THE INTENSELY private Steve Jobs would be deeply embarrased by the public outpourings of grief following his death.
The 56-year-old founder and chairman of Apple had communicated as little information as possible about his health since being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2004. In 2009 he dismissed the illness which caused dramatic weight loss as a hormone imbalance. Later it emerged he had undergone a liver transplant in secret.
Mr Jobs preferred the focus to be on the products that he created and which have had such a profound influence on the world. In the last decade alone he introduced the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. In doing so he revolutionised the music industry, mobile telephones and personal computing – for the second time in his own lifetime.
Mr Jobs, with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, introduced the world to graphical on-screen icons and the computer mouse in the early 1980s with the Macintosh computer. In the ultimate compliment, Microsoft’s Bill Gates copied the Apple innovations for Windows, which went on to dominate the market.
Mr Jobs's inability to compromise led him to depart Apple in 1985. His time away from his first love saw him found Pixar the production house that led a renaissance in animation through films such as Toy Story, Finding Nemoand Cars.
Apple’s products cannot just be dismissed as gadgets. For three decades with Mr Jobs at the helm it has created the benchmark for technology innovation. He led profound changes in how people consume and process information and entertainment.
Mr Jobs had a deep love of design which extended beyond how the products looked to how people used them. A number of Apple products are in the collections of museums including the renowned New York Museum of Modern Art.
He made massive demands on his staff to meet the goals he set them, but was said to be fiercely loyal to those who he felt delivered for the Apple corporation. Staff who he felt lacked loyalty, or talked to the media, were dismissed on the spot.
US president Barack Obama said: “there may be no greater tribute to Steves success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented”.
Mr Jobs would have been pleased with the nature of that tribute.