A few days ago, Steve Jobs reminded me why he is so cool. A man of his stature, who has rigorously defined and interpreted cool over the last 5 years, has now become the brunt of Hollywood gossip mags and moralistic word bombs. Jobs, the CEO and visionary of Apple, has made it a priority to deny any form of pornography in his App Store. Because of this, some are claiming that Jobs is imposing his own morals atop his multi-billion dollar company and taking away the ‘freedom’ of American consumers.
In a series of emails between Jobs and Ryan Tate, a writer for a gossip magazine not worth mentioning, Jobs remained stern in respect to his convictions that not making porn available in his App Store would actually increase revenue among the American people. The conversation went like this,
“If Dylan was 20 today, how would he feel about your company?,” Tate asked. “Would he think the iPad had the faintest thing to do with ‘revolution?’ Revolutions are about freedom.”
The CEO of Apple replied to say that he values:
‘Freedom from programs that steal your private data. Freedom from programs that trash your battery. Freedom from porn. Yep, freedom. The times they are a changin’ and some traditional PC folks feel their world is slipping away. It is.’
According to Al Mohler, “One of the interesting dimensions of Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple is his habit of answering selected emails personally. It appears that Ryan Tate’s complaint got under Jobs’ skin. It is even more apparent that Jobs’ response irritated Ryan Tate.”
“I don’t want ‘freedom from porn,’” says Tate. “Porn is just fine! And I think my wife would agree.”
In the most compelling line of this exchange, Steve Jobs dismissed the critic thus:
“You might care more about porn when you have kids.”
Interestingly, Jobs’ out-take on the priority of parents is Dylan-esque in cultural commentary. Parents should care about what their children are downloading and watching, and most parents do care. Jobs understands this and knows that Apple will sell more Apps when parents are at ease with what their kids might be downloading. For Christian parents, knowing that their children are safe from the dangers of porn, at least while in Jobs’ App Store, is something Christian parents can and should be excited about.
The answer that surged from Jobs concerning a consumer’s freedom to download porn apps from his App Store is savvily summarized by his ever-impeccable statement, “buy a different type of computer.”
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Further articles I have found helpful and interesting:
May 24, 2010 at 2:04 pm
Greg,
Great post! I highly respect Jobs for his stand against pornography. His stand is respectable and sets him apart from his competitors. We need more owners to joon him in his stand.
Man I’m really enjoying the articles and posts that you guys are doing on here. I like that each article is straight to the point; it’s short and sweet. Keep up the good work man!
May 24, 2010 at 2:35 pm
Thanks Ben! Keep spreading the word!