Skip to main content

Two Outstanding Movies this week

Saw Jobs in theater and Changeling on TV.
I saw Steve Jobs in Bell Labs two decades ago. He had come to Labs to show his NEXT computer; he had left Apple at that time. I was blown away by the richness of his NEXT computer. I don't think he sold NEXT much at all. In fact I had seen one Next computer in Labs, one of the MTSs had it. I vividly remember Jobs' style. Seeing the movie reminded me of his walking style and his bent back stature.

The movie was simply superb. It reflects American spirit and gives the viewer a glimpse of why America is great. America has at any time thousands of Jobs though not as spectacularly successful, but driven with zeal and energy all the same. Can you think of an invention in the last 50 years or so that came from a company outside of the US of A? I don't believe that people like Jobs, Gates don't exist elsewhere, but there is something in American culture and psyche that cultivates such men and women.

The movie brought back sweet memories of my own experience with Mac. I bought the the first Mac (still have it, bit the keyboard fell apart) when it was released. It came with awesome 128 KB RAM memory. I bought it because its price was dropped to around a thousand dollars for U of Utah students (almost 50% discount). I did my entire PhD thesis on it and printed it on the ImageWriter, another Apple creation, the most beautiful dot-matrix printer at the time. My thesis was the first one in the university ever printed on a dot-matrix printer. So the university had to decide whether to allow departure from typewritten thesis'. It took weeks for the U board to approve.
Our entire family was fond of Mac (I bought only one other Mac called Classic which looked similar to the first one but was vastly superior).

Jobs obviously had many personal failings like his abandoning his own daughter, his unkind treatment of his employees, but I think that can be forgiven considering his genius in innovation and technology that shook the world for almost four decades. I don't know Jobs personally but I assume the movie reflects his personality accurately. He was obviously a man who was just burning up inside, eternally unhappy, eternally driven. There was no way he could live for 100 years. Humans are not designed for carrying such mental load day-in and day-out their entire lives.


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Biography of Sri Hiriannaiah

I read the following biography of Sri Hiriannaiah at http://rajchat.info/vasudeva_kutumbukam/7_two_exemplary_officerst.html. Sri Hiriannaiah also belonged to Bobburkamme sect and most probably our family is related to his family, exactly how I don't know but may learn in the future. What was interesting is the propensity of descendants of Sri Kalappa to pursue law and serve in justice profession. The entire biography is copied from the above source. " Sakleshpur Hirianniah (S. Hirianniah for short) was born on 24th of June 1877 in Sakleshpura which is a taluq headquarters town in Hassan district. The taluq is situated in the high mountainous area of the Western Ghats, The mountains are covered by tropical forests where grow teakwood, rosewood, sandalwood and other tropical trees, and there is very heavy rain during the monsoon months. The ground under the trees are covered by all sorts of plants and creepers an...

My MOOC Progress

I finished my first MOOC course "Introduction to Mathematical Thinking" taught by Keith Devlin of Stanford, an outstanding professor. It was a tough course! I am almost half done with "Introduction to Genetics and Evolution" taught Mohammed Noor, another outstanding professor from Duke. I have already learned a great deal from this course. This is a tough course too. Believe it or not, I have signed up another 16 MOOCs! Within a month, three courses will be starting; Think Again: How to Reason and Argue , Introduction to Astronomy , Drugs and the Brain .  The New York Times called 2012, the year of the MOOCs, see http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/education/edlife/massive-open-online-courses-are-multiplying-at-a-rapid-pace.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&.

401K, 403B Rollover into an IRA

I am trying to gather info on the IRA rollover. I am piecing together info I found on the web. 1. Can I Use an IRA Rollover to Move Funds Out of My Company Retirement Plan While I Still Work There? Probably not. Most company retirement plans do not allow you to roll funds out of the plan while you are still employed. To find out if they do, you can call your plan sponsor, and ask if they allow what is called an "in-service distribution". Does AT&T allow? Does TIAA/CREF allow? An in-service distribution is a different type of transaction than a loan or hardship withdrawal. An in-service distribution is a transaction where you can rollover a portion of funds in your plan into a self-directed IRA account while you are still employed. Only some plans allow this. No Longer Employed Once you are no longer employed, it may make sense to roll funds from your plan into an IRA account. At that time, to avoid tax withholding, you'll want to choo...