Loss of Steve Jobs has created great void in global digital world.
Steve Jobs changed the world by many innovations like Design, Music, The PC, iPad,
Ads, iPhone, Apps Ecosystem, MacOS and Apple itself.
For most technologists, business men, and CxOs, Steve Jobs has been a role model
across the world. Best business schools in business cover various aspects of Steve
Jobs and Apple Inc in dozens of business cases as part of business management
programs.
I live in India, and these days I travel a lot deep inside country. I spend some time
interacting with people who belong to, what many people say, Bharat or real India -
where 70% to 80% of people live. These are towns, villages and small cities
consisting of 700 M population.
I ask people in my visits: do they use Mac? Have they seen anyone using iPhone
or iPad in their town or village? Do they know Steve Jobs?
I also do dipstick checks if they know Nokia, or if they know Google and so on.
There have been less than 1% cases, where my question on Apple or Steve Jobs
has resulted into any affirmative answer. In fact, people in India know more of
Google, and more of Nokia than that of Apple.
It is quite clear that Steve Jobs and his products have no real impact on India and
its vast majority of consumers at present.
Does it mean that Steve Jobs was elitist? Does it mean that his legacy has no
relevance to vast majority of the world population living in developing world?
Answer lies in finding out if other legends like Henry Ford or Mahatma Gandhi
created any impact beyond boundaries of their countries either in their life time
or later. When Henry Ford brought automobile to America; countries like
India, large part of Asia and Africa had no impact for a very long time.
However, Ford's legacy lies in a fact that world created hundreds of
automobile companies in Japan, Korea, India and everywhere else, decades later.
It is hard to believe that common people across the world would have been part of
automobile revolution decades later, had Henry Ford not innovated the consumer
automobile for America.
Great Innovators create hundreds of thousands of followers, who incrementally take
original innovation further, and make it relevant to various sections of society.
I have no doubt that Steve Jobs has no direct large impact on India at present. But
he is very closely followed by thousands of urban technology entrepreneurs of Indian
origin living in India or outside. Somewhere deep within these people, lies an urge to
innovate like Steve Jobs, to make the world better place. Many of them, for sure,
will try to make their innovations relevant for their country, towns and villages.
It is this entrepreneurial urge among thousands of Indians, that would create massive
innovation, and impact on real India. And that would be the right time to say what impact
Steve Jobs had on India or for that matter on developing world!!
Steve Jobs changed the world by many innovations like Design, Music, The PC, iPad,
Ads, iPhone, Apps Ecosystem, MacOS and Apple itself.
For most technologists, business men, and CxOs, Steve Jobs has been a role model
across the world. Best business schools in business cover various aspects of Steve
Jobs and Apple Inc in dozens of business cases as part of business management
programs.
I live in India, and these days I travel a lot deep inside country. I spend some time
interacting with people who belong to, what many people say, Bharat or real India -
where 70% to 80% of people live. These are towns, villages and small cities
consisting of 700 M population.
I ask people in my visits: do they use Mac? Have they seen anyone using iPhone
or iPad in their town or village? Do they know Steve Jobs?
I also do dipstick checks if they know Nokia, or if they know Google and so on.
There have been less than 1% cases, where my question on Apple or Steve Jobs
has resulted into any affirmative answer. In fact, people in India know more of
Google, and more of Nokia than that of Apple.
It is quite clear that Steve Jobs and his products have no real impact on India and
its vast majority of consumers at present.
Does it mean that Steve Jobs was elitist? Does it mean that his legacy has no
relevance to vast majority of the world population living in developing world?
Answer lies in finding out if other legends like Henry Ford or Mahatma Gandhi
created any impact beyond boundaries of their countries either in their life time
or later. When Henry Ford brought automobile to America; countries like
India, large part of Asia and Africa had no impact for a very long time.
However, Ford's legacy lies in a fact that world created hundreds of
automobile companies in Japan, Korea, India and everywhere else, decades later.
It is hard to believe that common people across the world would have been part of
automobile revolution decades later, had Henry Ford not innovated the consumer
automobile for America.
Great Innovators create hundreds of thousands of followers, who incrementally take
original innovation further, and make it relevant to various sections of society.
I have no doubt that Steve Jobs has no direct large impact on India at present. But
he is very closely followed by thousands of urban technology entrepreneurs of Indian
origin living in India or outside. Somewhere deep within these people, lies an urge to
innovate like Steve Jobs, to make the world better place. Many of them, for sure,
will try to make their innovations relevant for their country, towns and villages.
It is this entrepreneurial urge among thousands of Indians, that would create massive
innovation, and impact on real India. And that would be the right time to say what impact
Steve Jobs had on India or for that matter on developing world!!
Very relevant post sir. I agree on the part that Steve's inventions do't impact much of the Indians as of now, but the matter of fact is most of the inventions are influenced by the surrounding and society. The basic needs are already catered there and so he thought of the other needs of people out there.
ReplyDeleteBut for the GUI the digital age would have been a non-starter.
ReplyDeleteHow can we say that Jobs had no impact on India?