Steve Wozniak 3485

At first I had began brainstorming trying to think of a subject for this paper.

I had heard Mr. Perry speak of Apple computer and of Steve jobs. His rise topower and his fall from grace then his rebirth, like the phoenix from in mythsand legends rising from his own ashes. However I didn’t know much about thesubject. So I decided on the subject of Apple computers. Then the more Iresearched I found a more interesting subject.

In the next few pages I am goingto attempt to do justice of the accomplishments of Steve Wozniak. No not theother Steve, I found Steve Wozniak a more interesting person simply because Ihad never heard of the man. I never new he existed. Being of lesser knowledgethan most on the subject of computers I found it fascinating. The way SteveWozniak did things. Steve Wozniak was born in 1950.

A baby boomer he grew up insuburban Santa Clara Valley, California with his parents and siblings. Hisfather was an engineer for Lockheed and his mother was the president of aRepublican Women’s Club. He was into electronics heavily even as a child andyoung teenager. While looking at a magazine article he spotted a diagram for asimple calculator called the One-Bit-Adder-Subtractor.

Woz, as his friendscalled him, dissected the plans and made improvements. In Cupertino Science Fairhe took home first prize with the Ten Bit Parallel Adder Subtractor. It was hisfirst attempt at building a computer. This would be the beginning of a greatlearning era it would seem. In junior high he had already taught himself how todesign programs in computer languages. At homestead high school he absorbedeverything he could about electronics and physics.

He fare outreached hiscounter parts in class. After he graduated he went on to the University ofColorado but flunked out. You see he was bored with school because he was sointelligent. At least that is what he tells everyone. Returning to Californiathe Woz still was interested in computers even after his fall from college life.One of his early interests was the Altair 8800.

It was costly when it came outso he and a friend began research on it. In the garage of a neighbor SteveWozniak created what would be called the cream soda computer. Named that afterall the cream soda he drank while building it. While building it he met a mannamed Steve Jobs.

Although the computer went up in smoke during a test the basicgroundwork was laid for a machine that would change the world was set and afriendship that would turn into a new industry. After the introduction of theAltair an organization sprang up of hobbyist and amateurs. It was the HomebrewComputer Club and of course Steve Wozniak went to the meetings and rarely ifever missed one of them. It seemed the Altair used a costly microprocessor, theIntel 8080, to do its thinking.

Since Woz couldn’t afford the 179 dollars perchip he jumped at the offer Hewlett Packard offered its employees. At asubstantial discount he could buy the Motorola 6800 microprocessor. He didexperiments with it and like all computer parts the prices dropped. Then hemoved on to the 6502 Microprocessor by MOS Technologies. The MOS chip sold foronly 25 dollars this appealed to Woz because of the price per function.

Plus hethought all this computer stuff could be done on very few chips and parts makingit appealing to the everyday person. On April fools day in 1976 three men signedan agreement to form a computer company. After a little haggling a name waschosen for both the company and the computer. On 1300 dollars, which came fromthe selling of a VW van and a programmable calculator the three men would startan industry. They would call it Apple Computer and the first product would becalled the Apple I. The three would soon become two you see Ron Wayne would sellout for only 800 dollars never getting the ten- percent of the millions to come.

Surely he spent several nights tossing and turning at the thought of it. Thepecking order was Jobs was the go-getter. The person who made the deals, beggedfor orders, and got the parts. Woz didn’t care about anything as long as hegot to be the engineer.

The lack of interest in the business side of Applecomputer along with the cutthroat attitude of Jobs would be his demise at Applecomputer. That is ten years and millions of dollars into the future. Firsthowever is the rise to greatness. The Apple I had lots of problems most being inthe area of use. It was not very user friendly.

It didn’t even have a case atthe point of creation. You had to be a wizard to even unlock its potential.However that was what it had and a retailer by the name of Paul Terrell ordered50 apple I computers for his stores at the wholesale price of 589 dollars. Toget attention it was decided that he would sell them for 666.66 dollars. Thatwas another example of the Steve Jobs affect.

The next invention of the greatWoz was the Apple II. It had several improvements like the 4k of memory. It useda not included TV set as the monitor. It would become the first truly massproduced personal computer in history. Steve loved working on the Apple II itwas his baby and by 1977 he had built something very special. Big business beganto get in the way on the great things he was doing.

In 1980 Apple Computer wentpublic for 22 dollars a share. It was worth at that time 117 million dollars.Three years later it was valued at 985 million. Steve Wozniak after being acollege dropout and a complete electronic nerd was now worth 135.

6 milliondollars. That was only about 7 percent of the company. Jobs was worth at thetime 235 million dollars, and several others had there forks in Apple’s pie.Even Woz’s first wife got some stock in a divorce settlement years earlier wasnow worth 42 million dollars.

After all the money was made other problems beganto arise. The money gave Woz a new avenue to do things he had always wanted likeown planes and fly them. Being the easy go lucky guy he was his money was spreadto the family and his friends. He even sponsored a concert tour and lostmillions. In 1981 he had a plane crash and had to take some time to recover.

Upon his return two years later he would find a new toy at Apple the Macintosh,which was Jobs new baby. It competed with the Apple II line which was the bestselling computer in the entire history of the world. Also the Apple II got norespect and it was what started the company and was the breadwinner. In betweenwas a failure called the Apple III. Even though Woz had laid the groundwork forthe company he was being tossed away like an old toy. Finally after becomingdisgusted with the company he just stopped coming to work, sold his 7 percentand moved onto other things.

Now he spend his days trying to stimulate 8thgraders minds as a schoolteacher in California and enjoying his 6 children. Inconclusion Steve Wozniak was a special individual who had a vision and went forit and made it happen. It wasn’t money or power it was the search for aneasier way to do things that no one else would do. In this paper the emphasishas been put on Steve Wozniak.

This was done because I feel he has never had hisfare share of the glory. Like I said earlier I had never heard of the man whoshould be known as the father of the personal computer. Apple computer neededSteve Wozniak but it also needed Steve Jobs. Without either of them AppleComputer would have failed or not even been created. Without Jobs the wonderfulmachine Woz created would never had made it out of the garage. Without Woz, Jobswould just be a jealous dreamer.

When the company was first starting the CEO atthe time began giving out employee numbers and since engineers are moreimportant than businessmen Steve Wozniak became Apple Computer employee numberone. Which also drove Jobs crazy. Jobs even requested being employee numberzero. Really all this was pretty good for a college drop out and a man thatbarely graduated high school.