Steve Jobs doesn't like golf

[nevets88]

The Fortune article (not online) says he uses conference sites with no golf courses.

Interesting. I'd still work for Apple if they'd hire me. Where there's corporate meetups, there's usually a golf course within a drivable (by car) distance.

I dunno what it is about Silicon Valley, most tech folks don't like golf (Page, Brin, Zuckerberg, etc...) Probably too time consuming?

[Tomboys]

Buffet and Gates love golf, so to each their own.

[Kieran123]

I can;t imagine Steve Jobs swinging a club.

He isn't really a guy a lot of people get along with....( most of those 'higher ups' at Apple aren't....the ones I've met anyway )

If he started liking golf he'd invent some proprietary silver or white club, that only works with Apple balls and cost twice as much as any other brand, but it is of the same quality. And you wouldn't be able to change the shaft out of it either for any shaft, only Apple branded. And grips would be the same.

[Harmonious]

Originally Posted by Tomboys

Buffet and Gates love golf, so to each their own.

Amusing story: My son worked as a cart boy at a country club in Seattle where Gates was a member.  He told me that, one night, Gates was finishing up his round and dropped his golf cart and bag off at the cart return (they have bag storage) and walked down to the parking lot.  When my son went to take the bag, he found Gates' credit card still in the cart.  He had to run down to the parking to return it. Unfortunately for my son, tipping at the club was forbidden, as I'm sure old Bill was pretty glad to get the card back before thousand of dollars was run up on it.

Wonder what the credit limit was on the card?

[nevets88]

I can't imagine Jobs playing golf either, but if you want to take the Apple analogy further, yeah, Apple golf clubs would be more expensive and white but they would make hitting the ball easier compared to other clubs.

[Harmonious]

Wonder if they have a hackeysack area at Jobs' hotels?

[Clambake]

Many of the Valley entrepreneurs like those you mention (Page, Brin, Jobs, Zuckerberg, etc) were more the workaholic types staying indoors writing code all the time - I don't think outdoor sports requiring a bit of outgoing social skills really fit their personality.     But it would be funny as hell seeing Zuckerberg trying to deal with golf etiquette!

That was a funny story about Gates' credit card.     I wonder how often he actually pulls it out to pay for something.

I also had a funny Gates story on the course.    I was playing as a guest of a member at Del Mar CC here in the San Diego area, a course that is almost empty most of the time.   As we were zipping around the course, we came up on a twosome playing fairly slowly, especially on the greens.    We came up to them on a tee and politely asked if they minded if we played through, and they both said "sure, we'd be delighted" as they waved us by.     Only after driving past them and turning to say thanks did we notice it was Gates and Buffett out together.    They had been playing so deliberately on the greens that we assumed they had a good bet going on, but knowing those two it was probably only a buck a hole.

[Kieran123]

Originally Posted by nevets88

I can't imagine Jobs playing golf either, but if you want to take the Apple analogy further, yeah, Apple golf clubs would be more expensive and white but they would make hitting the ball easier compared to other clubs.

Unless you want to use a common ball, which wouldn't be compatible.....neither would common tees, or gloves. Oh...and it would be a generation behind at launch

It would look nice though...

[nevets88]

Trying to imagine MZ in hoodie and sandals playing golf. I read the Google founders don't like the time consumed by golf. I didn't notice many golfers when I visit. Lots of hiking, cycling.

[jamo]

He's never struck me as being much of an athlete at all. Can't say I could imagine even jogging. Then again, most of the times we've seen him recently he hasn't been doing so good.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Kieran123

Unless you want to use a common ball, which wouldn't be compatible.....neither would common tees, or gloves. Oh...and it would be a generation behind at launch

It would look nice though...

Says the guy that works for RIM... ;-)

Macs have been running Unix for looooong time, and in many ways, are one of the most open platforms around. Deal.

[Roblar]

...Of course, no one using Apple clubs would ever get the yips...

Originally Posted by Kieran123

Unless you want to use a common ball, which wouldn't be compatible.....neither would common tees, or gloves. Oh...and it would be a generation behind at launch

It would look nice though...

[Mattplusness]

You mean you wonder IF there was a limit

Originally Posted by Harmonious

Amusing story: My son worked as a cart boy at a country club in Seattle where Gates was a member.  He told me that, one night, Gates was finishing up his round and dropped his golf cart and bag off at the cart return (they have bag storage) and walked down to the parking lot.  When my son went to take the bag, he found Gates' credit card still in the cart.  He had to run down to the parking to return it. Unfortunately for my son, tipping at the club was forbidden, as I'm sure old Bill was pretty glad to get the card back before thousand of dollars was run up on it.

Wonder what the credit limit was on the card?

[nevets88]

When I think of SV, Buffett and Gates don't come to mind. Gates Seattle, Buffett Oklahoma. I would guess the rule is for exec types, is a high percentage of geeks golfers? In my experience, no. Not the best place for golf, despite the great weather. And Sun CEO McNealy is a Flogton proponent.

[Kieran123]

Originally Posted by iacas

Says the guy that works for RIM... ;-)

Macs have been running Unix for looooong time, and in many ways, are one of the most open platforms around. Deal.

The kernel XNU ( Darwin ) is open source; the user interface and all the applications that the OS comes with are not.

I have no problem with OSX. I have a problem with their hardware quality/restrictions

[BostonSully]

Originally Posted by Kieran123

I can;t imagine Steve Jobs swinging a club.

He isn't really a guy a lot of people get along with....( most of those 'higher ups' at Apple aren't....the ones I've met anyway )

If he started liking golf he'd invent some proprietary silver or white club, that only works with Apple balls and cost twice as much as any other brand, but it is of the same quality. And you wouldn't be able to change the shaft out of it either for any shaft, only Apple branded. And grips would be the same.

Hahaha too true. To me my computers are like hotrods to a gear head. My GF swears by apple and I feel physical pain shopping with her for that junk, oh yeah 3,000$ nice its got 1/3rd the power of mine for 4x the price sweet deal....

[JJack]

I think there's a split in the business community: the old line companies/firms still do a lot of business on the course, but the "new economy"-type jobs frown on the time consumed and seem anti-golf.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Kieran123

The kernel XNU ( Darwin ) is open source; the user interface and all the applications that the OS comes with are not.

I didn't say otherwise. :-) Of course the UI isn't open.

And "all the applications" is a bit misleading. Apple's done a lot to share key parts of applications like WebKit, for example. It's not the whole "Safari" but it's been a huge deal for certain groups.

Originally Posted by Kieran123

I have no problem with OSX. I have a problem with their hardware quality/restrictions

Quality is high. Various customer satisfaction surveys, reviews, etc. bear that out. Is it the highest? Nope. Is it higher than virtually every other pre-built computer? Yep. Better than one you can build yourself? Nope.

And Apple feels that controlling "the whole widget" is the way to go. I'd tend to agree that their approach works really well. Look at the Android market - some OSes won't work on some phones, some apps or games play like crap or crash on certain kinds of phones, etc. Windows has always been a hellish mess of device drivers and so on. Apple is able to popularize things like USB because of this approach. The new connectivity thing (Thunderbolt) will likely follow a similar route.

For the small percentage of folks who enjoy building computers, good for them. I'm glad they enjoy it. The rest of just want to get work done, or play, or enjoy our computers, and I think Macs excel at that.

I have no grudge against PCs. They're cheaper (in more ways than one) in my opinion and they're great computers for a lot of people. Some people seem to really hate Apple, though, and by extension, the people who like Apple. I never understood that (nor am I saying you're one of those people...).

I know where this will go, so I'll save us the time: we'll agree to disagree, and get back to talking about golf. ;-) Cheers!