Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, aka ‘The Woz’, is here in London and doing a little PR to promote the release of his new biography. While we’ve yet to bump into him in the local Borders our neighbours over at The Guardian have published a great interview with him.
Snippets from the interview after the jump...
On starting up Apple…
"There were a lot of little accidents - I can think of at least a dozen - that if any of these things that I had really wanted to happen had happened, there would have been no Apple. Things like moving with my company to Oregon and then my wife didn't want to go: Apple would never have happened if I'd moved. Hewlett Packard turned me down five times."
On running a company vs being an engineer...
"I had decisions earlier in life that I didn't want to be in the big money world. I didn't want to run companies, I didn't want to have companies, but I wanted to design the neatest products possible. And I stuck true to that. I turned down starting Apple at the start and eventually as Apple got successful, no, I wouldn't move out of engineering. As a matter of fact, for me to say yes to Apple was when I realised that I could be an engineer, nothing more."
On the longevity of the iPod…
"Will the iPod always remain that large? Walkmans seemed to come and then go away. I think Apple's making the most out of the lifespan."
On being ripped off by Steve Jobs over the Atari Breakout game…
"I didn't know it at the time, and I didn't know it until 12 years later. And there was no reason for it, but it's a minor issue."
And no, he won’t be buying a Zune.
More on Steve Wozniak and the Breakout rip off at Rotten.com.
Further reading:
'I didn't want to run companies' - The Guardian interview
I think, therefore I Woz - BBC interview
Chris Lake is Director of Product Development at Econsultancy, an entrepreneur and a long-term internet fiend. Follow him on Twitter, Google+ or connect via Linkedin.
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