6 peculiar facts about the life of Steve Jobs

For many people, Steve Jobs is a modern icon and almost an idol to adore. Apple's co-founder and computer genius became a man admired by hundreds of thousands of people. His innovative ideas, which founded the principles of the technology we have today, and the theatrical and different style he gave to his advertising campaigns made his products transcend the simple computer, mobile phone or music player and become part of the identity of the person who owns it. Steve Jobs was the face of a revolution that, even today, is only taking its first steps. Here are some interesting facts about the life of this modern guru.

Straight to Silicon Valley 

Steve Jobs was born in San Francisco in February 1955 and, since his parents were students and not married, he was given up for adoption a week after he was born. He was adopted by Paul and Clara Jobs, who moved to Mountain View, California, a rural city that became home to Silicon Valley, the 'electronics and computing paradise', where today the world's leading technology companies are headquartered.

Disenchanted with University

Disenchanted with university and with the educational system, Jobs only lasted a semester at the University, Red College in Oregon, although he continued to attend calligraphy classes. His first job was at Atari, one of the first video game companies where he saved some money and left his job to go to India "in search of enlightenment".

In his Garage

In 1975, together with Steve Wozniak, he founded Apple Computer Inc. which was born in Jobs' room. They began assembling computers by hand in their parents' garage. Within a few years the leap that the company took was gigantic, and by 1983 Apple had entered the Fortune 500, ranking (it was number 411), the fastest rise of a company in business history. 

From Apple to Pixar

Jobs left Apple in 1985 after being fired, but soon became CEO of another great company that emerged from technological advances, Pixar. With Jobs at the helm, Pixar produced the animated films 'Toy Story' (the first fully computer-generated feature film) and 'Bugs'. "People no longer read Herodotus or Homer to their children, but everyone watched movies," Jobs said in a statement to Time magazine.

The Apple Revolution

When he returned to Apple in 1997, he reorganized the company and started working on new computers, creating the iMac, then the iBook laptops and finally the iPod player. In 2007 he revolutionized the market again with his iPhone phone, and in 2010, he left the world speechless with the iPad tablet.

His Idols

Jobs once assured a journalist that he admired Bob Dylan and Pablo Picasso because they were both "always risking failure”.