steve wozniak
episode 34
The Moonshots Podcast continues our spotlight on Apple Inc. We go back to the early days with original maker-man - Steve Wozniak.
Dive into the early days of Apple, the days of the garage. You'll also be wowed by some the stories by Woz and his enormous respect for Steve Jobs.
show outline
A-BLOCK - Entrepreneurship
INTRO - THE WOZ in his own words
How Woz discovered his passion
It starts with a dream - not a business
Build for yourself first
A Vision of Entrepreneurship that starts with doing
B-BLOCK - Invention and Tech
The night that changed it all...and Apple was born
Thinking different to invent the color PC
Why Woz is so excited about voice interface
OUTRO - Woz knows what he wants to be
TRANSCRIPT
Hello? Hello and welcome to the moonshots podcast. It's episode 34. I am your co-host Mike Parsons. And as always I'm joined by the man himself, Mr. Chatto and Hey Mike. It's uh, it's sunny here in Sydney. How are we looking in Brooklyn? You must be in the midst of a sweltering Brooklyn summer. Oh, it's it's great.
I can't complain. It's not quite a do the right thing. Hot. But, uh, it's, it's definitely getting there. I looked up if I could a swim laps at my neighborhood pool, and unfortunately it doesn't open till 11:00 AM. So I'll have to find another spot to, uh, get into the water and cool off. Well, I don't, I don't know if this show's going to cool you off.
I think it's quite the opposite. I think we're going to turn things up a little here. We've got our second installment of our apples series. Uh, we just did Angela Ahrens and now we're diving into the world. Of another key integral member of the Apple family, but someone who's maybe a mystery to some of our listeners.
Yeah. So I'm pretty sure that most of our listeners are pretty savvy. That Apple was co-founded by, by two individuals and eventually, uh, three individuals. But yeah, we're going to hear from the was, as he is known or Steve Wozniak. There you go. The was, I mean, he is, I mean, he should not be underestimated.
Obviously jobs was, uh, in the limelight for, for many decades was, is, uh, far from being somebody who likes the limelight. In fact, quite opposite. In fact, he, he tends to involve anything that looks like management and leadership. He is really a very special. Person, I would say he's, he's the geeks geek. He's the, the engineer that hates Facebook loves Bitcoin is in the national inventors hall of fame.
He invented the Apple one, the Apple three, the Macintosh, this guy was pivotal in doing so many things. One thing that I thought was amazing, Chad, uh, preparing for this show is that, uh, the was, is responsible for putting color. On our computer screens now, something that we all take for granted, but he's the guy that did it.
I mean, this is how special the was is what, what strikes you about what makes the was so special? I found them to be for such a self-professed geek and engineer. He's a really great storyteller and. I think you really get excited for in the history of Apple when he tells it, which some founders or co-founders can do and others can't.
But, uh, I think he really makes it sound fun. You know, what he and Steve were doing in the garage so many years ago. And I think it just goes back to his, his passion for the science and the engineering of it. Absolutely. And you can tell that he was just someone who found what he, he loved. Um, so early on, and it was so fortunate us that his passion for engineering and ham radio and putting circuits and transistors together, that all of this turned out to be one of the, well, what is today?
The biggest company on the planet? And, uh, he seems so unaffected by it. He's just himself. Uh, he's so charming and down to earth, super bright. And I think we've got an action packed show because he has such a great history with technology. He puts it into some great perspective for us that we've not had before.
And you said it, Chad, he tells some stories and we've got some crackers. He takes us right back to the day to the Garret and he tells the story of how him and Steve really made these breakthrough inventions and an interest twist on all of this is that, uh, HP actually helped Apple a lot in the early days.
But the craziest thing of all that I thought was so mad. Uh, Chad. Was that HP turned down his ideas for the personal computer, not one, two, three, but like, was it six times? He got five times. Oh my gosh. I mean, talk about kicking yourself. That's that's leading with them. He's like, please let me keep my job here and work on the personal computer.
And they're just like this isn't going to be a thing. So Steve, Steve jobs, you know, ended up convincing them. Well, yeah, you know, we just need to do it. And, you know, we want to make you an integral part of Apple. And so I think that's what ended up sealing the deal. Isn't that crazy. I mean, that's up there with, um, blockbuster declining, uh, to acquire Netflix for like $20 million.
That's up there with Kodak inventing the digital camera and then trying to kill it and then being completely displaced by it. I mean, this is all time. This is all time. Great photo bar. If you, if you asked me, but nonetheless, we got so much ahead of us in this show. Lots of entrepreneurial and passion driven ideas.
Lots of ideas about invention and tech too. And if you're interested in any of the things that we're mentioning, please check out the show notes@moonshots.io, where you'll find everything you need about the show. I'm ready. It's it's the temperatures turned up. I'm ready to dive into the world of Steve wasn't yet the co-founder of Apple, Inc.
Um, Do you want to kick us off Chad yet? So, you know, for the most technical of technical founders, I think that we've profiled so far. Um, we've gotten a great intro in his own words. My name is Steve Wozniak and I co founded Apple computer. And I'm also known as the was, I was only like eight years old, maybe seven years old.
My dad was taking me around. He was an electrical engineer and I decided I'm going to be an engineer. Like my dad, I got the most valuable gadget in my life properly. I could tune in radio stations and sleep with music playing all night long. My parents got me a kit. It's an important thing in my life.
And there was a manual that showed you what order to assemble everything, bolt, everything together, solder all the pieces in place. It took weeks to build. And I sat down there and I had a Morse code, key thought it, thought it, thought I've thought, you know, and I, and I was a little ham radio operator.
They didn't teach us stuff in school. They didn't have books and bookstores on it. Nobody else knew this stuff. And I knew it. I grew up in Silicon Valley. We had ride our bikes to orchards, to go anywhere from our house, as far as you could see across the Valley. But because the inventor of the transistor had moved to mountain view, other companies had sprung out.
They were building transistors as a Silicon industry was growing. The only people that could afford the early chips were the military and the government. And my father worked for Lockheed missiles and space division in Sunnyvale. So I discovered a journal in the hallway closet that only engineers would have.
And the journal started out describing how numbers can be represented by computers. Okay. As ones and zeros. And I practiced on paper and started writing ones and zeros and figuring out the numbers. I said, Oh my gosh, this is easy. You don't need higher level math to know what a computer knows, fifth grade math.
So you can understand it all by sixth grade. Actually, my dad suggested why don't make you the play makeup machine that plays tic TAC toe. You make a machine that does that. Yeah. You know, what's so much more, Oh my gosh. And isn't it great to see that, you know, he was inspired by his father. He, he just, you know, he lit this, this fire of curiosity inside of state Wazniak and he was in the right place at the right time, too.
I mean, come on being, you know, growing up in Silicon Valley and his father working for Lockheed, I don't know that the situation gets. You know, any more for tourists for somebody next, Steve, and it's so funny that he talks about, um, you know, cycling and on his bike around the Valley. And it's all orchards as far as you can see, because, you know, having lived in Silicon Valley for six years, my memory of it is just the massive highways and the congestion.
And it's complete suburbia now. Um, It's so amazing to think that we are tuning into somebody who was at the beginning. I mean, it does not get any better than this and isn't it interesting chap when you hear him talk without a doubt, if you don't, actually, if you just feel what he's saying and don't listen to what he's saying, he is in his element here.
And I think passion has to be one of the biggest. Uh, pieces of his success and that has led to his invention is the fact that he is just so fired up about what he's doing. You can really feel it when he talks. Yeah. From age 10. He, when he built his first transistor radio. Yeah. I don't think he, I don't think he stopped doing things with his hands at the company until he left.
Apple. I mean, I'm pretty sure that he was in there in the guts of all of the products that they were building from the first, you know, PC boards that he and Steve jobs are building, I think for like 20 bucks and selling them for 40, um, yeah. All the way to the last products that he worked, that he worked on.
He was just a maker, a technician engineer through and through, and he stuck to that. Oh, yeah. And, and he, he will, as we'll discover, he's very self-aware of what he likes to do, where he is strong and, and avoids the missteps of someone who fails to judge where their strengths are. But this fire is, is such a big lesson.
I mean, I think we've heard from a couple of innovators. I think, I think, you know, when I, when I really reflect on, I think Oprah is deeply driven, uh, and, and. Gained so much of her energy from that. And I, and I think also Branson for sure, is another one that's full of passion and drive different passions, but the same energy.
So this next clip is really powerful because this is us kind of being able to understand, uh, how was discovered and found his passion. So let's have a listen to Steve. Wasn't the founder of Apple, Inc. In early years in my life, I was heavy into electronics. I stumbled into ham radio. You build all the pieces and soldered the parts together, and you had to learn a lot of theory to get a license.
So I had my ham radio license in elementary school and as building these fantastic school projects and I stumbled into computer technology in a journal, there were no books. There were no classes available back then. It was such an accident for a nine-year-old to stumble on a journal and start learning about ones and zeros.
And I just told myself at that very young age, this was the most interesting stuff I had ever discovered. It was going to be my heart's passion for the rest of my life. I would never have a job in it. I didn't think there were jobs in computers back then computers were further out than space science.
You heard about them less on the news. They were huge monstrous machines and nobody else around me was doing this stuff. What excited me about the computer itself is the fact that computers were kind of attributed to being the smartest things that they could do. Jobs that no humans could do. They were Superman stuff.
It was the people that were in the Homebrew computer club that attracted me. Here were a lot of people that were like myself. And they wanted a piece of technology to serve as a tool of a revolution where the young person who was shy, who was unknown, who met nothing but new electronics and new computers was now going to be valuable to the future of society and the world.
So what I did was I had this idea to build the Apple one computer, very affordable. I gave away my computer design for free. Free to everyone. I gave them my code listings. I helped other people build their own. It was when Steve jobs came to a club meeting, whenever he saw interest, he knew that wasn't money.
Steve was the total businessmen. He at the company, I just want to build cool products. The only obstacle I had was I didn't want to start a company on the side of the company that I worked for and loved and was loyal to and would never leave Hewlett Packard because we built products for engineers. And I was an engineer at heart.
So I proposed it to HB first and I pleaded, I wanted them to make this personal computer and they were so intrigued by the idea and they turned it down and it's very, very lucky cause they probably would have built a very boring product for engineers to use rather than citing interesting, colorful, animated game product for normal human beings.
It's just, it's so interesting to hear how like jovial he is in reminisce. Like I would guess if you go into whatever office space or study space Steve has today, like it's going to be strong with parts and gadgets and gizmos that you just get the sense that this is something that he does every single day.
And I think that's. Why he was so attractive to someone like Steve, who, Steve jobs. Who's kind of a little on the outside, like yes, knew about technology, but saw someone with a talent of Steve Wozniak. And I was like, okay. I've got an idea for a business and I want him to build it for me. Yeah. Isn't it crazy to just, uh, as a, as a sideways point here is to think that had HP actually said yes, we would have no Apple.
The biggest company in the world would not exist. Had an HPAC listened to was one of those five times, or how much longer would it have taken for the adoption of the personal computer? You know, not only on every desk, but in every home and now in every pocket on every wrist, you know, it's, it's header in every fridge and get, you know, I think it's, it's very, it's just very telling how.
Nascent the industry was at the time and like just how radical it was. I mean, you know, to get, to get a computer that didn't take up as much space as your, your furniture, you had to go or your house, you had to go to these computer clubs and learn how to build them. Yes. And again, for Steve Wozniak, it was completely over his head, uh, that there was even an, uh, a business proposition in this.
Like, he was just, he's just like, I want to get together with other cool computer geeks and, and build, you know, build better in different computers. And it took an outsider to understand the value in that and, and the market ability. Of that. And that, of course that's when Steve jobs enters the picture.
Well, um, you know, think, gosh, I mean, what talk about a Batman and Robin duo, but, but just, uh, going back one step. The other thing that strikes me, he's very much like Yvon Chouinard. It's sort of an accidental entrepreneur in this case was, is just trying to do cool stuff with transistors and circuit boards and, and microprocessors and all of that stuff.
As you said, like there's no, even. Notion of, of a business here and then it, it really didn't present itself, uh, as a route until HP had said no that many times, and that they had actually subsequently picked up so much momentum in almost, it was like a slam dunk. It was so obvious that they should go and do this.
And I think what's really powerful here. Is that the reminder that we're getting is that passion, interest and mission is really crucial to an entrepreneur's success. What's crazy about the next clip is I think it was pushes this even further is, you know, you really need to start with a dream and see if that dream could come true before you even pursue the idea of a business.
So let's, let's have a listen to two was now talking about dreaming first before a business. When I told my father that someday I was gonna give up a house. Cause computer costs as much as a house. I was going to live in an apartment so I could have my own computer. Finally, I saw the formula to try to make a computer that a person could afford to own.
So I saw the formula and that was just so lucky. I was going to build that computer for myself. No matter what I didn't think. Hey, I got a great idea. Let's start a company. I didn't think that way at all. I'm going to build a computer that impresses them. I'm going to show it to them because showing off was really my way of communicating.
I was still shy and I'm going to pass out my designs for free. And tell everybody for $300, you can build your own computer. That is so good. You can actually type programs in and run them. And that was the start for me. I would have done that thing in 1975, whether there was any idea of Apple computer, a company, um, anything like that, I would have just done that for myself.
And eventually Steve jobs came into town and he saw it. And he said, let's start a company, but, but people think, Oh my gosh, that was the start of Apple. Steve and I had been selling my, my designs for five years. I mean, we already had our company in, uh, in, you know, spiritual terms. Yeah. And they were both working at two other giant tech companies.
And as, as was the saying here, like this was really just a side gig for them for, for quite some time. So, you know, Steve was at a tare, I believe at this time. And Steve jobs was, and Steve Wozniak was at HP and they really only kind of came together at these computer clubs and, you know, selling. Selling their PC boards to a mom and pop computer.
Yeah. Well, and, and mom and pop computer computer stores as well. And what I'm taking away from this is a lot of the innovators we've heard from on the show, talk about identifying talent and, you know, bringing the right people in. And I don't know that many talk about. This in, in terms of co-founders and in, you know, starting a business with someone that, uh, compliments you in the right ways and has the right talents.
But I mean, I think Steve Wasniak like embodies the best of a technical co-founder. So if, if you're, uh, If you're an entrepreneur out there and you're you're, and you've got a great business idea, or you're a great marketer, like Steve jobs look for someone like Steve Wazniak, you know, go, go to those weird places where the geeks hang out and, you know, be genuinely interested in what they're doing and have cool and unique ideas and how they can spread it further.
Because I think Steve jobs convinced the Wozniak to start the business because in a way it was. Helping increase the speed in which more and more people could get these in their own homes, which is a cool idea. Wazniak and not necessarily making the money, but it's just giving the power of this new computers to more and more people.
And I think that's really what I'm taking away from this interesting contrast between the two co-founders of Apple, very rarely. And isn't of, uh, the Nike founders. Now I'm going to challenge. Your memory banks here, because I always failed to remember the guy. It was Phil Knight. And then there was this, the guy who actually put the, uh, the plastic in the waffle maker to make the first Nike, um, I can't remember the name of, do you remember the, the other Nike founder?
I'm drawing a blank too. His coach. Yeah. Yeah. But my point here is once again, there was sort of this tech. S or engineer and businessmen together. Um, two of the greatest companies on the planet in history, Apple and Nike started our men. That's it. Bill Bauman and Phil Knight. It's almost copy and paste, uh, uh, the two Steves at Apple, but the important take out here is I, I honestly think it's so bloody hard to do a startup by yourself as a single founder.
It's such a huge burden. You need to be able to share the load, but what, what you've pointed out is that chemistry that natural. balance, um, that we see here in the two Steves at Apple, it's incredibly powerful because they're full of passion. They've got this very big vision of, of what can be, and I think it really sets you up, but what's really cool about the Wars.
Yeah. Is, he's got some other thoughts that really, I think, build off this and he's a really big, uh, you know, it's funny chairing. He doesn't say the word, but I kind of think he's a stealth prototype guru, the Wazniak, what are you? Well, he just builds stuff. I mean, so of course he is, I think. Uh, everything, he, it, he also embodies this, you know, uh, solve a problem that you yourself have and, and create a product that you want most.
Um, I won't talk about it. I'll just let him, uh, share that with us. My tips are don't necessarily think that you have to have the home run and the huge Apple computer on your first start. I spent a long time in my life with skills, just building little devices for fun. For fun is one of the key things.
Cause that drives you to think and think, and think and make it better and better and better than you ever would. If you're doing it for a company, build things at first for yourself that you would want. If you're going to build a retail or a real estate business online. Well, if you're not in the real estate business, you're not going to really think about it the right way.
You're building it for other people. That's what I say is wrong. You should be building it for yourself. And if you're not building it for yourself, you better have a tight partnership with somebody that is, that absolutely wants it for themselves because they're going to want it to be so perfect and so right.
And not confusing and make it all the beauty into the product. Yeah, building yourself first for your, for yourself. First is such a big one because for me, um, if you're very present in the problem that exists, you'll know the solution. When you see, and then you can go and test and learn with other customers, but this is building for yourself first.
This theme, Chad, this is coming back quite a lot in the, in the recent shows, I feel like Martha was actually, you know, be your own customer was a big part of what she talked about her success was coming from is she was really building for herself. I think he, he's also kind of extrapolating from this saying don't, don't create the business first and like hire engineers to build it for you later.
Because they're not going to be as invested in it. And so you really need, I mean, how many times have you seen a company do just that they have a flash of insight and an idea and they have an engineering team builder, NDP. And how, how far does that go? Yeah, not very far, but you, what you'll find in the second half of the show is that the clips that we have.
Really put proof to this that the engineers need to will we'll have to overcome problems that, uh, that are enormous and it, and it comes down to the passion and the dream, but also building for yourself because in the end was wanted the solution as much as anybody this drove him, uh, and, and enabled him to work harder, longer, deep into the night, he talked about.
Working till four in the morning for months, and to get some of his work done, particularly when he was doing the underlying operating system for the Apple one, I think this build for yourself is so interrelated to the vision and the passion, but we're seeing this is, you know, think about it brands and did the same thing.
He waived. He couldn't get a flight. So he went and charted his own jet and went, walked around the airport with a chalkboard. So there's building things for yourself. First. It's such a powerful way to know if you have problem solution fit. I think it's a such a big learning don't you chat and even, you know, the likes of Yvon Chouinard, making reusable, aluminum P tons that they could, you know, uh, put into the sides of rock faces, and then take out instead of leaving all of the, all of the, you know, litter of, of steel
You know, and, and then, and grew the company from there. Again, he he's a self-proclaimed dirt bag and we had that, uh, Steve Wozniak is itself the claimed computer geek. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. And the funny thing is that a sort of subtle revelation that's come to me throughout the show is once again, Chad, where we're hearing that not only was it a passion, which, you know, and, and they built for themselves.
But it took, it took a long time. I mean, he talks about for years, he was, you know, geeking out and filling around and building stuff and, and, and just prototyping way before the actual company was created. I believe, you know, he, I mean, he's referencing, you know, when he was doing. A ham radio at the age of 10 was really the start of that.
Isn't it funny, that subtle thing that we're seeing more and more, these people are actually not overnight successes at all. It's sort of a life mission that maybe starts as a side hustle or even just a hobby and it takes years for it to manifest it and, and start contrast. I think to a lot of what's happening today in 2017, 2018.
Where you have a lot of quote, unquote serial entrepreneurs that are kind of moving from one idea to the next and they may not have had any personal interest or experience beforehand. I think that's what makes. Steve stories. So interesting is yes, this is something that he, he was obsessed with since he was 10 years old.
And it turned into Apple computer. Yeah. Not, not every day. It is like your, you know, your daily activities. And in the summer as a young kid, like, you know, turn into one of the most influential companies of our time. It's just, it doesn't happen that often. Any more. And so I think that's, it's really refreshing to me to learn from, from Steve and, and how, uh, it really just, it started when he was, it was 10 years old.
And what's nice about the sort of extent of his thinking and wisdom is actually, he's got some really clear thinking on how to take that passion and that, that practice of building for yourself. He's actually got some really good thinking about how you can connect that to entrepreneurship. So, um, we're very fortunate now in this next clip, he's going to really talk about how to build the bridge and, and where you need to start with entrepreneurship.
Knowing that so much of what we do today involves technology and engineering. So let's have a listen to Steve wasn't yet. These days, entrepreneurship is taught as courses in all the colleges, and usually it's a business level course. So you've got all these business guys that, Oh my gosh. If I write some ideas down on paper, that's how you go about it.
Starting a company. And I, my principal is no, I, I, so many people in Silicon Valley got used to write ideas down on paper and then try to get some money, try to get some money, try to get some money. Like we can just buy the engineering for it. No, I liked the type entrepreneurship that has actually created working models.
Here is an example of something that works the way we want and we built it and we've got the, the talented, the talented technical people that know how to do it. Yeah. Putting entrepreneurs and engineers together from the start and actually doing stuff, not guessing and writing it down the pace of like, actually.
Define the problem and try and solve it and start with rolling up those sleeves. This is such a powerful thought, Chad, like, I'm like, yes, yes. I'm violently nodding. As we're recording this podcast, you know, this is a little bit, you know, from the peanut gallery. Cause you know, yes, you and I have started.
In our own ventures and running our companies. But like there is, you know, I, I work in inside of a, we work here in, in Brooklyn and there's definitely that, that startup hustle it money. I got a good idea, you know, it's worth a million dollars kind of thing. And in the back of my mind, I'm just thinking like, you know, what are you building?
You know, what are you doing, uh, to make that a reality? And so it's, it's inspiring. It's inspiring to me, you know, to listen to Steve and it's like Apple, you know, the biggest company today didn't start like, just as an idea, like, no, it was, it started when Steve was, Nick was 10 years old and it took five years of them, you know, hustling to sell their, their PC boards to two people before the company even really was started as a legal entity.
And so the, you know, that. We've got some, even more interesting clips about the origin story. So I don't want to like give too much of that, but we'll hit for the second half of the show. Yeah. So, what I wanted to say was just to build off what you were saying is Apple is the furthest thing from some Oppenheimer opportunistic land grab.
This was two guys who deeply wanted to see. Personal computers and technology kind of come out of the refines of HP and these large tech companies and get them into the homes of, of all of us. And, you know, they had this very, um, Homebrew computer club. Kind of hacky prototype B, um, build some stuff kind of approach, which is really coming from, from their passion.
And you know, this is the powerful learning is don't go and do some sort of land grab. Don't be opportunistic. In terms of starting just another company and trying to raise money. That's so fraught with so many challenges, like start with something that you care about. That the big thing here for me is this is what keeps you going through the dark times, because I am sure that if you don't, if you're not really invested in the mission of your company or what you're trying to do, You just going to give up on it when times get tough.
Right. Chad? I mean, that's what people do if they don't, if they don't believe in it, they just, at the first sign of adversity, then they're out the back door. Yeah. So this idea of just to borrow from Nike, just do it, uh, in, instead of kind of. Uh, coming up with the business case first, I think really encapsulates this first half of the show where entrepreneurship for someone like Steve Wazniak is in, is in the work, is in the act of creation, uh, much less so than the, the numbers and the, the marketing plans, uh, et cetera, which I think is, uh, an interesting angle on.
Uh, what entrepreneurship is in contrast to some of these other immune shutters that we've learned from in the past. Yeah. And I think it's a timely reminder to, to, to stop guessing and start knowing if you've got something very, very inspiring, um, that, that everything that is today, the biggest company in the world, And an Apple, uh, all started with passion and vision.
And I think there's a lot for us to take out of that. I think an interesting point that we touched on, which we haven't done a lot in the show is this idea of get yourself a co-founder. I'd love to just call that out and reinforce that. Yeah. Something that we always reflect on. There's just no way this show would happen if it wasn't the two of us.
Yep. Right. It wouldn't, that would not happen. It would not happen. Oh. So, so, so it, you know, I think about just that as an example, I think of what we mentioned with Bauman and, and Phil Knight and at Nike, um, and the list goes on and on and on that, um, You know, getting through those early, early times, those early stages of a company of an idea or a vision really is much better when, when it's two or more.
And I think what a great sort of. Bunch of wisdom that we've just got from Steve was NIAC in the first half of the show. The cool thing is that we're going to dive into a whole world of invention and technology and stay tuned because we've got some grouping. I mean, this is these clips coming up, Chad, this is where we see some of his storytelling just come to the fore.
Right? Like, could you imagine like what Apple would be if it were. Or what the two companies would be if one was started by Steve Wozniak and the other was started by Steve jobs, like would either of them even still exist today? Probably not because, you know, if you think about how they kind of covered up each other's weaknesses and I don't know, it was one plus one equals three with these two guys.
I mean, what a, what a train wreck of an idea. I mean, I don't think they would have got very far, but, um, just stay tuned, everyone. This is where you got some great stuff. Uh, great stuff. But before we get into the second half, I just wanted to remind everyone that you can find all of the show notes and things that we mentioned here on the show and leave feedback for us at moonshots.
Dot IO. We really appreciate you taking the time to, to share your feedback and thoughts with us. Um, so yeah, send us an email@helloatmoonshotsdotatt.io. And, um, yeah, we'd love your feedback and something we want to hear from, as we've been kicking, uh, some ideas around about, uh, you know, what would be the next.
Series of the show. And I think something we'd love to hear from, from the audience is we're thinking we could do an author series, you know, uh, Eric Reese in the lean startup, uh, classics like Peter Drucker and clay Christianson, or perhaps doing an investor series, you know, Warren buffet. Oh gram, et cetera, et cetera.
You know, tell us, tell us where you think we should go here. We need some help. So it was an architects series. I was just thinking about a filmmaker series. There's so many, so many, uh, realms we can and industries we can dive into. Oh my gosh. I imagine Kubrick and Scorsese are so, so many innovators. Yeah.
Too many to list. Yeah. So where do we want to start this journey into invention and technology? Where do we start yet? I think we go to essentially the inception of Apple. Um, so I'll just get out of the way of Steve and have him, uh, tell us about when Apple was born. The first night of the Homebrew club changed my life.
I didn't know a thing about this microprocessor chip. And I was scared thinking I'll never come back to this club and they'll never know I was there. And I took the microprocessor data sheet home that night. And as I read its instructions, I said, Oh my God, this is just like those mini computers. I used to design in high school.
And Steve said we should start a company. So I had to go to Hewlett Packard first because I would never do something behind Hewlett Packard's back. And I. For them, my ideas on the personal computer after Hewlett Packard turned me down for the first of six times, Steve said, let's build a PC board. And that was the premise on which we started Apple, then a local store wanting to buy computers with all the parts in them.
I mean, Steve called me at work one day, Hewlett Packard. And he said, are you sitting down? And he said, I got a $50,000 order. That was a freakish moment. Oh my God. And we were in business. Now just one thing that comes to my mind, do you remember this is like 30, 40 years ago. So $50,000 as your first order, that is huge.
And Steve had to make all of them himself.
Uh, lucky he enjoyed it so much because there's just no way. Oh my God. Him making all of those computers. Um, but what a magical moment to think, getting that call he's sitting in HP, ironically, who had the chance to have done this themselves. It passed on it five times and Steve dis. Managed to convince some folks to make the first order and the rest, as they say is history.
Chad, isn't it great. We don't often get these moments where you see the Genesis. I mean, we had it with Branson. We love that story of him. You know, um, being stuck at the airport, but I'm not sure this is one of the only other real moments that accompany is born. Yeah. And, and, and maybe some of this is mythologized, I think between the two Steves, they probably could, uh, embellish this story if they had wanted, but at the end of the day, it, it, I think it was that, that moment when he got the call from Steve who was at Atari.
And then he, he himself is sitting, you know, in the, in the halls engineering halls of. Of HP, um, you know, saying, Hey, we got an order for, you know, a couple of, hundred of these computers. We've got to get to work this weekend so that we can cancel your weekend. But, uh, look, the stories of invention continue and these magic moments in Apple history.
Continue this next one is. Something, I didn't know anything about, and I, you know, I'm a pretty big Apple fan boy, but I had never heard this one. And what's really cool about this is we take color screens for granted and, you know, whenever I move off my, my retina or my. IPhone 10 screen for some weird reason.
And I'm working on something that's not retina. Uh, I mean the house of protests that I have of the poor screen quality, but there was a day where it was just black and white or kind of shades of this awful green and a Wazniak was like, you know what? Let's bring color to the personal computer and this next clip it's, it's a little bit longer.
But what I, what I really want everyone to do is just appreciate, we're going to hear in, in some detail, how color has been brought to the PC screen and how we are listening to the inventor. Literally walk us through that thinking process. I want everyone to think now about how they could apply the same rigor, the same creativity to something they're working on.
So let's have a listen to the was. The idea came, luckily in either comes here, doesn't sometimes to solve these things like putting color into computers. That was probably one of the biggest things Apple ever did. Nobody expected color to come into a computer because color machines cost a thousand dollars to germinate color and it had tons of chips.
And I figured out a way to do it with one little $1 chip. And I, and it was really strange how it happened, but this would apply to young children. I was without sleep for four days and nights because Steve jobs and I got a project to design a game for a tare called breakout. And we, and I, he said, and needed the money quick.
So we had to do it in four days and nights. I didn't think it was possible back then and games weren't software, they were hardware, little chips and voltages to wires from here to there, make it work. And I didn't think it was possible, but I said, I'll try it. And I just think the whole thing and we got it done for it.
It's nuts, but when you're without sleep, when you're going to sleep, you're in your head goes briefly into this period of. Really creativity kind of thinking it's not restricted to the normal thoughts of life and the day when you're waking up your head's a little like that. Well, my head was kind of in this floating half asleep state and out on the Atari floor, they only had black and white TVs and those dates for the video, the first arcade games.
They had this dark going across the screen, it's changing colors, like a rainbow, and it was hypnotizing like you're in a concert or something. And they just put little strips of Mylar, red, green, blue, yellow on the TV screen to do it. And I started thinking it was so beautiful. And I remember exactly what bench I was at.
Steve was, was wiring up the board over there and I'm red to this one bench. I just started drifted and I thought, you know, signals for color TVs. I remember from high school electronics, they go up and down, up and down at a certain speed. And I thought, what if you made a signal, it went up and down and up and down at different rate.
What? It looked like, color, just a digital, the normal, simple thing I can do with almost no parts at all. Would it look like color? And then, Oh my gosh, I figured out a way that I could have little Ford, little zero one bitch circling around and it could go up and down at different time. And red would become blue.
I can put it in a different pattern of ones and zeros. I had 16 patterns and it could become a different shade. It might be a little lighter and it might be a little darker what at work, you know, and didn't know. But when I finally wired it up about a year later, um, and brought Steve over, I mean, we saw it and that was Eureka.
You know, we knew this was a change, a big change in the world. Yeah, what am I mentioned? Yeah, the invention of, of color on, on displays for computers. It, I almost want to go back and listen to the clip again, because it's kind of engineered geek speak, but in a way you can kind of follow his train of thought where much of that is just kind of the crucible of the environment and the situation.
That forced them to do that. So my takeaway actually from this is kind of like why constraints are so amazing for creativity because they had four days to do this. It put him in the state of mind, this kind of wacky state of mind. That was like, what if I like crammed these, these disparate pieces of technology and learning and, and or knowledge and in engineering and tried it out.
And he wasn't able to do it right then and there because you know, they still have this deadline to meet, but a year, you know, he kind of worked on it, I'm sure for a year. And then finally was able to realize his, his idea. Um, I also like, uh, the lesson in here if thinking different, uh, something that later went on to become their brand manifesto and, and slogan.
But did you notice how he just asked, well, why can't I do it this way? And I think about what else has color and can I use that model in this situation and just thought outside of the box and, and. It really started with with just by becoming so deeply immersed in the problem. And then just asking some radically different questions.
He was out of Britain, bring color to the PC. And I think this speaks so much to how we ask questions of, you know, The solutions to the problems. And I think this is at the heart of it, because if you, if you see a problem and you can find a radically different way of solving it, then you're really you, you, this is really the path to innovation and doing something that's radically, massively different than what's on offer today.
It's doing, it's solving the problem in a different way because you often get. Extraordinary returns that haven't been seen before by doing it like that. So for me, this was a bit of an inspiration on thinking differently. How about you on that whole thing? Different. I just really loved that. Didn't you chat?
I do. And I think it's, it's also been interesting to me kind of reflecting in doing the research on this show, like the difference between invention and innovation. Yeah. And so Steve wasn't that comes from this. Deep engineering culture inside of the kind of premier engineering company at the time, HP, where engineers are just building things to build things, or, you know, they're inventing things to invent things, whether they're useful and solving a problem, you know, like that's, that's a totally different question.
So. So that's invention. Whereas I think innovation is the invention, but there's also like it's solving a problem. It's new and novel and it's like creating good or positive change. And I think Steve Wozniak and Steve jobs, you know, kind of helped strike the match that began, you know, the personal computer revolution and they just, you know, we're riding that wave.
So they were. They were committed to, to putting the best personal computer in as many places as possible. And so I think that kind of good and positive mission that was validated in the marketplace by, by the demand combined with the invention. Was really what accelerated the growth and success of the company, at least, you know, in its first decade, decade, and half.
Well, think about it though, Chad. I mean, that's what they did with the Apple one and the Apple two and the Apple three, but in the Mac, but then went on to continue doing with. I pod, I pad I phone. So, you know, look, it, it was in their DNA and, um, that is the theme of Apple. They just have been doing it over many, many, many decades.
And it's this, this decades of experience that gives was such a powerful view of. How technology can work. And we actually have a great clip, uh, coming up now, which is him looking a little bit into the future, but putting it into this frame of reference that he has, which is just all he's invented, all this amazing stuff.
And he's now looking at the future in this next clip and thinking about. What could be. And the paradigms that, that the PC and technology is really all about. So let's have a listen to, what's got Steve Wazniak excited about the future. And just over time in computers of all the year eras from back when it was vacuum tubes and punch cards, it's basically input, output, how it connects to a human being.
How do you actually use it? You know, and we got past punch cards. We got to our little terminals with the personal computers. We got to mouses and gooey. That means the. Play and the input, the input and the output, we're changing different ways. And now we've gone, we've gone a step further. We've gone to touch.
We went, we went to track pads and then we went to screens a lot that's changing, but I think the biggest change is going to be voice bill Atkinson at the recent macro, I believe said commented that, um, really the future of, of the smartphones is voice control. He may, he may, he may have been a little early on this.
I still think that this has to play out, but I mean, who knows? I trust his judgment again, like you said, because of his decades of experience, but I'm actually not interested in the voice control. I'm, I'm kind of like interested in, like, I have no idea what it is, but like what's the, what's the thing past.
That's right. So this is where the things like what Elon Musk is working on with the kind of computer brain interface. Like that kind of stuff I think is, is, is even cooler. Right? So, so let's just get into this for a moment. What I, what I think was really cool is he gave this clue at the start of that clip, where he said, look, it essentially comes down to the inputs and the outputs.
How do we get the data in. To computers and how we get it out. And if you think about it, that's exactly what your example from Elon is all about. It's just different inputs and outputs. And I thought that was really powerful. It's like, without a doubt, when we talk about voice, the removal of physical interface and the click click click, I truly think we'll be.
An amazing experience, whether you can make this at scale in the near term, who knows, because look, let's be honest, Siri, anchor eight, Alexis better, uh, from my experience, but it's also not great. And, um, I still notice and Google assistant, you know, still apologizes to me when I ask her what the weather tomorrow is going to be or yesterday or not tomorrow.
What was the weather yesterday? She still can't do. Oh man. So look, we know it's it's early times, but, um, the, the, the removal of that is a great, uh, of, of the physical interface. It is a great use case. And when you're on the go and you can. Um, you can get the quick commands to your technology. This, this is going to be an aha moment, whether we can get there in the, in the short term, totally different thing.
But what I so dependent upon other technologies like machine learning and, and, you know, the development of neural networks, et cetera, which again is still, uh, I think the bottleneck for, for voice that's true, but you know, what's really inspiring about. Listening to, to the was, is I think he's reminded us that the paradigm here, the paradigm is, is really, really about inputs and outputs.
And this is like the coalface of innovation. So if you're thinking of like what what's, uh, an interesting side hustle, I'd be like fixing inputs and outputs. I'd be looking at voice. I would be looking at. What's before that. What did, what did, what you mentioned, Chad? That's like, you think it, and it happens in the computer.
That's obviously the next, the next level there, but great to see this big frame that he can, he can put technology within. And I, I just think that. When I reflect on what we've just heard from him, uh, this deep dive into, into thinking like how to, how to bring color to the PC screen. And, and that magical moment that he got the call from Steven says we got an order for 50,000, all of this, uh, invention and technology and these magic moments bring to life, um, how great the company.
Got started with, with, uh, Steve Wazniak as the lead engineer. Like this guy was so hell bent on making things better for the PC, um, in you're left with almost no doubt. There's no wonder these guys succeeded. And then the coolest thing is you throw in a Steve jobs next to him and then it is totally Batman and Robin, isn't it?
Yeah. My biggest takeaway. Is really, you know, if you really want to start a great company, try just finding something that you're extremely passionate about and obsessed with and want to do all day every day to four in the morning for. Months on end, you will stumble onto the idea or, or the product or the service, and someone will find you and give you the money or give you the marketing expertise or, you know, help you co-found run the company.
And, uh, that's, what's really interesting to me about Steve Wozniak because his archetype is like kind of different from maybe what we first think of when we think of innovator, entrepreneur. Kind of archetype and, you know, he's, he's definitely, he's a geek through and through. And so I, I liked that he kind of bucks that, that expectation and stereotype.
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. He he's, um, such a. Stark contrast to what I think a lot of people might consider to be the perfect archetype. Um, and I think what it, what he reminds us of is build for yourself, love what you're doing it like, and it's, and it's passion first before business. But the, uh, the, the, the most charming thing perhaps about the was, is.
Outside of all of the inventions and all of the advice he has for us is I think one of the most powerful things. Uh, about him is he just knows who he wants to be. So we've got a final clip that I think is beautiful in capturing the true essence of the was. So let's have a listen to, there was talking about who he wants to be in the world.
And, uh, he's playing around here with one of these original Apple, one inventions as he talks. I don't remember the beat command. Do I too bad? I worked in my own language. Oop run says, hello. My name is Steve. Apparently see it, but it's there soldering things together, putting the chips together, designing them, drawing them on grafting tables.
That was so much a passion in my life. And to this day, they'll stay at the bottom of the org chart being an engineer because that's where I want to be. At the bottom of the org chart and have not, not a bad place to be. Uh, if you've got someone like Steve jobs, you know, running the company with you. Sure.
But have you, have you heard this from anyone? Anybody else on the show? I mean, no. I mean, evolution doesn't even have a job at the company. He doesn't have a formal role. He's just like spiritual leader. Vision do. Um, but I think the closest kind of explicit advice along this line is from bill Belichick and the do your job mantra.
I mean, his role is different, but the fact that he says, you know, do your job. And I think, you know, that Steve was Nick, like he knew his place and he was like, I, I want to be in the corner, in the closet with my soldering gun and, uh, that's where I belong. And don't invite me to any management meetings.
Nope, no. Oh, I like that. I like the sound of that. Yeah. Yeah. He's he? What a wonderful character could you have asked for a more friendly, uh, fun, uh, just. He's like that lovable uncle, the Woz isn't he, he's just such a charming guy. Um, yeah. And, and, and like I said, at, at the, at the start, he's a great storyteller, you know, I think he.
You can tell that he looks very fondly on his memories, you know, at the beginning of Apple, I mean, sure. There's stories of kind of what has happened later, but I don't think you can argue that him just getting to build the things that he wanted to build and having someone like Steve jobs help him turn that into a business was like perfect for him.
Absolutely. Perfect. So, so what I. What I'm trying to think of is what am I taking out of this? I think, you know, get a founder was a powerful reminder and I, I think it starts with the doing is perhaps the most powerful message he has for us. I'm really sort of, um, I, I think I may be making a mistake sometimes with my ideas that I.
That I indulge in them in paper and fantasy and fancy looking slides. And I'm a great fan of prototyping, but maybe even this is another powerful reminder for me is just going, do it, like stop talking about it. Stop writing it down. Go do it. And really big reminder here. Well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna push you a little further there, Mike, like, what's, what's the thing right now.
That's like maybe a hobby or something that you, you find yourself getting lost in, in the work that you're doing, you know, along the lines of, you know, soldering, PCB boards and that kind of thing. I'm curious if there's anything. Like that for you now. And then if not, like maybe this is a challenge for you to, to do that.
Yeah. And I, I think that the, what I think about is the first way I would process it. I think what you and I both did is we had this passion for making moonshots. So we pretty quickly. And started building this show together. Didn't we, I think we would have made the, was pretty happy with that approach. Um, so I, I feel like we did it right there.
My, my thing would be, I probably am. I'm very excited about, you know, not only the work that I do, you know, during the day as a, as a sort of innovation guide and. Uh, all of that good stuff. I love what I'm doing here. And, and you know, another big part of how I spend my time is, is coaching people to play rugby, um, on all three fronts.
I'm. Quite busy doing. And I think that the richness that I get from all of those is because I do this stuff. So, um, I find that like I have that management. No, I'm just, I'm just doing I'm I I'm I'm like the was I I'm just out on the rugby field doing the coaching, you know, so I spent a good three hours out on the rugby pitch last night in the middle of a Sydney winter.
Coaching and, and helping others. And it it's just so damn rewarding. I feel like my own little was of, of rugby coaching. Um, so I think that the, the rewards are there and I, I humanly could not fit anything else into my. Day into my, into my week schedule. So that gives me all the permission to turn it back at you.
Don't you don't you try that on me. So come on. Um, you've, you've heard it starts with the doing, and I know you're busy producing a lot of work at the moment. Can you find another, another vehicle that has perhaps got to get out of. Out of the, uh, the PowerPoint and into the doing, I think for me, it's going back to like, I can't quite put my finger on when I became, so just enamored and in awe of, of films.
And so making a documentary, I mean, there's like a couple of moments in time that I think compounded, you know, to bring me where I am today and what I'm spending as much extra, you know, The 15 minutes here and the hours on. It at one hour on the weekend, there is just going back to kind of the ancient roots of story and storytelling and trying to learn from the likes of Aristotle and Homer and Joseph Campbell.
And wow. Really just steeping myself in what is myth and what is collective consciousness and all of these crazy, crazy, crazy things. Um, I think, yeah. Because I'm realizing that the power of story and a direct line that I drew really just in the past couple of weeks is like all strategy is, is a story.
You know, that that's, that's ex that's well executed, and this is all, all of those things are I think, coming together for me to like really just up my, my story with a capital S game. So yeah, my, my stack of reading is grown by several feet and, um, Also turning that into, into some writing, which is something that I haven't done much of beforehand.
So that's, that's what I'm hoping can kind of form the bedrock of, you know, the, the next transformation that my work and my business goes through here in the next couple of months and years. Nice. Ah, that's inspiring. Well, you've got plenty of inspiration, uh, from the was to get you going on your, on your mission.
And, um, before we sign off, I think we have to take a moment just to entertain the idea. Of our next show. I mean, come on, Chad. There is no bigger show than next week. I don't know if you want to hype it up too much. My, we have to deliver, well, you know me, I'm the energy. Bring it here. Come on, Chad. This thing is massive.
It's gigantic. It's. Dude there's no bigger than, than the focus of our next show. Come on. I'm I'm very curious to see if we can uncover or shine a light on something that's maybe been underreported, slightly overlooked. Oh. So that's what I'm really spending my time. And in preparation for the show is like, there is this.
Out their public persona of who Steve jobs was and like really what he's brought to the world and to the tech industry. Um, but like, I want us to, to find some out of the ordinary things. So that's what I'm hoping. We, uh, we come to the table with that. He is fantastic. That is totally, uh, pricked my.
Imagination because you're absolutely right. We've all heard a million stories about Steve jobs and, um, yeah, we gotta, we gotta find a way to package this together. I also think that. Ed capital on, on the show we did with him, alluded to the fact that actually, uh, there was a transformation in the latter part of Steve's career where he, uh, he made a change that not a lot of people saw.
And so it would be interesting to dig into that a little bit. I also think that he's. Equally a product genius as he is a marketing genius. And, um, I truly believe that these other two skills, the two practices that, that make up modern innovation, the modern company, uh, all growth comes from those two things is my firm belief.
So I am, I feel like I'm going to, to sit down with the grand master for the next show. And I am so excited because. I deeply love both the, the telling of story and marketing and the building and designing of product and put those two together. And I think it's just, uh, it's magical. It's Nike, it's Apple, Google.
It's Amazon. So I'm, I'm very excited about that. So, man, I just can't wait. Um, and, and we have another we'll do Tim cook after Steve jobs. That will be a four-part Apple executive series. And don't forget we did Jonathan Ives. So if people want to check out our previous show on Jonathan OD, where can they go for that, Chad?
And they can go to moonshots. Dot IO. And you will find all of the links to subscribe on your favorite pod catcher. You'll find summaries of all of our episodes and show notes, uh, in you'll even find in the area where we're kind of, uh, teasing some potential show topics. And again, you can find all of that@moonshots.io.
Exactly. Well, I think we've come to that, uh, that time, uh, where we set off into the sunset of New York or to the morning break, uh, hearing in Sydney, Chad, this was so cool. I mean, what a storyteller was the walls, huh? Really fun. And two. And I, again, I think just really encouraging to all of those geeks that live in all, all of us, you know, it's okay to just go and do your thing.
And, uh, and you know, as long as you stick to it and, uh, and connect with the right people along the way, you know, good things can happen. I agree, fitting words, uh, to wrap up show. So thank you to you, our listeners. Thank you to you, Chad. Can't wait for you this next show. I am. I am so literally going to actually start the prep today here in Sydney, Australia.
So thank you to all, uh, where at the end of show, 34, where we focused on. None other than Steve Wazniak and we will see you for the next show where we dive into the world of Steve jobs from Apple. That's it for today. We'll see you next time. See you later, the moonshots podcast.