Tuesday, October 11, 2011

You should never have to look over your shoulder

Obama spoke this evening at the Human Rights Campaign’s annual dinner. I assume he dined on the flesh of his enemies. The Human Rights Campaign is a gay group, so he started off with a joke about how he had held “productive bilateral talks with your leader, Lady Gaga.” Stop trying to make jokes, Barry. Just stop.


INSERT, ER, INTERJECT YOUR OWN DOUBLE ENTENDRE HERE: “you should never have to look over your shoulder -- to be gay in the United States of America.”

INTERJECT YOUR OWN DOUBLE ENTENDRE HERE: “it took two years to get the [Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell] repeal through Congress. (Applause.) We had to hold a coalition together. We had to keep up the pressure. We took some flak along the way.” Adding, “No one has to live a lie to serve the country they love.” I was contemplating some joke about him being a Kenyan or something when it occurred to me that somewhere along the line the phrase “serve their country” has come to mean military service exclusively.

He does keep inching closer and closer to supporting gay marriage, without ever quite doing so. Zeno’s Gay Marriage Paradox. He warned today against those trying to turn back the clock, “who, as we speak, are looking to enshrine discrimination into state laws and constitutions,” which can only mean bans on gay marriage, but I guess he wants credit for supporting marriage equality without saying words that would be used in attack ads. Sigh.

He castigates the candidates at the last debate for not criticizing the audience members who booed the gay soldier dude. “You want to be commander in chief? You can start by standing up for the men and women who wear the uniform of the United States, even when it’s not politically convenient.” Kind of a weird sentence, that.

Evidently progress in America “happens when a father realizes he doesn’t just love his daughter, but also her wife.” But not in a creepy way.

That said, any time Obama refers to someone in a gay marriage as a husband or wife – I believe I’ve noticed him doing so once before – it counts as a win.

“It [progress, that is] happens when a soldier tells his unit that he’s gay, and they tell him they knew it all along and they didn’t care, because he was the toughest guy in the unit.” Heh, he said “toughest guy in the unit.” Note that to be accepted, gay soldiers evidently have to be “tougher” than straight soldiers.


Adding to the sum of world knowledge, no doubt

Do you know where Sarah Palin is right now? The World Knowledge Forum, in Seoul. That is all.

David Koch beats Mayor Bloomberg

David Koch beats Mayor Bloomberg: Wealthy New Yorkers are getting richer. Businessman David Koch retained his title at the big top of the list of rich New Yorkers as his chance grew to $25 billion to edge out Mayor Bloomberg once more, agreeing to the yearly list of the four hundred richest Americans put together by Forbes magazine. The list showed that while Bloomberg's fortune rose $1.5 billion to $19.5 billion since last year, it was not enough to catch the 71-year-old Koch, an oilman who's a big supporter of conservative causes and the Tea Party. Koch's chance was listed at $21.5 by Forbes in 2010. Mayor Bloomberg is the 2nd richest New Yorker, agreeing to Forbes magazine. REUTERS Mayor Bloomberg is the 2nd richest New Yorker, according to Forbes magazine. Forbes said the mayor's company, Bloomberg LP, has been very successful over the past year and "keeps adding office space and employees."At the same time, Donald Trump, who's flirted with running for president next year, also saw his chance rise $500 million this year to $2.9 billion. With seventy percent of the billionaires on the list being self-made, this year is all about the social media. The year’s greatest dollar gainer is Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg with a gain of $10.6 billion putting him at No.14 on the overall list with $17.5 billion.Zuckerberg was joined on the list with Facebook buddies Dustin Moskovitz (No. 91 with $3.5 billion), Eduardo Saverin (No. 212 with $2 billion) and Sean Parker (No. 200 with $2.1 billion). Meanwhile, Bill Gates retained his spot at the top of the list with $59 billion, followed by Warren Buffett (No. 2 with $39 billion) and Larry Ellison (No. 3 with $33 billion). While most Americans are feeling the effects of the ongoing recession, rich Americans are not. Collectively, Forbes found that all member of the Top twenty gained wealth this year -- with the exception of Buffett, who was down $6 billion compared to last year. Overall, net worth increased for 262 members -- almost two-thirds of the list. Net worth decreased for just seventy-two members.David Koch beats Mayor Bloomberg:

Breaking News Phoenix Jones' Arrested in Seattle


Breaking News Phoenix Jones' Arrested in Seattle: Seattle's masked superhero crime fighter "Phoenix Jones" is now fighting an assault charge for allegedly spraying pepper spray on folks who he claims were fighting. Seattle police force claim the folks were dancing. Phoenix Jones, who has been unmasked by police force as Benjamin Francis, was caught about 2:30 a.m. Sunday while still wearing his black and gold superhero costume, a bullet-proof vest and carrying 2 cans of pepper spray. Jones is a member of Rain City Superhero Movement, a group of self-proclaimed superheroes who say they patrol the streets to fight crime. He was charged with assaulting 2 folks who police force said were "dancing and having a good time" as they walked to their car. In this particular case, he perceived that this group was fighting and when we contacted them, they said they were not fighting," said Det. Mark Jamieson, a Seattle police force section public information officer. "Unluckily, he used force. He committed a crime, an assault versus these individuals. That's versus the law. The police force report by Officer Hosea Crumpton said cited a woman who was sprayed saying the four victims "began dancing and frolicking with each other. Suddenly she observed a human running full sprint towards her group. The human sprayed all 4 victims with pepper spray, the report stated. Francis, who was being filmed by a journalist at the time, told police he "ran into the crowd to break up the fight. Seattle Superhero Phoenix Jones Now Fighting Assault Charges He saw 2 white males fighting, but could not explain why 4 folks, including women, had been sprayed," the police force report said. In a video taken by a journalist who was with Jones when he was arrested and posted on Jones' Facebook page shows Jones rushing towards commotion and a crowd in a road beneath an underpass in downtown Seattle. It's unclear from the video whether the group is fighting or just messing around, as police force said. The police report said that Francis "has had a history of injecting himself in these incidents. Recently there has been increased reports of citizens being pepper sprayed by [Francis] and his group." Earlier that night several other nightclub patrons told police they had also been pepper sprayed by Phoenix Jones, but left the area before police arrived. Peter Tangen, a photographer and spokesman for Phoenix Jones, questioned how police can say the group was dancing and joking around when Jones was on-scene as an eyewitness and police were not when the situation occurred. The first thing Phoenix did was to scream out to call 911," Tangen said. "He's been doing this four or five nights a week this entire year and he has never been charged with a crime. To assert that he ran into a bunch of people dancing and pepper sprayed them is entirely inconsistent with what he has done consistently this entire year." Jones, the husband and father of two, is a self-proclaimed superhero who roams the streets of Seattle late at night allegedly protecting his fellow citizens. "I'm definitely not going to let my fellow citizens be assaulted and not do anything," Jones told "Good Morning America" in January. "It's a pretty simple message. Citizens need to be more accountable. Calling 911 is a great start, but it's not the end all to end all," Jones said. "Criminals feel free to just run wild in my city, and I'm not going to stand for it." Jones isn't the only one who feels this way. He is just one of many citizen superheroes around the country with similar groups in Orlando, New York and Salt Lake City among other places. Over the years, the citizen superheroes have grown more organized, with websites popping up to help them organize themselves such as Superheroes Anonymous and Real Life Superheroes. On these websites, participants can do everything from share their crime-fighting stories to learn about patenting their looks and names. The Salt Lake City group, called the Black Monday Society, is made up of 9 members that go out to patrol downtown Salt Lake City some times a month. They meet up at the Salt Lake City Library and fan out from there, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. While the group does break up fights, they also deliver meals to the homeless and balance their superhero lives with families and day jobs.Breaking News Phoenix Jones' Arrested in Seattle

Monday, October 10, 2011

Obama press conference: The American people are very frustrated

Obama held a not-very-interesting press conference today.

CLEAR! “Our economy really needs a jolt right now.”

BUT YOU’LL TELL US WHEN IT IS THE TIME FOR THE USUAL POLITICAL GRIDLOCK, RIGHT? “This is not a game; this is not the time for the usual political gridlock.”


RICH PEOPLE AREN’T ASKING FOR TAX CUTS? RICH PEOPLE ARE ALWAYS ASKING FOR TAX CUTS. “We can fight to protect tax cuts for folks who don’t need them and weren’t asking for them, or we can cut taxes for virtually every worker and small business in America.”

THAT’S A RHETORICAL QUESTION, RIGHT? “historically, Republicans haven’t been opposed to rebuilding roads and bridges. Why would you be opposed now?”

WHAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE HAVE BEEN FOR A LONG TIME: “The American people are very frustrated. They’ve been frustrated for a long time.”

Have you heard about this Occupy Wall Street thing? “Obviously I’ve heard of it. I’ve seen it on television.” No word on whether he’s keeping up on the economic plight of ordinary Americans by watching “Two Broke Girls.” “So, yes, I think people are frustrated”. And evidently they’re mostly frustrated by Republicans who want to roll back Dodd-Frank. And bankers and the financial system and whatnot. If they’re frustrated by Obama and the Democrats in any way at all, Obama must not have seen evidence of it on television.

Jake Tapper asks if they aren’t frustrated that no one on Wall Street has been prosecuted. Obama says that’s because all those corrupt practices were actually legal and shouldn’t be. Way to undercut future prosecutions.


Re “Fast and Furious” (selling guns that went to Mexico so we could track them, without the actual tracking them part), he has “complete confidence” in Attorney General Eric Holder, who has “indicated that he was not aware of what was happening in Fast and Furious,” which you’d think would undercut that complete confidence just a little bit, but evidently not. “And I think both he and I would have been very unhappy if somebody had suggested that guns were allowed to pass through that could have been prevented by the United States of America.” So that’s okay then.

IRONY! “The irony is the same folks that the Republicans claim to be protecting, the well off -- the millionaires and the billionaires -- they’d be doing better, they’d be making more money if ordinary Americans had some money in their pockets and were out there feeling more confident about the economy. That’s been the lesson of our history -- when folks in the middle and at the bottom are doing well, the folks at the top do even better.” Heads, the rich win, tails the rich still win.

Oh, and that is not at all the lesson of our history.

GIVE ME WHAT I WANT, OR I’LL GO MAKE SOME MORE SPEECHES: “I would love nothing more than to not have to be out there campaigning because we were seeing constructive action here in Congress. ... And I would love nothing more than to see Congress act so aggressively that I can’t campaign against them as a do-nothing Congress.” The R’s must really be trembling in fear right now.

Friday, October 7, 2011

Detroit Tigers

Detroit Tigers: Some things to keep an eye on the Rangers and Tigers set for things ALCS: Who playgrounds of two for the Rangers? We know that CJ Wilson and Justin Verlander are expected to become entangled in what should be fun. But what about Game 2! The Rangers could keep their same rotation and go with Derek Holland in Game 2 at home and send Colby Lewis, whose road splits were much better than his home ones, in Game 3 at Comerica Park. Lewis is coming off a solid outing in Tampa in a pivotal Game 3. Holland was able to grind out a solid start as well in Game 2, so the Rangers may elect to just leave things the way they had it. That would include Matt Harrison in Game 4, also on the road. Wilson and Verlander would likely go at it again in Game 5 in Detroit, if both stay on normal rest. Jim Leyland decision Verlander threw a side session of more than 50 pitches before Game 5 at Yankee Stadium a few people raise their eyebrows. But he sent a clear message to Doug Fister this game was the party of 5. And the Tigers got the win without having to use their ace. Game 2 starting for the Tigers, Max Scherzer, who started 1 1 / 3 innings in Game 5 probably could. That would leave Doug Fister, which began in Game 5 for Game 3 on Tuesday in Detroit rest. Look at the large gardens in the area of ​​Comerica. Craig Gentry said Thursday that he's ready for that area to cover a lot of ground and Josh Hamilton said he'd be fine, but noted there was plenty of room in center out there. The Rangers must decide whether to carry an extra pitcher. It seems likely they'll do that, but which one? Darren O'Day and Yoshinori Tateyama threw side sessions on Thursday and they seem to be the leading candidates. Michael Kirkman could also be considered. Both Texas and Detroit benefited from great bullpens in the ALDS. Joaquin Benoit pitched in and out of a jam in the seventh on Thursday and Jose Valverde didn't blow a save all season. The Rangers have Alexi Ogando, Mike Adams and Neftali Feliz for the final three innings. Watching these two bullpens work should be fun -- and you better score some runs early. Ogando started in all three of the Rangers' wins vs. Detroit and posted a 1.29 ERA and the Tigers batted just .205 against him. He allowed three runs on 18 hits in 21 innings 18 strikeouts, three walks. Regular season results aren't necessarily a great gauge of how a postseason series will go. That's especially true for the Rangers against the Tigers. Why? For starters, they weren't particularly healthy when playing Detroit (after all, Hamilton got hurt in the first series up there) and many of the players that found their way into games aren't even on the roster anymore. Dave Bush started one game against the Tigers with bullpen pieces coming in that won't be on the postseason roster. Plus, the bullpen let some games get away early in the season vs. Detroit and it's not the same bullpen in Texas now. The last time the two teams played was Aug. 4. A lot has happened for both teams since then. Is Verlander to the Tigers like Cliff Lee was to the Rangers in last year's ALCS? Lee pitched only once in the ALCS in 2010.
But he hung over the series. The Yankees knew they had the pressure on them to win the first two on the road knowing Lee was waiting. Verlander will pitch at least twice in this series. If he wins those games, it gives the Tigers a big edge. But if Wilson gets the better of Verlander, it's a huge boost for Texas. So those games should be fun and big for momentum. Of course, the Tigers could decide to go with Verlander on short rest and he's said he's willing and pitches him in Game 4 and Game 7. Remains to be seen Rangers hit .275 as a team against the Tigers, but the part that was a very good game. They need to Ian Kinsler and Elvis Andrus hit them better than they did in the regular season.

Jorge Posada’s final At Bat: Yankees big set to retire

Jorge Posada’s final At Bat: Yankees big set to retire: Share in a hare-mail on Facebook Share on Twitter Stumble Upon hare hare RedditShare on DiggSubscribe Yes, but this spacer articleybh Print By John Romano, "YBH" - I'll go ahead and say something the Yankees have yet to say!: Thank you Jorge Posada and good luck!  Tonight, Jorge Posada ended his career with the New York Yankees.  Mr. Posada’s last at bat was a ground out to Detroit Tigers shortstop Jhonny Peralta in the bottom of the 8th inning.  An anti- climactic end to a great career, Mr. Posada had a disappointing season this year, during his first and only at the designated hitter spot, after serving as the Yankees starting catcher for 14 years.  He hit .235 for the season and batted in 44 runs over 115 games.   Mr. Posada did, however, have a great post season in five games against Detroit in the ALDS batting .429. Posada’s late season surge and Robinson Cano’s post season home run prowess were not enough to get the Yankees past a resilient Tigers club.  Detroit’s two first inning home runs last night put the Yankees on the defense and the team simply could not recover.   Detroit bested the Yankees 3-2 in a thrilling game 5 which sent the Tigers to the ALCS for the first time since 2006.  The Tigers face the Texas Rangers in a best-of-seven series that begins on Saturday. La Posada 40 years has hit 275 homers and struck in 1065 operates in a sixteen-year career with the New York Yankees. His lifetime batting average is .273. He will be missed.Jorge Posada’s final At Bat: Yankees big set to retire:


Thursday, October 6, 2011

Westboro Baptist Church


Westboro Baptist Church: Whatever your thoughts are about the "God Hates Fags" mantra of the Westboro Baptist Church, it can't be said that the organization doesn't know its rights and how to defend them in court. Once again the controversial, Kansas-based church has won a legal decision in Missouri. The newest came yesterday when the America Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit affirmed last summer's decision striking down the City of Manchester's funeral protest ordinance. In so doing, the court reaffirmed that peaceful pickets on world sidewalks near funerals are entitled to the protection of the 1st Amendment. In recent years Westboro Baptist Church has taken to protesting outside military funerals under their opinion that God is punishing America. Soldiers for their nation tolerance of homosexuality Manchester modeled its ordinance later an Ohio funeral protest statute that was found to be constitutional by a court in 2008. Yesterday's decision disagreed with that conclusion. Manchester's ordinance criminalized speech in a manner the 1st Amendment can't tolerate," said Anthony Rothert, legal director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri, which represented the church. "Allowing speech we find offensive in public forums is one cost of the freedoms that define U.S.A.." Last year a federal court also threw out a Missouri state law restricting protests near funerals.Westboro Baptist Church

Joan Baez, And Amnesty

Joan Baez, And Amnesty: The following is a special message for a long time supporter of Amnesty Joan Baez during our annual membership drive in September: Support Amnesty Dear, All my life I felt humbled by the suffering of others. It's just that I have by accident of birth, was born at the right place at the right time and another Huddle, not me, in a prison cell, tortured and face the unbearable consequences of being born in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or, as the legendary Phil Ochs song says, there but for fortune, go you or I. Happily for me, I discovered early on that, in the words of Swedish Ambassador Harold Edelstam, “I cannot tolerate injustice.” This inability to tolerate injustice brought me to the roots of human misery; he called to join the fight for rights, freedoms and dignity of others. And in so doing, helped me maintain my own dignity, In 1972, he was inspired to dedicate a year of my life to helping Amnesty launched its first U.S. office in the West Coast and around the world years later, when the organization had reached epidemic proportions to carry out both a conspiracy of the Human Rights of Hope and now! Visits, Today I stand with Amnesty and their Death Penalty Abolition Campaign to fight for the life of Troy Davis, who within weeks could be executed for a crime he may not have committed. There remain serious doubts of his guilt. His death sentence defies all logic and morality. In matters of life and death, there is no room for doubt. With their death penalty campaign work, Amnesty has long been a leader in the struggle to abolish the death penalty in every corner of the world. In honor of Amnesty’s 50th birthday, please join me in this life-saving work. Become a member during Amnesty’s September membership drive and a generous donor will match your gift dollar-for-dollar. It used to be that human rights abuses weren’t on anyone’s agenda. Today, when human rights prevail, it happens thanks to organizations like Amnesty. Amnesty has grown into the most powerful human rights movement in history, winning freedom for tens of thousands of individuals jailed for expressing their beliefs, shutting down torture chambers and halting executions. At the heart of these victories for human rights Amnesty members are dedicated feed envelopes, signs, petitions, is visible in marches and rallies, recruit friends, tweets, and Amnesty support with financial contributions. I have a special place in my heart for Amnesty. I hope you will too. We need an amnesty, Amnesty and need us. Please join me as a member today.

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates: In his reflections on the status of Steve Jobs at Apple, it is impossible to separate the role of Microsoft. Enterprises, as well as employment and Microsoft founder Bill Gates, a pioneer in the industry and to define an era. The two leaders and at different times, competing all the time and competed in ways that helped shape the landscape of techno. It's a complex relationship. In the early days of computing, Apple depended on software from Microsoft for its Macintosh computer. There's a charming 1983 video, aired in an edited form for the D: All Things Digital Conference in 2007, in which Jobs hosts a "Dating Game" with software execs including Gates. It is a celebration of love with Gates comments on the Mac "really captures the imagination of people" and the use of the decision in the end, all the needs of support frameworks, including Gates. Because Microsoft got to the top of the computer industry, Apple has become more marginalized in the 1980s, the gloves came out. In 1988, Apple sued Microsoft for infringing on the patents regarding the look and feel of its operating system. Over years of litigation, Microsoft won rulings that whittled away almost all of Apple's claims. By 1997, Apple's fortunes had sunk so low that it reached out to its sometime partner, sometime nemesis for a hand. Gates appeared via satellite at the MacWorld conference have agreed to invest $ 150 million of Apple as well as to develop and ship future versions of Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, and development tools for the Macintosh. The companies also settled the claims remaining in dispute over patents. That investment, which will surely be rewarded for Microsoft over the years, also helped Apple once again the economic base. And it helped Jobs move forward on the job of turning around Apple and ultimately making it the most valuable company in technology. Along the way, Jobs often sparred with Microsoft, criticizing the company's lack of creativity. "The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste," Jobs said in the 1996 public television documentary "Triumph of the Nerds." "They have absolutely no taste. And I don't mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way, in the sense that they don't think of original ideas, and they don't bring much culture into their products." In a New York Times article that ran after the documentary aired, Jobs disclosed that he called Gates afterward to apologize. But only to a degree, ‘I told him I believed every word of what I'd said but that I never should have said it in public,'' Jobs told the Times. ''I wish him the best, I really do. I just think he and Microsoft are a bit narrow. He'd be a broader guy if he had dropped acid once or gone off to an ashram when he was younger.'' At the time, and for many years after, those words often seemed like sour grapes from an executive whose company had been surpassed in so many ways by Microsoft. But in the end, Jobs demonstrated his vision on the right. The muzzle of the design and vision helped launch the iPod, iPhone and iPad and revolutionary Apple products business became more profitable and more valuable than Microsoft.


Steve Jobs Commencement Speech

Steve Jobs Commencement Speech: I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the best universities in the global. I ne'er graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've always gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just 3 stories The 1st story is about connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College later the 1st 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another eighteen months or so earlier I really quit. So why did I drop out? It began earlier I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they actually desired a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the nighttime asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had ne'er graduated from college and that my father had ne'er graduated from high school. She refused to sign the last adoption papers. She only relented a few months after when my parents promised that I'd someday go to college and seventeen years after I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. Later 6 months, I could not see the value in it. I had no idea what I desired to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was jolly scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the finest decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that did not interest me, and start dropping in on the ones that looked interesting. It was not all romantic. I did not have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I came back coke bottles for the five¢ deposits to buy food with, and I'd walk the seven miles across town every Sunday nighttime to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I enjoyed it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example: Reed College at that time offered maybe the finest calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on all drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and did not have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between other letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science cannot capture, and I found it fascinating. None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But 10 years later, when we were designing the 1st Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the 1st computer with attractive typography. If I had never dropped in on that exclusive course in college, the Mac would have ne'er had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had ne'er dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards 10 years after. Again, you cannot connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you've to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You've to trust in something your gut, destiny, life, and karma, whatever. This approach has ne'er let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss. I was lucky I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parent’s garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation the Macintosh a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly what had been my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating. I really do not know what to do for some months. I felt I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was over for me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing so bad. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over. I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life. During the five years I started a company named neXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would be my wife. Pixar went on to create the world's first computer animated film, Toy Story, and now the most successful animation studio in the world. A significant turnaround, Apple bought NEXT, I returned to Apple and the technology we have developed the first renaissance in the center of Apple. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family. I'm sure none of this would have happened if I had not been fired from Apple. It awful tasted medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As in all matters of the heart, you know when it was found. And like any good relationship, it is getting better and better as the years roll. So we're looking until you find it. Do not settle. The third story is about death. When I was 17 I read a quote that went something like this: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll certainly be right." I was impressed, and from that moment, the past 33 years, I looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, I would like to do, what I'm about to do today?" And whenever the answer is "No" too many days in a row, I know that I need to change something. 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.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and take the right things, which is the code of medical Prepare to die. It means everything to try to tell your children that you thought you'd be in the next 10 years to tell them just a few months. This means ensuring that all the buttons so that it is as easy as possible for your family. It means saying goodbye really. Living the diagnosis all day, later that evening I had a biopsy, which stuck an endoscope down the throat, through my stomach and intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now. This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept: 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. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true. Your time is limited, so do not waste it living someone else's life. Do not be trapped by dogma which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Do not let the noise of the opinions of others to cover their own inner voice and most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. Somehow already know what you really want to become. Everything else is secondary. When I was young, was an amazing publication called the Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation? It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and Polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions. Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Underneath were the words: "Stay Hungry Stay foolish." It was their farewell message to his signature. Stay Hungry. Stay foolish. And I've always wanted for myself. And now, when you go to start over, I hope for you.