DizBiz: The iSteve and The Mouse

First published January 22, 2003

By C. W. Oberleitner

What do Disneyland and MacWorld San Francisco have in common? A heck of a lot more than you might think.

Ever since it first burst upon the scene in San Francisco's Moscone Convention Center, MacWorld has been called Disneyland for Mac fanatics. It's an annual four-day E-ticket ride for owners and vendors of all things even remotely related to Apple Computer Inc.'s little computer that could.

Waiting in line for admittance to the keynote speech that starts each MacWorld is like waiting for rope drop on Disneyland's Main Street. At 7:30 A.M., Tuesday January 7, Roger Colton and I found ourselves behind a rope, outside Moscone Center's Grand Ballroom. And, just like Main Street's rope drop, the second the rope went down we found ourselves in a stampede. This rush was not to be first in line for Indiana Jones or Space Mountain, but rather to get a good seat for the hottest ticket in town that day; a MacWorld keynote address delivered by Apple Computer, Inc.'s CEO, Steve Jobs.

Once inside the cavernous ballroom the similarities between the real Disneyland and the MacWorld version don't end there. After we had been ushered to the "Media" section a series of announcements were made.

"Ladies and gentlemen. As we are expecting an overflow crowd for this morning's address, would you please move all the way to the end of the aisles and fill in all the seats."

Just like the theatre shows in the parks, the Apple folks move us to the ends of the aisles and start a mass grumbling about the people who stop dead center in the aisles to grab the best seats. This forces everyone else to climb over these squatters and their computer bags. Of course, the folks stumbling over the people in the center seats are carrying bags of their own. The whole maneuver resembles a fire drill on a fully loaded 747 that's still in flight.

Bending Reality

Finally, the lights go down and a hush falls over the crowd. Even the hard-bitten journalists that surround us begin to crane their necks for a first look at the iSteve, as some Mac aficionados have taken to calling Apple's CEO, Steve Jobs. For it is Steve Jobs, more than any new product announcement, that everyone in the room has come to see. We all are waiting for the opportunity to experience first hand that phenomenon that is known as The Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field.

American history has a legacy of master showmen. The nineteenth century had P.T. Barnum. The twentieth century had Walt Disney and the twenty-first century has Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs is Apple's No. 1 salesman and is as much a symbol of the company as its trademark's once bitten apple logo. He doesn't make new product announcements so much as he enthralls an audience. For the next two-plus hours he will completely engage our attention.

Clad in his trademark jeans and black turtleneck pullover--several journalists speculate he has closets full of these things--he strides back and forth across the ballroom stage keeping his audience hanging on his every word. And just what is it he's talking about? Three software upgrades, one new software application, and two new laptop computers. Not exactly the kind of stuff that you would expect rousing applause for, but that is exactly what Jobs receives with each and every announcement.

The only unexpected silence in the audience comes when he thanks Microsoft, along with several other software manufacturers, for their support of Apple's latest UNIX-based operating system OS X.

When most Disney fans think of Steve Jobs, they tend to think more of Pixar Animation Studios, of which Jobs is also CEO. After all, it is Pixar that has for several years produced some of The Walt Disney Company's biggest animated film successes. Films such as Toy Story, Toy Story II, A Bug's Life, and last year's Monsters Inc. have all been extremely profitable for both Pixar and the WDC. It is, however, more his skills at running Apple and Pixar, along with his ability to captivate audiences during his keynote addresses that invites comparison between Steve Jobs and Walt Disney.

Walt Disney acknowledged that he was not a great artist or animator. It has been observed that Steve Jobs is not an outstanding computer engineer. Yet both of these men came to head highly respected businesses in the fields of animated films and personal computer production, respectively.

Walt Disney is best remembered as "kindly old Uncle Walt" who, for years, we invited into our homes via the Disneyland and Wonderful World of Color television shows. And on stage at MacWorld, Jobs is every bit as engaging and charming as Disney ever was. Both men, however, are much more complex individuals.

Walt Disney was famous for demanding the impossible from his staff, and he wasn't known to suffer fools gladly. Decades after his death, stories about artists and animators being reduced by a withering glance from beneath an arched Disney eyebrow still abound. At the same time, virtually everyone who ever worked for him credits Disney with bringing out skills and ideas they never dreamed they possessed.

While the term most often used to describe Steve Jobs' overall persona, mercurial, is rarely if ever used to describe Disney, both men still have a great deal in common in terms of heading companies that are very well known for imaginative new products. Steve Jobs is not known to suffer fools gladly anymore than Disney. However, like Disney he has managed to attract and keep highly-skilled and gifted people at both Apple and Pixar, in turn positioning both of these organizations as innovative leaders in their fields.

Both men are known for inspiring--one way or another--those around them to achieve great things, often beyond their belief in their own capabilities. Both have inspired great loyalty not only among their workers but also in terms of a large avid loyal customer following. Beyond that, however, they are both visionaries and master storytellers. Disney had and Jobs has a way of envisioning the future and communicating that vision in a way that compels those around them to want to go along for the journey.

Drudging up Rumors

Way back in 1999, when Steve Jobs was returning to a troubled Apple Computer, Michael Eisner wasn't "embattled," and things were fairly cordial between Pixar and The Walt Disney Company, a rumor began to circulate in some fairly respectable publications.

Just prior to MacWorld, the front page of The San Francisco Examiner ran a story about an "unconfirmed" report that suggested that Michael Eisner was engaged in talks that would result in the Disney Company acquiring Pixar Animation Studios. The purchase would only take place after Pixar completed the purchase of Apple Computer. The story went on to say that Steve Jobs would then move on to the number two position at Disney to become Eisner's heir apparent.

Over the course of the next several years, despite the ongoing pooh-poohing and denials by executives of all three companies, the story would surface from time to time in several other well-respected publications. It appears to have finally ended its life cycle on the Internet-based Drudge Report. And, given the current state of relations between Pixar and The Walt Disney Company, the story probably has about as much chance of coming true as Atlantis and Treasure Planet have of becoming Disney Studios all time box-office champs. But maybe that isn't such a good thing.

Steve Jobs is on record saying that, as far as Pixar is concerned, he wants to make movies in the 21^st century that will become to future generations what Snow White, Bambi, and Pinocchio were to the generations of the 20^th century. And given the team he has assembled and the path he's placed Pixar on, it seems clear that he, like Walt Disney, posses the vision to do this.

Through his MacWorld keynote addresses, Jobs has articulated his vision of a digital future that we all will live in. You only have to look at the phenomenal success of Apple's Internet-ready, multipurpose iPod to realize that he really seems to be on to something. And, through the marriage of great traditional storytelling and an appreciation of what whiz-bang technology can do for it, he truly appears to be worthy of consideration to head the company that bares Disney's name.

For the second time since Walt's death in 1966, the WDC--blessed as it is with universal brand recognition and product acceptance--finds itself struggling to restore both investor and consumer confidence. The company's greatest successes appear to come from divisions and partnerships that are furthest removed from its corporate headquarters in Burbank, Ca.

Pixar, located in Emeryville in Northern California, and Miramax in New York have produced many of the company's recent box office successes. Tokyo DisneySeas, developed with and operated by The Oriental Land Company, thrives while WDC's own Disney's California Adventure struggles to attract guests. Even last year's very successful animated release of Lilo and Stitch--while technically an in-house production--appears to have benefited by being produced thousands of miles away from Burbank at the company's Florida animation studios.

Walt Disney was praised for being a visionary and a dreamer. Virtually all of his success has been credited to his capacity for making his dreams and visions come true. Over the course of the past several years, the current management of The Walt Disney Company has been accused of many things‑‑being visionary is not one of them. Perhaps it is time to drag that old rumor out of moth balls and imagine what a 21^st century Walt Disney Company might look like through the Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field.

Epilogue

Roger and I successfully made it through both Steve's keynote and the technological Disneyland that is MacWorld. We each received a free copy of Apple's new presentation production software Keynote, and neither of us succumbed to the desire to buy a new computer. In my case, that's only because Apple won't have its sleek new aluminum-clad PowerBook with its largest-ever 17" LCD screen available for pickup until next month. Jim, I need a raise.

C'ya real soon!