Steve Jobs Day: Notable Quotes from the Late Apple Co-founder, CEO

Sunday is officially Steve Jobs Day, thanks to the state of California, where the Apple co-founder and long-time CEO lived before he died last week at the age of 56. Jobs, who had recently resigned as Apple's CEO, is known as one of the world's all-time great innovators.

In honor of Jobs and Steve Jobs Day, being recognized in California where Apple is headquartered, here are some notable Steve Jobs quotes about himself, Apple, innovation, and the world through his eyes.

Steve Jobs Speaks on Apple and Leadership

We've never worried about numbers. In the market place, Apple is trying to focus the spotlight on products, because products really make a difference. (...) Ad campaigns are necessary for competition; IBM's ads are everywhere. But good PR educates people; that's all it is. You can't con people in this business. The products speak for themselves. (Playboy, 1985)

The most compelling reason for most people to buy a computer for the home will be to link it into a nationwide communications network. We're just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people--as remarkable as the telephone. (Playboy 1985)

Picasso had a saying: 'Good artists copy, great artists steal.' We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas...I think part of what made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians, poets, artists, zoologists and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world.

That's what a computer is to me: the computer is the most remarkable tool that we've ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds. (Interview for the documentary Memory and Imagination, 1990)

My model for business is The Beatles. They were four guys who kept each other's kind of negative tendencies in check. They balanced each other and the total was greater than the sum of the parts. That's how I see business: great things in business are never done by one person, they're done by a team of people. (60 Minutes, 2003)

A lot of companies have chosen to downsize, and maybe that was the right thing for them. We chose a different path. Our belief was that if we kept putting great products in front of customers, they would continue to open their wallets.

I'll always stay connected with Apple. I hope that throughout my life I'll sort of have the thread of my life and the thread of Apple weave in and out of each other, like a tapestry. There may be a few years when I'm not there, but I'll always come back. (Playboy, 1985)

Steve Jobs on innovation

Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things. (Steve Jobs)

I want to put a ding in the universe.

An iPod, a phone, an Internet mobile communicator... these are NOT three separate devices! And we are calling it iPhone! Today Apple is going to reinvent the phone. And here it is. (introducing the iPhone, 2007)

And no, we don't know where it will lead. We just know there's something much bigger than any of us here.

Everyone here has the sense that right now is one of those moments when we are influencing the future.

That's been one of my mantras -- focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it's worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains. (BusinessWeek, 1998)

I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what's next. (NBC Nightly News, 2006)

A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them. (BusinessWeek, 1998)

It gave a tremendous sense of self-confidence, that through exploration and learning one could understand seemingly very complex things in one's environment. (Smithsonian Institute, 1995)

It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them. (BusinessWeek 1988)

Steve Jobs on Humanity

As individuals, people are inherently good. I have a somewhat more pessimistic view of people in groups. And I remain extremely concerned when I see what's happening in our country, which is in many ways the luckiest place in the world. We don't seem to be excited about making our country a better place for our kids. (Steve Jobs)

It's not a faith in technology. It's faith in people.

It's not the tools that you have faith in -- tools are just tools. They work, or they don't work. It's people you have faith in or not. Yeah, sure, I'm still optimistic I mean, I get pessimistic sometimes but not for long. (Rolling Stone, 1994)

Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world? (From Odyssey: Pepsi to Apple)

Steve Jobs on Life (and Death)

I'm the only person I know that's lost a quarter of a billion dollars in one year.... It's very character-building. (Apple Confidential 2.0)

My favorite things in life don't cost any money. It's really clear that the most precious resource we all have is time.

Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. (Stanford commencement address, 2005)

You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something -- your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life. (Stanford commencement address, 2005)

Stay hungry, stay foolish.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart...Stay hungry. Stay foolish. (Stanford commencement address, 2005)

I read a study that measured the efficiency of locomotion for various species on the planet. The condor used the least energy to move a kilometer. Humans came in with a rather unimpressive showing about a third of the way down the list...That didn't look so good, but then someone at Scientific American had the insight to test the efficiency of lomotion for a man on a bicycle and a man on a bicycle blew the condor away.

Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me. Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful, that's what matters to me. (The Wall Street Journal, 1993)

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. (Stanford commencement address, 2005)