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World’s top tech firm brought to book by minor monologuist over working conditions in factories that make its gadgets

These days Mike Daisey is run off his feet. “I don’t even have time to listen to my voicemail now. That’s a phenomenon I have not experienced before,” he told the Observer with an amazed laugh. Perhaps he shouldn’t be so surprised. In the past fortnight, Daisey has gone from being a gifted but obscure solo act in the US theatre to the public face of a backlash against one of the iconic corporations of the 21st century.

Daisey’s latest work, The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, has triggered off a spasm of soul-searching about the sometimes appalling labour conditions in China under which many of America’s most cherished products are made. Specifically, the shiny, sleek iPhones, iPods and iPads produced by Apple.

The Agony and the Ecstasy was devised after exhaustive research talking to exploited and abused workers in China, for almost 18 months. Daisey played to small but appreciative crowds across the US, winning critical praise but stirring little trouble, not even with the target of his ire: Apple itself.

But everything changed in January when a discussion and partial performance of Daisey’s monologue appeared on the National Public Radio show This American Life. It rapidly became the most downloaded episode of the show’s history and an online petition calling for Apple to reform its practices began. Within 48 hours it attracted 140,000 names. Then the New York Times ran an exhaustive investigation of Apple’s supplier network in China that revealed industrial accidents, brutal working conditions and child labour. Daisey had briefed the newspaper’s reporters and they had watched his show last year. Suddenly, Apple’s Chinese supplier network was huge news.

That has turned him into an unlikely nemesis, sending tremors of fear through one of the largest and most powerful companies in the world. It is an amazing shift. After all, for 15 years the New York-based Daisey has crafted his art as a gifted monologuist, winning praise but little mass appeal on a variety of topics from his first job at Amazon to his views on Oprah Winfrey, or recounting a trip to the South Pacific.

But now, arriving apologetically late and harried in a trendy Brooklyn restaurant near his home in New York, Daisey is a man in intense demand. He has appearances lined up on CNN and other TV shows. On his blog he has been updating the story regularly and fending off criticism from Apple’s defenders, including comedian Stephen Fry and Forbes columnist Tim Worstall.

Daisey is delighted but exhausted, having been up until 5am composing a response to a public attack from Worstall. “I am tired but I am encouraged to see traction. The only way you can fight for a thing like this is when you know the truth is on your side,” he told the Observer.

Daisey’s sudden catapult on to the world stage as the public face of criticism against Apple is an astonishing development, especially for such a rarely practised art as the theatrical monologue. It has also likely made his Steve Jobs piece one of the most remarkable performances of recent years, not least because of its leap from the stage to real world activism. “It’s the first time maybe in a generation that the American theatre has affected change.”

The play’s premise is simple enough. It blends Daisey’s own backstory as a nerdy geek who loved – and continues to love – Apple products, with the story of how Jobs ran the company with a mix of tyranny and genius before he died last year. But then it heads into dark territory as Daisey recounts how he became obsessed with photographs that emerged from inside the giant Foxconn factory in which many Apple products are made.

His fascination with how his beloved gadgets were built ends up with a subversive trip to southern China and interviews with ordinary workers who describe the physically and mentally crippling conditions in which many toil. On the trip Daisey was stunned that he, as a playwright, was the one digging up the truth. “I wanted journalists to tell the story. I am a monologuist and it’s not the same thing. But I had to act as a journalist,” he said.

Daisey is scathing about many of the journalists who cover Apple. He claimed they were often cowed by the firm, given strictly controlled access to the latest product launches but subject to intimidation over writing about anything that might hurt Apple’s public image. He recites the story of one tech journalist who agreed to appear on a panel with him, only to be contacted by Apple and warned off doing so. “Apple has built an incredible institution of secrecy and people understand that when Apple threaten them they mean it. Everyone knows that,” Daisey said.

As a performer, though, Daisey is immune. Yet he confesses he still has a complex emotional relationship with the company. He still uses an iPhone and does not tell people to boycott the company, just spread the word about Chinese labour practices in the hope that they change. When people email him to ask what phone they should buy – and they do in large numbers – he tells them to make an “ethical” choice they are comfortable with. He himself no longer upgrades his devices and is considering buying secondhand in the future.

Apple for its part says many of the stories emerging from China are not true and that it already is acting to monitor its suppliers’ behaviour and bring in greater transparency. Other defenders of the firm point out that many other electrical goods firms are equally as culpable as Apple, if not more so.

For Daisey, perhaps because he loved Apple’s caring and cool public image so much, that is not good enough. “It is like watching a friend lose his way. It is hard to imagine the Apple of a generation ago making this ham-fisted error.” He believes the firm could have acted years earlier to improve its supplier network in China and would have reaped a PR bonanza, rather than the current global whirlwind of bad publicity.

“Now all they have to do is clean up the mess, but if they had got ahead of it they could have looked fantastic,” he said.

Daisey himself is not stopping his charge. His monologue is still on stage and will remain so for at least the rest of the year. He may take it to bigger venues for one-off shows, aiming at 2,000-3,000-seat venues so the ticket prices can be driven down. He is also seeking to turn the monologue into a film. As a final way of spreading the word, he is soon to release a transcript of it and allow anyone in the world to adapt his show or put it on in as their own live performance. “People can tell this story to other people. This is exactly how the environmental movement really took hold. People realised these values mattered and they began to tell the story from person to person and that’s what caused change,” he said.

Though Daisey has other ideas for future monologues he knows the success of the Jobs show and the issue of Chinese labour practices that it illustrates is going to dominate his life for the foreseeable future. As he got up to leave the restaurant he left behind a half-eaten sandwich. He was headed to a car that would whisk him to a TV studio for another interview. “It’s like that feeling you get when you climb a mountain and you get to the top and it turns out you are in the Alps, and there’s a whole series of mountains ahead of you. Then you sharpen your stick and keep walking,” he said.

Almost 150,000 people sign online petition which calls for tech giant to clean up its act on alleged human rights abuses in China

Mark Shields, a communications worker in Washington DC, did not intend to become an activist calling for Apple to clean up its act over allegations of brutal labour abuses in its Chinese supplier network.

But, listening to a recent radio show on the subject, Shields, a dedicated user and fan of Apple products, felt he had to act. He was going to write a letter to Apple until a friend suggested he start a petition at change.org, an online group that facilitates campaigning on controversial subjects.

In its first 48 hours, Shield’s petition attracted more than 140,000 signatures. Now more 147,000 people from all around the world have signed up, and it has become one of the main focuses of consumer discontent at the way Apple makes its sleek computer products that have become a mainstay of much of modern life. “I am an accidental activist here. I have never started a petition before,” Shields, 35, told the Guardian. “I am an Apple person, I have my MacBook and iPhone. I love all that stuff. These products have changed my life,
but they are coming at a cost in human suffering,” he added.

Apple is current facing a wave of bad publicity over a New York Times story that exposed many problems with Apple suppliers in China. They included industrial accidents, abuse of workers for long hours and the use of underage labour. Though such problems also occur at many other western consumer electrical companies that have their products made in China, Apple’s position as a brand leader – and its huge profits – make it a high-profile case.

The Times story itself followed on the work of playwright Mike Daisey, whose one-man show, The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, has highlighted the issue, and was featured on the National Public Radio show that Shields listened to.

Some columnists and observers of the American tech scene have warned that Apple might now face a boycott of its iPhones, iPads and iPods: products that have made it one of the biggest companies in the world. Shields said that he himself did not advocate a boycott. “I don’t think they really help,” he said.

But at the same time he had found himself unable to buy a new Apple gadget. “I would really like to go and buy an Apple TV and I can’t do that right now in good conscience. I would feel bad about it,” he said.

Instead, Shields’ petition asks Apple to release a new worker protection strategy for the period around its product releases, when the huge pressure to deliver a high volume of sought-after new products could potentially cause a spike in worker abuses. It also asks Apple to increase transparency and publish the names of its suppliers who have violated labour standards and exactly what those violations were.

“Please make these changes immediately, so that each of us can once again hold our heads high and say: ‘I’m a Mac person,’” the petition said.

Apple did not immediately respond to a request to comment on the petition. However, last week, Apple chief executive Tim Cook did send an email to the firm’s staff – leaked to the media – which promised to crack down on problems, while admitting that issues had occurred. “Any suggestion that we don’t care is patently false and offensive to us. As you know better than anyone, accusations like these are contrary to our values. It’s not who we are,” Cook said in the email.

He added that the firm was working hard to resolve things and discover abuses.

“No one has been more up front about the challenges we face. We are attacking problems aggressively with the help of the world’s foremost authorities on safety, the environment and fair labour,” Cook wrote.

However, the rapid growth of the petition shows the depth of the potential PR disaster that Apple is facing. Many comments written on the petition expressed similar sentiments to Shields’ views, coming from dedicated Apple fans.

“Apple, you have the power, and most certainly the resources to change things,” wrote “Gabrielle” of Grandville, Michigan, who confessed to standing in line for hours to buy an iPad when the tablet was first released. The success of the petition was also hailed by organisers at change.org for its swift growth.

“It has been incredible to see the resonance Mark’s campaign has had with other Apple users, and to watch him become part of a growing movement of consumer-driven change,” said Amanda Kloer, change.org’s director of organizing.

Technology giant more than doubled profits making $13.06bn (£8.35bn) compared with $6bn for the same quarter in 2010

Record sales of iPhones and iPads resulted in record profits at Apple in the final quarter of 2011, the first since the death of its co-founder, Steve Jobs.

Apple more than doubled its profits: to $13.06bn (£8.35bn), compared with $6bn for the same quarter in 2010. The result easily beat analysts’ forecasts, taking pressure off the chief executive, Tim Cook, handpicked by Jobs as his successor. Last October Apple shares recorded their biggest single-day dollar drop after iPhone sales missed their forecast.

Cook said he was thrilled the company sold a record 37.04m iPhones in the final quarter of 2011, a 128% rise on a year ago. “We could have sold more if we’d had more supply,” he said. The recently launched iPhone 4S proved to be the company’s best seller in the quarter. “We could not be happier,” said Cook.

In record sales across nearly all product categories, Apple sold a record 15.43m iPads over the quarter, more than double a year ago. It sold 5.2m Macs during the quarter, a 26% unit increase.

Only sales of iPods fell, down 21% year on year to 15.4m; however, Apple has enjoyed higher average selling prices as consumers buy more of the iPod Touch.

Cook told analysts that tablets would prove to be a huge market; they had already surpassed sales of desktop PCs in the US. He was dismissive of competition in the tablet market, including Amazon’s far cheaper, if less powerful, Kindle Fire. “I don’t think limited function tablets are in the same category,” he said. “Last year was supposed to the year of the tablet; and I think that most people will agree it was the year of the iPad, for the second year in a row.

“I think it’s remarkable that we’ve shifted 55m iPads ,and we’ve only been in the market since April 2010.”

Competition is intensifying however. Apple this week lost a court battle to have Samsung tablets banned in the Netherlands. The two firms have been locked in legal battles in almost a dozen countries over smartphones and tablets.

The company said its iTunes store generated $1.7bn in revenue; the 361 Apple stores also had a record run. The chief financial officer, Peter Oppenheimer, said the stores made an average $17.1m in the last quarter, up from $12m a year ago, More than 110m people visited an Apple store over the quarter, and the average store attracted 22,000 visitors per week.

Cook said: “Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline.”

Revenue jumped 73% to $46.3bn, exceeding analysts’ forecasts. For the current quarter, Apple projected revenue of $32.5bn with earnings per share of $8.50, noting the quarter has 13 weeks. Analysts had forecast revenue of $32bn with earnings per share of $8.02, according to consensus forecasts.

Last week Apple launched iBooks 2 for the iPad, a software and online store aimed at shaking up the textbook market by offering interactive books for students. According to Jobs’ biographer, Walter Isaacson, the Apple founder spent the final years of his life looking at the textbook market. Oppenheimer said that more than 600,000 copies of its textbook authoring app has been downloaded.

Analysts pushed Apple’s executives on the $90bn cash pile that the company has amassed. Oppenheimer declined to comment on any specific plan but said the company was discussing what to do . “We are not going to let the money burn a hole in our pocket,” he said. “What we focus on is making the best product,” said Cook. “We just want to stay ahead.”

Cook was made chief executive in August last year when Jobs resigned through ill-health. He has been with Apple since 1998 and filled in for Jobs for two months in 2004, when Jobs was recuperating from cancer surgery.

Successor to Steve Jobs to earn nearly $400m in stock and salary options over the next decade

Apple’s late founder Steve Jobs created the world’s most valuable company and was paid just $5 in the last years of his life – but his successor Tim Cook, unknown outside Silicon Valley until his elevation to the top job last summer, has been awarded a $378m (£244m) pay jackpot.

In the clearest sign yet that the wage bills for America’s leading executives are ramping back to eye-watering pre-credit crunch levels, Cook’s 2011 rewards, disclosed yesterday, put him in pole position to become the year’s highest boardroom earner.

Cook took home $900,017 in salary during 2011 and a further $900,000 in cash from an incentive scheme. But the bulk of his earnings will come from a windfall award of 1m Apple shares that tie him to the company for the next decade. On 24 August last year, to mark his promotion when Jobs retired, Cook was given stock then worth $376m, half of which will be handed over in 2016 and half in 2021.

But by the time Cook takes delivery of the shares they might be worth substantially more. Every time Apple’s share price gains a dollar, its chief executive’s paper fortune will increase by more than $1m. Previous awards of shares mean a total of 1.376m shares are now owned by Cook or held in his name. Because Apple’s price has risen steadily since last August Cook’s shares are already worth $550m.

The shares have no performance criteria attached. To claim his winnings Cook, who joined Apple in 1998 from Compaq Computer Corporation, must simply remain with the company until 2021.

The details of Cook’s vast pay package come as the UK government has pledged to bring in new legislation to tackle excessive executive pay. David Cameron said: “The market for top people is not working. It needs to be sorted out.”

Average pay for the chief executive of a FTSE-100 company climbed 33% last year and now stands at £5.1m – but it remains a fraction of boardroom rewards in the US.

“It’s another planet,” said Sarah Wilson, chief executive of Manifest, which advises shareholders on corporate governance. “The awards are eye-watering in the US and you really do have this cult of the chief executive as superstar. There is a lot of fear and uncertainty among board members that if they don’t pay these large sums they will not get the people they want.”

Jobs was granted 5.5m shares during his lifetime, worth $2.3bn to his heirs, but between 2007 and his death last year he received no further awards. Instead, he collected a nominal annual salary of just $1 during the period that produced the first iPhone, the first iPad, and during which Apple’s stock market value doubled.

Cook’s payout is still dwarfed by the $646.6m Jobs received in 2006, when his last swath of stock options vested, taking his total compensation for the preceding five years to $650.17m.

Apple overtook oil giant Exxon Mobil as the world’s biggest company last summer, and is now valued at $394bn on the stock market. But Cook’s earnings are well ahead of those of Exxon’s chairman and chief executive, Rex Tillerson.

In 2010, the most recent year for which figures have been disclosed, Tillerson earned $29m in cash and shares, of which $5.6m comprised his salary and bonus for the year.

KBEs awarded to Nobel-winning physicists, an Oxford church historian and the designer of Apple’s iPod, iPhone and iPad

A knighthood for the Oxford church historian Diarmaid MacCulloch, author of landmark works on Thomas Cranmer and the Reformation but perhaps best-known for his television series on the history of Christianity, comes as something of a rebuke to the Church of England. Macculloch turned to an academic career instead of his original intention of ordination because of the church’s attitude to gay people.

About 11% of the honours go to people working in education: among them Glynis Breakwell, vice-chancellor of the University of Bath who is made a dame in recognition of her efforts increasing her institution’s profile as a world-class research centre. Sylvia Morris, head of the Cathedral School of St Saviour and St Mary Overy in Soutwark, rated outstanding by Ofsted, is also made a dame.

A CBE goes to Jean Gross for her work in improving services to children with speech and communication difficulties and an MBE is awarded to Jeanette Orrey, the school catering manager credited with inviting Jamie Oliver to take an interest in children’s nutrition.

Science and technology make up 3% of the awards, with knighthoods for professors Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov (below), Manchester University’s Nobel Prize-winning physicists, and to Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, who received the Nobel chemistry prize three years ago for his work on DNA. Jonathan Ive, the British-born, American-resident designer of the iPad, iPod and iPhone, is awarded the KBE.

Su Butcher is thinking about buying a laptop for her seven-year-old son. She wants him to learn something, not just play games

I’m thinking about getting a laptop for my seven-year-old son and I’m looking for ideas. He’s keen on playing games, but his dad is very wary of it, especially given recent research that has criticised it as a learning tool. I’m hoping that I can interest him in using the computer for things other than shooting games and collecting bananas. I’m also concerned about his safety and security. We have an iMac, which I use professionally, and I’d like to keep him off that too. But I’m not a Mac nut – I also have a Samsung netbook. What would you suggest?
Su Butcher

Netbooks are great starter computers for kids, because they are small and light, reasonably cheap, and have good battery life. Much of the netbook design thinking came from Intel’s Classmate project, and Asus launched its first netbook into the UK education market in October 2007, as I reported at the time. Later, Intel’s much more robust Classmate 2 added a touchscreen for pen operation, with the screen folded back over the keyboard. A UK example is ZooStorm’s Fizzbook Spin netbook, with the latest version costing around £400.

However, parents and schools tend to buy cheaper off-the-shelf netbooks. The Samsung NC-10 was hugely popular, and the Toshiba NB200 was an attractive alternative. The current equivalents include the Samsung NC-110 and Toshiba NB550D, but these are relatively expensive. You don’t mention a budget, but the Asus 1008HA (£189.99) and Asus 1011PX (£199.99) are better value at Amazon.co.uk prices. You should also add £10-£12 for a 2GB memory upgrade.

If you are willing to spend a bit more on a netbook, then look at the AMD-powered Lenovo IdeaPad S205 instead. For a netbook-type price of £274.99, you get a bigger 11.6in screen, faster graphics (Radeon HD 6310M) and the full Windows 7 Home Premium instead of Windows Starter.

The next step up from the S205 would be a Lenovo Z370 (£449) notebook with a 13.3in screen, Intel Core i3-2330M processor, 500GB hard drive and DVD-RW. It has RapidBoot so it starts Windows 7 in 20 seconds, and an SSD (Solid State Drive) is optional. However, that type of laptop is more suitable for secondary school and older users.

There’s no shortage of educational programs and games for Windows-based netbooks and laptops, and Windows 7 includes parental controls. You could also install Scratch, an educational programming language, and Pivot Stickfigure Animator, along with IE9 and all the usual utilities from All My Apps. (Sadly, this site doesn’t have a section for education software, but it does have 5,581 free utilities and 1,266 free games.) You will already know from your son’s use of your netbook what kinds of apps might be worth trying, and can introduce him to some of the videos on the Kahn Academy website.

Netbooks are good value but they have not improved very much over the past couple of years, and you already have one. I can’t really see the point of buying another if he can use yours. It might be better to upgrade your Samsung with 2GB of memory and a £38.49 student copy of Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 32-bit Upgrade Edition, unless you have already upgraded it.

Assuming your budget is £200 or so, upgrading your Samsung would leave £150 to buy your son either a Nintendo DS (eg, the DSi XL, which has bigger screens and a built-in browser) or an 8GB Apple iPod Touch. These are more games-oriented and may have less educational value than a laptop, but they wouldn’t require as much parental help or supervision, and might be less breakable.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked readers what they’d recommend for young children, and the Nintendo DS and iPod Touch were the most popular recommendations. Steve Turley says the DS is an excellent choice for four- and five-year-olds and older children because of “the robust nature of the units and the wide availability of used units and games”. While there are plenty of Apple iOS-compatible apps for primary school children, he reckons the iPod Touch and iPhone “aren’t built to survive the rigors of small child usage without a fair degree of adult supervision”.

David Jeffery says: “If you’re considering a gift for a child at the older end of the spectrum, I reckon the 3DS is a decent bet. It can access the internet, plays videos, takes 3D photos, can store and play music, has a growing library of (actually very good) games, and has recently received a massive price cut. The main drawbacks are that it doesn’t play Flash games, is not an email client, and doesn’t look like daddy’s iPad either.”

But John Rogan, who has boys aged eight and 11, “would go for a fourth-generation iPod Touch. Not only are the games substantially cheaper than for the DS,” he says, “you have the added attraction of Facetime, setting up their emails, and internet access, which is becoming more and more necessary for homework.”

Some of your son’s friends will probably have one or both of these handhelds, so he will know which he’d prefer.

Finally, while netbooks haven’t changed much in the past couple of years, the market has. Today, Apple’s iPad 2 is the answer to most tech questions, and there are also some cheaper multi-touch tablets running Google Android. According to Nielsen research, the iPad 2 tops the electronic wishlists of kids aged six to 12, and 44% would like one for Christmas.

I think an iPad 2 is too expensive and probably too fragile to give to a child, but you could buy one for family use and your son could use it when supervised. The main attractions are the accessibility of the touch interface and the vast number of apps, including many educational titles. There are a couple of child-friendly alternatives, which you can see in an ABC News video review, Don’t Break My iPad: Tablets Designed for Kids.

David Jeffery, quoted above, says that for younger kids, “there is more value in something like a LeapPad reading system, [which] can be thrown against a wall and still work. Our youngest lad still loves his LeapPad and he’s five.” Leapfrog recommends the LeapPad Explorer for children aged five to nine, so your son might outgrow it too quickly. Still, it looks good value at Amazon.co.uk’s price of £139.49, and even better value at the US price, $99.

The arc of Steve Jobs’s life is the stuff of legends, but his new biography forces us to stare at the realities of the actual man

Let me jump to the conclusion: This is an extraordinary book on many levels. It’s informative, entertaining often, insightful, sympathetic but not indulgent; it rises to its unusual subject and manages to render its complexity in a straightforward manner that attests to the biographer’s talent.

Get thee to a physical bookstore, if you can find one, or to Amazon’s or Apple’s online dispensers – you won’t regret it. And if you don’t have the time or patience, start with Chapter 36: The iPhone, Revolutionary Products in One (page 465 on paper, easily searched on electrons).

Last year, Walt Isaacson called to talk about the bio Steve had asked him to write. No surprise there – Dear Leader always wanted the best, and Isaacson had written world-class biographies of Ben Franklin, Einstein and Henry Kissinger.

I told Isaacson how sad this felt, how I perceived Steve’s decision as ”putting his affairs in order” before leaving this Earth. Walt didn’t answer directly, but he did say something shocking: Steve had relinquished all control over the book; all decisions were Walt’s.

I didn’t believe it. I couldn’t see Steve giving up control on anything. His fanatical attention to detail is, sorry, was a key ingredient of his success. But Steve’s editorial grip on the book went no further than his picture on the cover. In Isaacson’s words:

He had never, in two years, asked anything about what I was putting in the book or what conclusions I had drawn. But now he looked at me and said, “I know there will be a lot in your book I won’t like.” It was more a question than a statement, and when he stared at me for a response, I nodded, smiled and said I was sure that would be true. “That’s good,” he said. “Then it won’t seem like an in-house book. I won’t read it for a while, because I don’t want to get mad. Maybe I will read it in a year – if I’m still around.” By then, his eyes were closed and his energy gone, so I quietly took my leave.

To be sure, this isn’t your typical CEO encomium where the slightest achievements are remembered as world-changing deeds, and unseemly details are airbrushed into endearing idiosyncrasies.

The arc of Steve’s life is the stuff of legends: abandoned at birth; raised in Silicon Valley; an acid-dropping, ashram-dwelling college drop-out, hacker, and co-founder of the most iconic of personal computer companies; fired at age 30; re-inventor of animated movies at Pixar; the struggle to create the NeXT big thing; the return to Apple in the most stunning turnaround the industry had ever seen; reshaping the music industry; building a world-class retail network in his own image; re-inventing the smartphone industry and grabbing half of its profits; and, finally, after 30 years of false starts, making tablets a reality and grabbing iPod-like market and profit share as a result. An arc that saw the unmanageable hippie become the head of one of the world’s best-managed companies. And he died just as he reached the pinnacle.

This could tempt both subject and his biographer to produce a statuesque book, a North Korean monument to Dear Leader’s achievements. But instead of The Life and Miracles of Saint Steve, we get the gift of truth. We are forced to stare at the reality, or realities of the actual man. Thinking of his children, for whom Steve said the book was, so they got to better know him, this book is a great present. Judging oneself only by comparison to the better side of a parent is a terrible burden. Walt’s book gives them an independent look into the incredibly luminous Steve as well as into his sometimes repulsive dark side. Steve’s must have hoped to free them from his legend.

On the one hand, Isaacson shows the man who thrilled us with his (almost) unerring taste, with his sense that computers of various sizes and forms were more than merely utilitarian, that they were the objects, the vehicles of an evolving culture. Visionary, artist, leader, innovator … the list of meliorative words goes on, and rightly so: Steve was all these.

On the other hand, Isaacson manages the feat of being, by turns, empathetic, even affectionate and, in the next sentence, unblinkingly factual. The book will confirm everything you’ve heard about Steve’s unpleasant sides, and then some. When learning of his truly pathological eating habits, for example, you’ll wonder about his sanity. I don’t use the word pathological lightly: you’ll see how delusional Steve was when, for eight months, he refused surgery for his diagnosed pancreatic cancer, choosing instead a strict vegan diet, acupuncture and “herbal remedies, and occasionally a few other treatments he found on the internet or by consulting people around the country, including a psychic“.

In a similar vein, you’ll read what Jony Ive, Apple’s senior vice-president of design, Steve’s soulmate, had to say about his dark side:

… his way to achieve catharsis is to hurt somebody. And I think he feels he has a liberty and a license to do that. The normal rules of social engagement, he feels, don’t apply to him. Because of how very sensitive he is, he knows exactly how to efficiently and effectively hurt someone.

Yes, that’s also the way Steve was. With everyone, family included.

Knowing or having known many of the characters in the book, I can vouch for its accuracy. But, even more important, I can vouch for its voice. Walt Isaacson got Steve right. He didn’t get intimidated, he wasn’t seduced into being a groupie, he didn’t get nauseated or angry. Instead, he delivered the truest rendition I’ve read of one of the most complicated people I’ve known.

His subject’s complexity didn’t rob Isaacson of his dry wit, such as this observation when observing Jobs after his liver transplant:

As Jobs got better, much of his feisty personality returned. He still had his bile ducts.

Or from recording memorable Bill Gates quotes such a this one:

I’ve been predicting a tablet with a stylus for many years,” he told me. “I will eventually turn out to be right or be dead.

(Not so fast, Bill, we love to have you and Ballmer around.)

In my view, the only way to keep one’s sanity when dealing with Steve was to stay ambivalent, to force oneself to harbour contradictory feelings about him. Easier said than done. In my case, over time, feelings of admiration and affection have taken over when watching the feats and the struggle. Reading Walt’s book was a helpful and, at times, painful reminder of who Jobs actually was.

JLG@mondaynote.com

[For a small compendium of Walt's best-selling Steve Jobs bio reviews, look here.]