The Smithsonian's interview with Steve Jobs

While I personally think next year's keynote will have Steve announcing his retirement (having climbed about every mountain around), it's important to understand that SJ has led multiple lives already. College dropout, seeker of truths, dad, entrepreneur, tycoon, Pixar CEO, NeXT founder, etc. And then he came back to the company he started and got fired from. Pretty wild ride, and after steering Apple into the great consumer device future it was destined for (remember how computers were supposed to be in our kitchens?), it's only logical that Steve will follow Bill's act and bow out gracefully... Of course, I could be wrong.

But while you wrap your head around my completely unsubstantiated rumor-mongering, let's take a moment to reflect back on the Steve that was. In this 1995 interview for the Smithsonian's "Oral and Video Histories" series, Jobs waxes poetic on his youth, computing, Apple, and what was, at the time, his big new thing, NeXT computer. It's a little shocking to hear him talk about how NeXT shouldn't have made the whole widget, as he'd done with the Macintosh. Especially given his recent return to the "one widget" philosophy...