a calculators (the small ones) and the keys are normal sized.

7) the keyboard shortcuts are similar to windows, but instead of the ctrl key its command key. But it is more mouse friendly or I might be wrong, still getting to know the functions.

On this Independence day...

Somehow I don't think we were meant to see a computer screen 24X7.

Delayed but happy

This is what I do when rain delays my journey to office -

 The beauty of having a fully automatic camera !

 Little drops of rain

 When people don't believe I have an amazing view from my house!

 Sometimes all it takes is to look though the wrong glass to distort the image.

 I wont say it drizzled, it poured.

The cause of all problems - Cumulonimbus cloud (this pic was taken by my mother as it requires a person to getup at 6 AM, the time I am in my REM state of sleep)