Wozniak Says Silicon Valley Cares Too Much About Money

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In an interview with Mashable, Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple and all around nice guy, said today's Silicon Valley cares too much about money. In particular, Woz said that people coming out of business school are all about money while engineers are more into coming up with unique designs.


It wasn't in a garage, it was in my Cupertino apartment and my Cupertino office at Hewlett Packard. The garage was kind of a true story because we were humble and we had no money. I think the money that's been made has attracted a different kind of people looking at technology today and saying 'Oh my gosh, I could maybe have a startup and make a bunch of money.' And the ones that come out of business school, money's the priority. For the ones that come out of engineering school, being able to accomplish and design things that didn't exist before is their priority.
 
Silicon Valley Cares too much about money? Wonder if he's including his beloved Apple who are the biggest offenders. It's what makes the world go around, profit, profit, profit.
 
Mike89 said:
Silicon Valley Cares too much about money? Wonder if he's including his beloved Apple who are the biggest offenders. It's what makes the world go around, profit, profit, profit.
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uh, it was probably directed right at them?

dude hasn't been at apple for a while now, think is a high school science teacher last I loked
 
Let me correct that, everyone cares way too much about money. That is all that maters to any for profit, how many extra zeros can I add to the end of my bank account.
 
Dear Steve, if the industry wasn't about money, there wouldn't be an industry........see: All that cool electronic shit that everyone owns that just kind of happened by accident.
 
Great things come from love of the pursuit of creating them. Then they become cash machines. Such is the way of capitalism...
 
Exavior said:
Let me correct that, everyone cares way too much about money. That is all that maters to any for profit, how many extra zeros can I add to the end of my bank account.
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Sure, just ask some people who don't have any and they'll set you straight.
 
There is quite literally nothing more important than money.
Anyone that says otherwise is kidding themselves.
 
HeadRusch said:
Dear Steve, if the industry wasn't about money, there wouldn't be an industry........see: All that cool electronic shit that everyone owns that just kind of happened by accident.
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how's that linux thing working out?
 
alxlwson said:
There are very few people in the world that wish they didn't have more money.
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You and I know this but I'm not so sure about some folks.

The Korean War effectively ended in 1953.

US Army officers sent their to study what kind of shape South Korea was in when it comes to rebuilding reported that it was a total loss. No roads, bridges or infrastructure left standing. the Japanese had long since cut down every tree in the South. A great amount of the male population was dead.

My wife, youngest child of 6, was born in 1961. She had brothers and sisters born during that war. She was literally born into poverty.

She finished high school in a country where parents had to pay for their children to go to school. She new many girls just like her who weren't so lucky. Not all Korean parents viewed the education of their girls as more important than getting their boys into college.

My wife takes the subject of money very seriously.

I'm just being honest when I say that I really understand, when in fact, I can not comprehend. For me it's like understanding gravity. I know it's there and it's effects, but fuck me if I actually "understand why it works".

So when someone expresses themselves the way you have Exavior, forgive me if I reply a little harshly. I suppose you and I can both afford to have such a point of view. But I know it's limitations, I know just how far that sentiment stretches if you know what I mean?
 
The demand for money drives innovation because you're always looking for the next big thing. This isn't Star Trek, yet.
 
FLECOM said:
how's that linux thing working out?
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Pretty profitable :D

Red Hat tops $2 billion in annual revenue

Once Linux started to mean something to enterprise, the "donations" flowed like water. Anything that's desirable to a corporation gets funding. And for an OS as flexible and mold-able as Linux a support contract is worth it's weight in gold!

Linux Torvalds is worth $150 million. Not bad for a kid who made his own OS because he couldn't afford one! Proves you can do what you love and still accidentally end-up rich...much like Wozniack!

But it also proves that money makes the world go round. Without the massive amounts of corporate dollars, Linux as we know it would not exist.
 
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FLECOM said:
uh, it was probably directed right at them?

dude hasn't been at apple for a while now, think is a high school science teacher last I loked
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He still draws a six-figure paycheck from them.

And I'm pretty sure he didn't help found it 40 years ago to establish a charity.
 
There's two ways to take this.

It's about making money. This is the true part. People need to make money doing this work or when it got hard or no longer fun, they'd go to the beach and smoke pot all day. At a minimum you will run out of resources doing what you do if you're not in the 'black'.

Its about managing the monetary opportunities and not the product. "Cost is King" and sacrifice quality, employ loyalty, and your reputation or "how can we wring every last penny out of a customer. ie sell their data" and destroy customer loyalty and trust in the process.
 
Mike89 said:
Silicon Valley Cares too much about money? Wonder if he's including his beloved Apple who are the biggest offenders. It's what makes the world go around, profit, profit, profit.
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Osirus said:
He still draws a six-figure paycheck from them.

And I'm pretty sure he didn't help found it 40 years ago to establish a charity.
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Could one of you point out where exactly he says profit is bad?

He's basically saying that the success of companies like Apple depends having an engineering-focused internal culture that can attract creative people and ideas. You can't have detached management, marketers, and lawyers running everything like a machine and expect to keep churning out iPhoneX forever. Innovation is more important to their long-term success than squeezing money out of what they have.
 
Retronym said:
There is quite literally nothing more important than money.
Anyone that says otherwise is kidding themselves.
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Indeed, if it's that important people are willing to do anything for it. Thus the love of money is the root of all evil.
 
He's not wrong, we got a ton of lawyers and businessmen and not enough scientists and engineers, it's allot harder to become a doctor and the work stress sucks, why not go into suing people instead?

Not great for long-term prosperity of the nation, but sure pads the savings account.
 
Wierdo said:
He's not wrong, we got a ton of lawyers and businessmen and not enough scientists and engineers, it's allot harder to become a doctor and the work stress sucks, why not go into suing people instead?

Not great for long-term prosperity of the nation, but sure pads the savings account.
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All of those jobs require a great deal of work and effort, but the margin of "profitability/glamour" is always in the favor of lawyers and businessmen. Being a business billionaire will always seem more "glamourous" than being a mere engineer -- especially when said billionaire has PR people to feed "bling propaganda" to the sheeple (I won't even go into all the movies, TV shows, PR Twitter/Instagram accounts, and so on). The majority of Instagram-fanatics today (including a lot of "rational, thoughtful folks") couldn't give a rat's ass about Einstein, but will know far too much about the details of some Kardashian's posterior (including how much makeup was used, and how much that cost, and where to get that -- higher-end types [but still abiding by that basic principle] will be hitting the Fashion Weeks in various major cities). The sad fact is, if a message (however stupid) is broadcast ad nauseam, then even otherwise "intelligent people" will buy into it. Don't believe me? Germany was, by far, the most intellectual nation on Earth before the rise of a certain Austrian with a mustache and a penchant for wild racial theories/conspiracy ideas. How could a guy like that rule over the most intellectual nation on Earth? Good question ...
 
Osirus said:
Oh BS. We're shitting engineers out of college like its going out of style.
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My experience in graduate engineering was a room of 30, 2 Americans, the rest Indian and Chinese students, so maybe you're correct in a way that doesn't address the problem.

As long as a good chunk of those graduates stick around then we can sustain ourselves through importing bright minds, but for how long?

The BRICK nations are rising rapidly, at some point their standards of living may be enough to attract those minds back home again, so we don't have much time on our hands to get back on the saddle.
 
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Exavior said:
Let me correct that, everyone cares way too much about money. That is all that maters to any for profit
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Yeah, those are called psychopaths. Money is important, but when it's ALL that matters for someone, good chance they're a psychopath. They tend to be very successful in business.
 
Times have changed too much, when Apple was founded in a garage you could afford a suburban house with not much more than a job than anyone with a high school education had that was a step above fast food worker, now you need a 6 figure salary just to afford the mortgage on a major reno/"fixer upper" in the same area. Unless you're lucky enough to have mom & dad who had a house there pre-boom and they let you live in their basement/garage, there are no more garage miracles that are going to happen in this area ever again.
 
tetris42 said:
Yeah, those are called psychopaths. Money is important, but when it's ALL that matters for someone, good chance they're a psychopath. They tend to be very successful in business.
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gettyimages-508360902.jpg
 
jpm100 said:
There's two ways to take this.

It's about making money. This is the true part. People need to make money doing this work or when it got hard or no longer fun, they'd go to the beach and smoke pot all day. At a minimum you will run out of resources doing what you do if you're not in the 'black'.

Its about managing the monetary opportunities and not the product. "Cost is King" and sacrifice quality, employ loyalty, and your reputation or "how can we wring every last penny out of a customer. ie sell their data" and destroy customer loyalty and trust in the process.
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And I think that's what he meant. Engineers want to create something, and money will follow. The problem here is that we have a generation of people who aren't about trying to improve the world, but figure out how to just make as much money as possible, and we end up getting terrible products as a result.
 
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i think that it is a problem with society as a whole.

some of the people want to make money by making things better, more efficient, more powerful, cheaper.

but a bunch of people only want to make money, they dont have the brains to improve things, they just scam and con and manipulate the poor and dumb into buying into shit, and then lobby to make the populace dumber.

it sickens me that so many of the richest people in the world dont invent jack shit. they just manipulate, and advertise, and hide bullshit in the fine print.


meh, i want the inventors to be the richest. not the ceo
 
Says the guy with a ton of money... Get a room with Warren Buffet. Tired of all the guys who make more in interest in a week/day/hour than most people make in a year, giving douchy liberal financial advice.

Granted, Woz is generally a humble guy, but he needs to step back and see things from us peons' view. The real world runs on money.
 
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sleepeeg3 said:
Says the guy with a ton of money... Get a room with Warren Buffet. Tired of all the guys who make more in interest in a week/day/hour than most people make in a year, giving douchy liberal financial advice.

Granted, Woz is generally a humble guy, but he needs to step back and see things from us peons' view. The real world runs on money.
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Yeah but Woz never set out to make money. He was a genuine nerd that loved to tinker and wanted to create cool shit. He's only rich and famous because of the other Steve.

He's basically saying to focus on building a better mousetrap, which he did, instead of building the most profitable mousetrap.
 
Rich person says other rich people love money too much. News at 11. ;)

Jesting aside, the Woz does make valid points about the bum rushery towards the biggest paycheck from selling technology instead of improving it.
 
LAME ASS F 'n CLICK BAIT HEADLINE.

I read the article and could not find anywhere Woz saying SV cares too much about money.

They ask him "Do you think the influx of money has changed startup culture today?"

To which he answers "I think the money that's been made has attracted a different kind of people looking at technology today .... the ones that come out of business school, money's the priority. For the ones that come out of engineering school, being able to accomplish and design things that didn't exist before is their priority."
 
potency said:
Yeah but Woz never set out to make money. He was a genuine nerd that loved to tinker and wanted to create cool shit. He's only rich and famous because of the other Steve.

He's basically saying to focus on building a better mousetrap, which he did, instead of building the most profitable mousetrap.
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The other Steve wouldn't have amounted to anything without Woz...
 
prime2515102 said:
Great things come from love of the pursuit of creating them. Then they become cash machines. Such is the way of capitalism...
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They only pursue things that they see as a potential cash-machine.It's not that they can spend R&D money on anything and then see how it can be turned into a cash machine.

And if you expect them to do anything differently you're not realistic.
 
Money is everything, anyone who says otherwise is a damn fool.

Times have changed too much, when Apple was founded in a garage you could afford a suburban house with not much more than a job than anyone with a high school education had that was a step above fast food worker, now you need a 6 figure salary just to afford the mortgage on a major reno/"fixer upper" in the same area. Unless you're lucky enough to have mom & dad who had a house there pre-boom and they let you live in their basement/garage, there are no more garage miracles that are going to happen in this area ever again.
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It goes a little deeper than this, but this is a great statement. You could do things in the 60's-80's that you can't do now. Now, in order to get an apartment you have to have first and last months rent and a cosigner for the lease. Back in the day you could just rent it on good faith you will pay your rent, people actually gave young people a chance.

Now we have entry level jobs advertised and then they ask for 1-2 years experience... WTF it says entry level?

Bottom line we blame millenial's for "wanting it now" when in reality the boomers and gen-y has leverage the economy based on the fact that parents will help their kids. It is catch twenty two. 35 years ago you could walk out of your parents home with nothing and make it. Now you go straight to homeless unless your parents help out, then when parents help out we blame them for "giving their kids everything on a silver spoon".

All while shipping very good jobs overseas (blue collar). You don't fight poverty with government handouts, you do it by empowering your youth to do things like Woz and Jobs did.

I could ramble on, but hopefully I made sense.
 
As an engineer, I'm pretty doggone concerned about making money. On the other hand, that's not really what the article was about.
 
It's what funds the engineers. The engineers/scientists are usually about what awesome stuff they can create. Yes, they want paid for their work. But, it's not the main motivator.

They want to create the best thing they can and make money from it. Not create a cost effective, mediocre design and maximize profit but releasing small steps to where they could have been initially... Only people I know that want to do just a mediocre job are lazy people...


Mike89 said:
Silicon Valley Cares too much about money? Wonder if he's including his beloved Apple who are the biggest offenders. It's what makes the world go around, profit, profit, profit.
Click to expand...
 
That's probably because everything is overpriced in California due to high taxes and overregulation. People who care about money and have skill at making it are the only ones who can afford to live there now. No surprise, really. I suspect the innovators with less cash will probably appear in other regions now. The computer/tech industry is also fairly mature now, not sure whether that's where most future innovation will occur.
 
amenard said:
The other Steve wouldn't have amounted to anything without Woz...
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Maybe, but Jobs did have a gift for business acumen and probably would've found success some other way. He had a great track record as a CEO of more than just Apple. But I was countering the other dude's argument though that Woz's comments had a political slant to them, when history shows that he's preaching what he's practiced since day 1.
 
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