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After Apple, Jobs didn't sit on his hands, but went on to found two companies - Pixar and NEXT. Pixar alone would have made him famous, again. And, NEXT assured his return to Apple, because of Apple's failure to innovate in early 90s and the need of something, anything to restart its OS line. NEXT and Jobs were their best bets.

Even without Apple Jobs would have accomplished many things. That's just the kind of person he was. So, luck has nothing to do with this.



Just a quibble, but Jobs purchased what became Pixar from George Lucas. Saying that he founded it is a bit of a stretch -- he pretty much just bankrolled it until it finally found its niche with "Toy Story". Alan Deutschman's "The Second Coming of Steve Jobs" draws a sharp contrast between Jobs' roles at the two companies:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Second-Coming-Steve-Jobs/dp/076790...


Luck has everything to do with it.

If Jobs and Woz had been born in Jackson, Mississippi, they would not have known much about phreaking, attended Home Brew Computer club meetings, or known HP employees with disposable income to spend on the Apple I.


This recent submission is quite relevant: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4065233


Luck has everything to do with him returning to Apple, which is what I was talking about.

Yes, he would have been a successful person regardless. Indeed, he was a successful person already. But he was very lucky to be allowed back at Apple.




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