6 அக்டோபர், 2011 - தொழில்நுட்ப முன்னோடி ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸ் மறைந்தார்
உலகின் பிரபல கணினித் தொழில்நுட்ப நிறுவனங்களில் ஒன்றான, ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனத்தை கூட்டாக உருவாக்கியவர்களில் ஒருவரான, ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸ் , காலமானர். நீண்ட காலமாக , புற்று நோயால் அவதிப்பட்டுவந்த, ஜாப்ஸ், நேற்று இரவு காலமானதாக ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனம் அறிவித்தது. அவருக்கு வயது 56. உடல் நலக்குறைவு காரணமாக அவர் கடந்த ஆகஸ்டு மாதம்தான், ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனத்தின் தலைமை நிர்வாகி பதவியிலிருந்து விலகியிருந்தார். ஆப்பிள் மேக் கணினி,ஐ-பாட், ஐ-போன், ஐ-பேட் போன்ற நுட்பமான தொழில்நுட்பங்களைக் கொண்ட கருவிகளை ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனம் உருவாக்கிய முயற்சிகளுக்கு அவர் தலைமைத்துவம் முக்கியமானதாக இருந்தது.

 ஜாப்ஸின் அறிவு, உற்சாகம் மற்றும் தொழிலில் அவர் காட்டிய ஆர்வம் ஆகியவைதான், இந்த நிறுவனத்தின் புதிய கண்டுபிடிப்புகளுக்கு உந்துதலாக அமைந்தன என்று , ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனம் கூறியது.

ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸின் மரணம் குறித்து உலகத்தலைவர்களும், ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனப் பொருட்களை உபயோகிப்போர்களும் தங்களது அஞ்ச்லியைத் தெரிவித்துள்ளனர். ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸ் நமது வாழ்க்கையை மாற்றியவர், ஒட்டுமொத்தமாக பல தொழிலக்ளுக்கு புது அர்த்தம் தந்தவர் என்று தமது அஞ்சலியில் அமெரிக்க அதிபர் ஒபாமா குறிப்பிட்டார். அவரது மரணம் குறித்து அவர் கண்டுபிடித்த கருவியிலேயே உலகில் பெரும்பாலோனோர் தெரிந்து கொண்டனர் என்பதைவிட அவருக்கு பெரிய அஞ்சலி எதுவும் இருக்க முடியாது என்றும் ஒபாமா கூறினார்.

ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸின் மரணம் குறித்து பேஸ்புக், ட்விட்டர் போன்ற சமூக இணைய தளங்களில் அஞ்சலிக் குறிப்புகள் குவிந்த வண்ணம் உள்ளன. சீனவில் ட்விட்டருக்கு இணையான சமூக இணைய தளம் ஒன்றில், அவரது மரணம் குறித்து 5 கோடிக்கும் மேலான அஞ்சலிக் குறிப்புகள் பதியப்பட்டுள்ள்ன. அது போல, ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனத்தின் வளர்ச்சியை அவதானித்துக்கொண்டிருந்த, போட்டி நிறுவனங்களில் தலைவர்கள் மற்றும் தொழில்துறை சகாக்களிடமிருந்தும் அஞ்சலிகள் வந்திருக்கின்றன.

மைக்ரோசாப்ட் நிறுவனத்தை நிறுவியர்களில் ஒருவரான, பில் கேட்ஸ், ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸ் செலுத்திய தாக்க்ததைப் போல உலகில் வேறொருவரைக் காண்பது அபூர்வம் என்றார்.

பேஸ் புக் இணைய தளத்தின் நிறுவனரான, மார்க் ஸுக்கர்பெர்க், தனது பேஸ் புக் பக்கத்தில், ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸை தனது ந்ண்பர் மற்றும் ஆலோசகர் என்று குறிப்பிட்டு, " நாம் ஒன்றை உருவாக்குவதன் மூலம் உலகை மாற்ற முடியும்ென்று காட்டியதற்கு நன்றி" என்று கூறியிருக்கிறார்.

ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸை, தாமஸ் ஆல்வா எடிசன் மற்றும் ஐன்ஸ்டீனோடு ஒப்பிட்டு புகழஞ்சலி செலுத்தினார் நியூ யார்க் மேயர் மைக்கேல் புளூம்பர்க்.

சிக்கலான தொழில்நுட்பத்தை பாமரனும் பயன்படுத்தச் செய்தவர் ஸ்டீவ் ஜாப்ஸ் என்று ஆப்பிள் கணினியில் தமிழ் எழுத்துக்களை உள்ளீடு செய்த மென்பொருள் வல்லுநர் முத்து நெடுமாறன் தமிழோசையிடம் தெரிவித்தார்

http://www.bbc.co.uk/tamil/global/2011/10/111006_stevejobsobit.shtml

CBS News: Apple co-founder Steve Jobs dead at 56  ByTom Krazit .64 Comments

(CNET)  Apple co-founder and Chairman Steve Jobs died today. He was 56.

Jobs had been suffering from various health issues following the seven-year anniversary of his surgery for a rare form of pancreatic cancer in August

2004. Apple announced in January that he would be taking an indeterminate medical leave of absence. Jobs then stepped down as chief executive in late

August, citing his inability to "meet my duties and expectations" stemming from his illness.

In a statement, Apple said paid tribute to its one-time leader as " a visionary and creative genius" adding that the world had "lost an amazing human being."

"Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple," the company statement said.

Jobs "died peacefully today surrounded by his family," the family said in a statement, which went on to thank the "many people who have shared their wishes and prayers during the last year of Steve's illness" and promise a website for those who wish to offer tributes and memories. But tributes and memories were already flowing in from political leaders, titans of Silicon Valley industry, and from ordinary Americans. In San Francisco, people had already begun to place tributes to Jobs on stick-it notes on the main Apple store's windows.

California Gov. Jerry Brown mourned the loss of "a California innovator who demonstrated what a totally independent and creative mind can accomplish."Recalling his interactions with Jobs over three decades as "colleagues, competitors and friends," Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said "the world rarely sees someone who has had the profound impact Steve has had, the effects of which will be felt for many generations to come. For those of us lucky enough to get to work with him, it's been an insanely great honor. I will miss Steve immensely. "

Jobs had undergone a liver transplant in April 2009 during an earlier planned six-month leave of absence. He returned to work for a year and a half before his health forced him to take more time off. He told his employees in August, "I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple's CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come."

One of the most legendary businessmen in American history, Jobs turned three separate industries on their head in the 35 years he was involved in the technology industry.

Personal computing was invented with the launch of the Apple II in 1977. Legal digital music recordings were brought into the mainstream with the iPod and iTunes in the early 2000s, and mobile phones were never the same after the 2007 debut of the iPhone. Jobs played an instrumental role in the development  of all three, and managed to find time to transform the art of computer-generated movie-making on the side.

The invention of the iPad in 2010, a touch-screen tablet computer his competitors flocked to reproduce, was the capstone of his career as a technologist. A conceptual hybrid of a touch-screen iPod and a slate computer, the 10-inch mobile device was Jobs' vision for a more personal computing device.

Jobs was considered brilliant yet brash. He valued elegance in design yet was almost never seen in public wearing anything but a black mock turtleneck, blue jeans, and a few days worth of stubble. A master salesman who considered himself an artist at heart, Jobs inspired both reverence and fear in those who worked for him and against him, and was adored by an army of loyal Apple customers who almost saw him as superhuman.

Jobs was born in San Francisco in 1955 to young parents who gave him up for adoption. Paul and Clara Jobs gave him his name, and moved out of the city in 1960 to the Santa Clara Valley, later to be known as Silicon Valley. Jobs grew up in Mountain View and Cupertino, where Apple's headquarters is located.

He attended Reed College in Oregon for a year but dropped out, although he sat in on some classes that interested him, such as calligraphy. After a brief stint at Atari working on video games, he spent time backpacking around India, furthering teenage experiments with psychedelic drugs and developing an interest in Buddhism, all of which would shape his work at Apple.

Back in California, Jobs' friend Steve Wozniak was learning the skills that would change both their lives. When Jobs discovered that Wozniak had been assembling relatively (for the time) small computers, he struck a partnership, and Apple Computer was founded in 1976 in the usual Silicon Valley fashion: setting up shop in the garage of one of the founder's parents.

Wozniak handled the technical end, creating the Apple I, while Jobs ran sales and distribution. The company sold a few hundred Apple Is, but found much greater success with the Apple II, which put the company on the map and is largely credited as having proven that regular people wanted computers.

It also made Jobs and Wozniak rich. Apple went public in 1980, and Jobs was well on his way to becoming one of the first tech industry celebrities, earning a reputation for brilliance, arrogance, and the sheer force of his will and persuasion, often jokingly referred to as his "reality-distortion field."

The debut of the Macintosh in 1984 left no doubt that Apple was a serious player in the computer industry, but Jobs only had a little more than a year left at the company he founded when the Mac was released in January 1984.

By 1985 Apple CEO John Sculley--who Jobs had convinced to leave Pepsi in 1983 and run Apple with the legendary line, "Do you want to spend the rest of  your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?"--had developed his own ideas for the future of the company, and they differed from Jobs'. He removed Jobs from his position leading the Macintosh team, and Apple's board backed Sculley.

Jobs resigned from the company, later telling an audience of Stanford University graduates "what had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating." He would get the last laugh.

He went on to found NeXT, which set about making the next computer in Jobs' eyes. NeXT was never the commercial success that Apple was, but during those years, Jobs found three things that would help him architect his return.

The first was Pixar. Jobs snapped up the graphic-arts division of Lucasfilm in 1986, which would go on to produce "Toy Story" in 1995 and set the standard for computer-graphics films. After making a fortune from Pixar's IPO in 1995, Jobs eventually sold the company to Disney in 2006.

The second was object-oriented software development. NeXT chose this development model for its software operating systems, and it proved to be more advanced and more nimble than the operating system developments Apple was working on without Jobs.

The third was Laurene Powell, a Stanford MBA student who attended a talk on entrepreneurialism given by Jobs in 1989 at the university. The two wed in 1991 and eventually had three children; Reed, born in 1991, Erin, born in 1995, and Eve, born in 1998. Jobs has another daughter, Lisa, who was born 1978, but Jobs refused to acknowledge he was her father for the first few years of her life, eventually reconciling with Lisa and her mother, his high-school girlfriend Chris-Ann Brennan.

Jobs returned to Apple in 1996, having convinced then-CEO Gil Amelio to adopt NeXTStep as the future of Apple's operating system development. Apple was in a shambles at the time, losing money, market share, and key employees.

By 1997, Jobs was once again in charge of Apple. He immediately brought buzz back to the company, which pared down and reacquired a penchant for showstoppers, such as the 1998 introduction of the iMac; perhaps the first "Stevenote." His presentation skills at events such as Macworld would become legendary examples of showmanship and star power in the tech industry.

Jobs also set the company on the path to becoming a consumer-electronics powerhouse, creating and improving products such as the iPod, iTunes, and later, the iPhone and iPad. Apple is the most valuable technology company in the world, and has a market capitalization second to only ExxonMobil, which Apple surpassed multiple times this past August.

He did so in his own fashion, imposing his ideas and beliefs on his employees and their products in ways that left many a career in tatters. Jobs enforced a culture of secrecy at Apple and was an extremely demanding leader, terrorizing Apple employees when he returned to the company in the late 1990s with summary firings if he didn't like the answers they gave when questioned.

Jobs was an intensely private person. That quality put him and Apple at odds with government regulators and stockholders who demanded to know details about his ongoing health problems and his prognosis as the leader and alter ego of his company. It spurred a 2009 SEC probe into whether Apple's board had made misleading statements about his health.

In the years before he fell ill in 2008, Jobs seemed to soften a bit, perhaps due to his bout with a rare form of pancreatic cancer in 2004. In 2005, his remarks to Stanford graduates included this line: "Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything--all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure--these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important."

Later, in 2007, he appeared onstage at the D: All Things Digital conference for a lengthy interview with bitter rival Bill Gates, exchanging mutual praise and prophetically quoting the Beatles: "You and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead."

Jobs leaves behind his wife, four children, two sisters, and 49,000 Apple employees.

CNET's Josh Lowensohn and Erica Ogg contributed to this report.

Courtesy: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/05/tech/main20116338.shtml?tag=nl.e879