Steve Jobs | “people don’t know what they want”

'Back in the day' in around 1 BI (Before Internet), people used to say “…as you can see…” a lot in demos. Don't ask me why, it's the most ridiculous thing. Of course we can see. Even Steve Jobs says it repeatedly during this demo from his days as CEO of NeXT Computer. But, how many CEOs do you know who could demo their own software? Jobs really knew the ins and outs of how his software could benefit business. It’s hard to imagine now that people got excited about embedded audio-clips in emails or a pair of lips called ‘lip-service’ that you clicked on to play the audio. He spends quite some time in the video playing audio clips in different languages aka ‘padding the demo’. But the detail with which he explains various concepts in the demo is quite revealing, I thought. You wouldn’t normally expect that type of explanation of technical detail from a CEO. It’s possible that enthusiasm for ‘user experience’ not only helped him relate better to customer requirements, but also gave him the insights to actually define the market when he took back control of Apple.

For Apple trivia fans it’s fascinating to get some insights into Steve Jobs from these ‘old’ videos, but to save you time I’ve linked to a few of my favorites clips:
The ‘lips’ clip.
The ‘languages’ clip.
The ‘Inter-application Communication’ clip
The ‘very very simple app’ clip.
The ‘new fax button’ clip.
The ‘pizza’ clip…(“why did I put this on here…”)
The ‘Ferrari on the beach’ clip.

OS X and iOS are direct descendants of NeXTSTEP—the operating system used on the computer in the demo.