Yesterday, Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, penned an article for us about his journey in the technology world. After that, being the nice guy he is, Woz stayed up until 4am (Jakarta time) answering questions from readers.
Here are some of the best answers from the Woz Q&A:
On people who want to change the world:
Change the world because you want to. Don’t judge it by money success. Don’t expect success from the start. Go as far as you can making it perfect before you share it or seek funding. Have a working model or demonstration before you seek venture money. You could get funded and spend $100K on a video demonstration and then own less of your company and need further funding sooner.
Or you could work hard to make a video for free, in your home (garage), and be that much better at the deal you finally work. And expect that many of your first tries will go nowhere. But they will get you experience toward the big one. You should have a job or live at home so you can work on your own passions on your on time. That implies not being too social or partying. Make good things when you are young and you’ve covered your needs for life.”
On how he feels about the Lumia 900 after living with it:
I think highly of the visual appearance of things on my Lumia 900. It’s not able to be a main phone of mine yet due to limited voice actions (I need and want something like SIRI) and voice dictation. I wouldn’t tell anyone it’s a lousy phone. Microsoft did a lot that does not look anything like other smartphones on the screen and I applaud them.
On the Nexus 7:
I haven’t had time to think about the Nexus 7. With the iPad being such a good value and a smaller one rumored, I’ll hold off. I do like the larger size of my Samsung Note, and I like the size of my Kindle, so there’s some sense to this size in my mind.
On whether he’ll buy a Surface tablet:
No.
On the Steve Jobs biography:
Haven’t had time to read it but I met Walter and his and Steve Jobs’ integrity in writing this book impress me and I expect that I’ll like it and call it accurate.
On whether you can use him as a personal reference for a job at Apple:
You can, but when they call I’ll say I don’t know you. Or worse.
On his favourite college prank:
[I] Built a TV jammer…the only color TV (1968) was in the basement of Libby Hall, a girl’s dorm. I sat there one night and jammed (fuzzed up) the TV. A friend hit the TV and I made it go good. After a few sessions, they started stationing a student right by the TV every night whose job it was to knock and pound and adjust (fine tuning in those days) the TV until it worked. I started making it work depending on what they did and where their bodies were. I got a guy to stand on a chair with the twin-lead antenna in his hand to make it work. One time I got a guy to hold his hand on the TV screen and a foot on a table while he stood on the other foot, to watch the last half of Mission Impossible.
On the future of education:
I think that students should learn what they want to outside of school. In school they will have the same pages as 30 other students every day of the week, and a test on Friday. By 3rd grade many have dropped out of education being important, since a few top students always have the answer first. A better solution to this is to call on students randomly. But so little of what we learn is necessary. Someday we’ll have one teacher per student and the major goal of letting kids learn what they want to at the pace they can learn it, for straight A’s, will be achieved. But our teachers won’t be pure human. Oh, they’ll have to be conscious and feeling but cost less than real humans.
Teachers can only teach what they know. In this digital world, that’s a problem. When I went to school our teachers may have known more than us about everything. But when I taught, students in elementary school knew more about computers and video games than any teacher. Performance in the classroom is only at the expectation level of the teacher. So we need more teacher who are totally into applying the digital tools to every subject in the classroom.
Image: Image: OnInnovation/Flickr