John Carmack: My stories about Steve Jobs
One day my wife asked me, “Why do you give up what you do when Steve Jobs asks you to do something for him? For everyone else, you don't do that. ”
Indeed, there is something to think about.
In my youth, I was a fan of the Apple computer, Jobs and Wozniak were revered people for me, and the desire to have Apple 2 was a defining feature of my childhood for several years. Years later, when I first saw the NeXT computer at a computer exhibition - at the time when I was already selling my first commercial software - it seemed to me to look into the future (but the price tag was more than $ 10,000 - not bad!).
')
When Id Software became successful thanks to Commander Keen and Wolfenstein 3D, the first personal serious purchase for me was not a car - it was a NeXT computer. As it soon turned out, it turned out to be very useful for developing our software, and as a result we transferred our entire company to NeXT equipment.
We liked our NeXTs so much that we wanted to release Doom with a special logo “Designed on NeXT computers” on the screen saver. However, when we asked permission for such a step, we were denied.
Some time after the release, when Doom began his march around the planet and began to leave a noticeable mark on it, we learned that Steve had changed his mind on this issue and would have been happy to see the NeXT branding on the game — however, this ship already sailed for him. Then we exchanged a few messages with Steve Jobs and I thought it was cool.
Years later, based on my observations and circumstantial evidence, I came to the conclusion that in the depths of his heart Steve never had a high opinion of games - and that he always wanted games to not have as much value for his platforms as they occupied really I never took it personally.
When NeXT was able to conduct a kind of “reverse takeover” of Apple, and Steve was again at the helm, I sincerely rejoiced at this and anticipated all the useful features that a resurgent Apple could bring from NeXT to the mainstream.
I was invited to discuss the needs of games in general, but I chose my mission to convince Apple to adopt OpenGL as its 3D graphics API. We argued a lot with Steve about this.
Part of his method of communicating with others (at least with me) was mocking modern alternatives - and no one dared to contradict him or speak differently. He could recognize these options as pragmatic - but, of course, they could not, by definition, be a good choice. “I have a Pixar. We will build something [API] that will work really well. "
It often disappointed me, because he could speak with certainty about things he was simply wrong about - for example, the price of memory for video cards or the capacity of systems available for AltiVec extensions .
However, when I know what I am talking about, I will stand my ground up to the last against anyone.
When Steve was identified with something, he acted decisively. Dictates were held, companies were acquired, presentations were planned - to which the notorious field of distortion of reality was connected, turning all the ideas that had been discussed and considered before into horrible and inappropriate ideas.
I believe that this decision of mine was one of the most impressive indirect influences on the industry that I had during my career. OpenGL never seriously threatened D3D on a PC, but it was critically important for Apple - and that meant that he still had enough attention for OpenGL to become the definitive choice of API at the moment when mobile devices started installing their GPUs. Now we have all this pall, but it is much better than if each of the five SoC manufacturers would roll out their own API at the dawn of the mobile era.
As a result, I held several presentations with Steve, and each time it was like a crazy fire alarm - there was never enough time to do everything right, and more often than not many people needed heroic efforts to make it happen. In part, it seems to me that in fact it was a calculated part of his method.
The first impression I got from “ Keynote Steve speaking” was Jobs, who reprimanded the poor working scene about “this Home Depot crap” - a device that rolled out a stand with a new Mac, and which he was extremely disappointed with. Although his complaints had a strong case, and as a result, with his attention to detail he improved the quality of the presentation - but I would not want to work for him as a working scene.
One day, my wife (then the bride) and I met with Steve at Apple - he wanted me to hold a presentation that was scheduled for the same day as our wedding. With a wide smile and full of charm, he suggested that we move the wedding to another day. We refused, but he continued to crush. In the end, my wife came up with a counter offer - if he really needed “her” John so much, he should lend John Lassiter to her media company for a day to consult. Steve ohkrenelno quickly turned from a man full of charm into real ice - and as a result I didn’t speak at that presentation.
When I was working on the early Doom 3 tech demo for a presentation in Japan, it was hard for me to work with some of the managers who dealt with the issue - because they insisted that I change the demo, because “Steve doesn’t like blood”. I was aware that Doom 3 didn’t fit well into his tastes - but he wasn’t the point of the presentation.
I raised this question in a discussion with Steve and everyone involved on board. He answered all of us as follows:
“I trust you, John. Do whatever you think is best. ”
Such an answer was of great benefit to me - after him no one said a word to me.
When my wife and I later started creating games for “regular” phones ( DoomRPG! Orcs & Elves! ), I repeatedly spoke to Steve for making Apple’s phone a great idea. Every time there was a rumor that Apple supposedly was working on the phone, I refined my pitch in front of it. Once he called me at home on Sunday (where did he even get my number from?) To ask one question, after which I had a long and enthusiastic discussion of potential opportunities.
I was not involved in creating the iPhone - but I was very impressed when the iPhone finally saw the light. Giant (for its time) screen with accurate color ( true color ) and with the GPU! On it we could do incredible things!
Steve first talked about developing applications for the iPhone on the same presentation where I showed the new ID Tech 5 engine on a Mac, so I was sitting in the front row. When he began to talk about web applications ( Web Apps ), I (albeit quite quietly) publicly expressed my disapproval.
After the audience had settled, and the rest were gathered in front of the stage, I immediately began to talk about how terrible the web applications are, since they will not reflect the full potential of the device. We could realize so much more interesting ideas if we had real, direct access to the device!
Steve answered me with the same words that I heard earlier - “bad applications can disable base stations of cellular communication”. I hated those words. He could just say, “We are not ready for this,” and I would have treated this normally.
I had some guesses, and I decided to argue that the components of the iPhone and its OS already provided a sufficient level of protection for native applications. I pointed to the engineer closest to me and asked him, "Do you no longer have a MMU and process isolation on the iPhone?" His eyes opened wide - he looked at me with a look, "please don't drag me into this," but in the end I waited for an affirmative answer from him.
I said that OS X was almost certainly used for activities with far greater security requirements than a phone — and that if Apple couldn’t provide sufficient protection in this area, it meant they had big problems. He sarcastically replied, "You're a smart guy, John, why don't you write a new OS?" At that moment, I thought, "Fuck you, Steve."
People parted from us to the side. When Steve was angry, Apple employees didn’t want to catch his eye in order not to accidentally fall under the hot hand after. Later, one of Apple's managers reassured me with the fact that "Steve welcomes such energetic discussions."
Being still disappointed about this decision, I made some unflattering comments, which the press immediately picked up. Of course, Steve didn't like it.
The famous “hero / shithead roller-coaster” swing of Steve Jobs (“swing carrying you either in the dirt or towards recognition”) turned out to be true. After I had been at their summit for many years, now I was at the bottom. I was told that Steve gave direct instructions not to give me access to the early version of the iPhone SDK, when work on it was finally completed.
As a result, I wrote several successful applications for the iPhone on the side (they all have now sunk into oblivion due to the fact that Apple ceases to support 32-bit applications, and this disappoints me) - and, despite the fact that I had many strong employees inside Apple, I was on knives with Steve.
The latest product for iOS, on which I worked, was the game Rage for iOS. At that time, in my opinion, she set a new bar for visual quality among mobile games, and also supported some new features like TV-out. I heard that inside Apple itself they were very pleased.
I debriefed for the team after launching the game, when they called me. I was busy, so I dropped the call. A few minutes later, someone entered the room and said that Steve wanted to call me. Oops ...
Everyone laughed at the fact that I “hung up the phone to Steve Jobs” - but, as it turned out later, this was the last time that we interacted with him.
As news of his deteriorating health leaked to the press, I sat down at various times to write him emails, trying to come up with something meaningful and positive with a view to supporting him - but I never finished them, o what I regret very much today.
I confirm the existence of many negative traits of character for which he was widely known - but the elements of the path that led me to where I am today depended on the traces he left in the universe.
So why did I give up all my business when Steve Jobs asked me about anything? I exhibited before him.
Indeed, there is something to think about.
In my youth, I was a fan of the Apple computer, Jobs and Wozniak were revered people for me, and the desire to have Apple 2 was a defining feature of my childhood for several years. Years later, when I first saw the NeXT computer at a computer exhibition - at the time when I was already selling my first commercial software - it seemed to me to look into the future (but the price tag was more than $ 10,000 - not bad!).
')
When Id Software became successful thanks to Commander Keen and Wolfenstein 3D, the first personal serious purchase for me was not a car - it was a NeXT computer. As it soon turned out, it turned out to be very useful for developing our software, and as a result we transferred our entire company to NeXT equipment.
We liked our NeXTs so much that we wanted to release Doom with a special logo “Designed on NeXT computers” on the screen saver. However, when we asked permission for such a step, we were denied.
Some time after the release, when Doom began his march around the planet and began to leave a noticeable mark on it, we learned that Steve had changed his mind on this issue and would have been happy to see the NeXT branding on the game — however, this ship already sailed for him. Then we exchanged a few messages with Steve Jobs and I thought it was cool.
Years later, based on my observations and circumstantial evidence, I came to the conclusion that in the depths of his heart Steve never had a high opinion of games - and that he always wanted games to not have as much value for his platforms as they occupied really I never took it personally.
When NeXT was able to conduct a kind of “reverse takeover” of Apple, and Steve was again at the helm, I sincerely rejoiced at this and anticipated all the useful features that a resurgent Apple could bring from NeXT to the mainstream.
I was invited to discuss the needs of games in general, but I chose my mission to convince Apple to adopt OpenGL as its 3D graphics API. We argued a lot with Steve about this.
Part of his method of communicating with others (at least with me) was mocking modern alternatives - and no one dared to contradict him or speak differently. He could recognize these options as pragmatic - but, of course, they could not, by definition, be a good choice. “I have a Pixar. We will build something [API] that will work really well. "
It often disappointed me, because he could speak with certainty about things he was simply wrong about - for example, the price of memory for video cards or the capacity of systems available for AltiVec extensions .
However, when I know what I am talking about, I will stand my ground up to the last against anyone.
When Steve was identified with something, he acted decisively. Dictates were held, companies were acquired, presentations were planned - to which the notorious field of distortion of reality was connected, turning all the ideas that had been discussed and considered before into horrible and inappropriate ideas.
I believe that this decision of mine was one of the most impressive indirect influences on the industry that I had during my career. OpenGL never seriously threatened D3D on a PC, but it was critically important for Apple - and that meant that he still had enough attention for OpenGL to become the definitive choice of API at the moment when mobile devices started installing their GPUs. Now we have all this pall, but it is much better than if each of the five SoC manufacturers would roll out their own API at the dawn of the mobile era.
As a result, I held several presentations with Steve, and each time it was like a crazy fire alarm - there was never enough time to do everything right, and more often than not many people needed heroic efforts to make it happen. In part, it seems to me that in fact it was a calculated part of his method.
The first impression I got from “ Keynote Steve speaking” was Jobs, who reprimanded the poor working scene about “this Home Depot crap” - a device that rolled out a stand with a new Mac, and which he was extremely disappointed with. Although his complaints had a strong case, and as a result, with his attention to detail he improved the quality of the presentation - but I would not want to work for him as a working scene.
One day, my wife (then the bride) and I met with Steve at Apple - he wanted me to hold a presentation that was scheduled for the same day as our wedding. With a wide smile and full of charm, he suggested that we move the wedding to another day. We refused, but he continued to crush. In the end, my wife came up with a counter offer - if he really needed “her” John so much, he should lend John Lassiter to her media company for a day to consult. Steve ohkrenelno quickly turned from a man full of charm into real ice - and as a result I didn’t speak at that presentation.
When I was working on the early Doom 3 tech demo for a presentation in Japan, it was hard for me to work with some of the managers who dealt with the issue - because they insisted that I change the demo, because “Steve doesn’t like blood”. I was aware that Doom 3 didn’t fit well into his tastes - but he wasn’t the point of the presentation.
I raised this question in a discussion with Steve and everyone involved on board. He answered all of us as follows:
“I trust you, John. Do whatever you think is best. ”
Such an answer was of great benefit to me - after him no one said a word to me.
When my wife and I later started creating games for “regular” phones ( DoomRPG! Orcs & Elves! ), I repeatedly spoke to Steve for making Apple’s phone a great idea. Every time there was a rumor that Apple supposedly was working on the phone, I refined my pitch in front of it. Once he called me at home on Sunday (where did he even get my number from?) To ask one question, after which I had a long and enthusiastic discussion of potential opportunities.
I was not involved in creating the iPhone - but I was very impressed when the iPhone finally saw the light. Giant (for its time) screen with accurate color ( true color ) and with the GPU! On it we could do incredible things!
Steve first talked about developing applications for the iPhone on the same presentation where I showed the new ID Tech 5 engine on a Mac, so I was sitting in the front row. When he began to talk about web applications ( Web Apps ), I (albeit quite quietly) publicly expressed my disapproval.
After the audience had settled, and the rest were gathered in front of the stage, I immediately began to talk about how terrible the web applications are, since they will not reflect the full potential of the device. We could realize so much more interesting ideas if we had real, direct access to the device!
Steve answered me with the same words that I heard earlier - “bad applications can disable base stations of cellular communication”. I hated those words. He could just say, “We are not ready for this,” and I would have treated this normally.
I had some guesses, and I decided to argue that the components of the iPhone and its OS already provided a sufficient level of protection for native applications. I pointed to the engineer closest to me and asked him, "Do you no longer have a MMU and process isolation on the iPhone?" His eyes opened wide - he looked at me with a look, "please don't drag me into this," but in the end I waited for an affirmative answer from him.
I said that OS X was almost certainly used for activities with far greater security requirements than a phone — and that if Apple couldn’t provide sufficient protection in this area, it meant they had big problems. He sarcastically replied, "You're a smart guy, John, why don't you write a new OS?" At that moment, I thought, "Fuck you, Steve."
People parted from us to the side. When Steve was angry, Apple employees didn’t want to catch his eye in order not to accidentally fall under the hot hand after. Later, one of Apple's managers reassured me with the fact that "Steve welcomes such energetic discussions."
Being still disappointed about this decision, I made some unflattering comments, which the press immediately picked up. Of course, Steve didn't like it.
The famous “hero / shithead roller-coaster” swing of Steve Jobs (“swing carrying you either in the dirt or towards recognition”) turned out to be true. After I had been at their summit for many years, now I was at the bottom. I was told that Steve gave direct instructions not to give me access to the early version of the iPhone SDK, when work on it was finally completed.
As a result, I wrote several successful applications for the iPhone on the side (they all have now sunk into oblivion due to the fact that Apple ceases to support 32-bit applications, and this disappoints me) - and, despite the fact that I had many strong employees inside Apple, I was on knives with Steve.
The latest product for iOS, on which I worked, was the game Rage for iOS. At that time, in my opinion, she set a new bar for visual quality among mobile games, and also supported some new features like TV-out. I heard that inside Apple itself they were very pleased.
I debriefed for the team after launching the game, when they called me. I was busy, so I dropped the call. A few minutes later, someone entered the room and said that Steve wanted to call me. Oops ...
Everyone laughed at the fact that I “hung up the phone to Steve Jobs” - but, as it turned out later, this was the last time that we interacted with him.
As news of his deteriorating health leaked to the press, I sat down at various times to write him emails, trying to come up with something meaningful and positive with a view to supporting him - but I never finished them, o what I regret very much today.
I confirm the existence of many negative traits of character for which he was widely known - but the elements of the path that led me to where I am today depended on the traces he left in the universe.
So why did I give up all my business when Steve Jobs asked me about anything? I exhibited before him.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/358596/
All Articles