Note: This article was first published, in slightly edited form, in The Guardian on January 5, 2006 under the title ‘Behind the Magic Curtain’. It appears here in unedited form.
When the CEO of Cadbury announces a new line of truffles or speaks at a conference, or Nike introduces a new kind of air-cushioned running shoe, you might expect to see it covered on page 47 of some specialized magazines, then quickly forgotten. But next Tuesday a chief executive will stand up and announce something, and within minutes it’ll be examined in minute detail all across the Web and on stockbrokers’ computers. It’ll be in newspapers. They’ll talk about it for months.
(more…)
In February of 2001, Steve gave the keynote presentation at the Macworld Expo in Tokyo. I was there to do the demo of the new version of Final Cut Pro. Although not nearly as stressful as preparing for my first keynote demo the month before, I was highly stressed nonetheless. 
