#HTE

During the opening of today’s Apple Special Event, there was a clip from Steve Jobs that I hadn’t heard before, about showing appreciation for life:

THERE’S LOTS OF WAYS TO BE, as a person. And some people express their deep appreciation in different ways. But one of the ways that I believe people express their appreciation to the rest of humanity is to make something wonderful and put it out there.

You never meet the people, you never shake their hands, you never hear their story or tell them yours, but somehow in the act of making something with a great deal of care and love, something’s transmitted there. And it’s a way of expressing to the rest of our species our deep appreciation.

We need to be true to who we are, and remember what’s really important to us. That’s what’s going to keep Apple, Apple–is if we keep us, us.

STEVE JOBS

At the highest levels, you can tell a lot about the designers of something by simply using the thing they designed. When people truly care–when they obsess–about what they are working on, their thoughts, ideas, and feelings get injected into their work and then transmitted to the people who use it.

One of the first things I do when I get a new Apple product is to look for the compromises made by the designers, to understand them, to feel their hard work, and ultimately to feel their appreciation for my time and my life. If you look hard enough, you can understand the philosophy, love, and care of the people who took an idea, made it wonderful, and then made it real.

Something’s transmitted.