put something back into the world

Steve Jobs over dinner with Steven Levy:

"I look at myself as [sort of trapeze artist, without a net] if anything. But it's a way of expressing feelings about, a group of feelings. Wanting to put something back into the world. You know we're constantly taking. We don't make most of the food we eat, we don't grow it, anyway. We wear clothes other people make, we speak a language other people developed, we use a mathematics other people evolved and spent their lives building. I mean we're constantly taking things. It's a wonderful ecstatic feeling to create something and put it into the pool of human experience and knowledge.

The interview transcript is an appendix to a new edition of his older book about the development of the Macintosh, "Insanely Great"

One thing the book mentioned was John Sculley pricing the late-80s Mac a bit high, going for profit margin rather than marketshare. I guess a version of that strategy is working well for Apple now, taking something like 90% of the mobile phone industry profits, but still visions of a world where the Mac had early, Apple II like penetration, and where every college kid had one rather than just the artsy ones... if HyperCard had been in the hands of even more people...

(Of course, looking around in the environs of Boston tech and Cambridge coffeeshops, it's astounding that only 1 in 10 PCs are by Apple - they seem to be omnipresent)

Getting back to the Steve Jobs quote, thinking of what I try to add to that pool. I guess except for "JoustPong" (heh) my best bet is helping people to calm down about death via So, You're Going to Die.