Steve Jobs: Master Presenter

As you’ve probably heard, Steve Jobs has resigned as CEO of Apple, although he’ll still be working for the company. Unlike most people, we’re not mourning because this has been the de facto state of affairs for some time, although there is one thing we’ll miss: Steve Jobs making a product presentation exciting.

Jobs is as much about careful PR manipulation as anything else, and the result is that Apple’s product demos and announcements are actually looked forward to by, well, everybody. To most writers, covering a press announcement is a chore; covering Apple’s are fun.

Partially it’s the sense of humor: back in 2007, when showing off the iPhone, Jobs actually demonstrated the phone’s unique capabilities by prank-calling a Starbucks. Or the time he covered masterfully for a broken Keynote presentation, for that matter. Partially it’s the sense of mystique: part of the reason Apple is subject to such incredible speculation is that Jobs runs a tight ship and product demos rarely leak out, which is why when the iPhone 4 leaked early it was such a big deal.

But in the end, it’s because he actually loved his products. They weren’t just units to him: they were his dreams, his hopes made real. Jobs didn’t revolutionize the phone in your pocket and turn tablets into the most important market of personal computing because it made him lots of money, although it did and does. He did it because these were the things he wanted to see. He wasn’t presenting to us: he was sharing a bit of himself with us.

Tim Cook was and will continue to be a great CEO, but we kind of hope that Jobs will, someday, come back with that turtleneck and jeans. He may not be leaving us…but we’re sure going to miss him.