Episode 32 - WOZ Steve Wozniak, Apple Computer on Inventing as Art, Philanthropy and the Spirit of Creativity Part 2 of 2
This is part two of a two part interview of Steve Wozniak, who personally invented the Apple I and II and launched Apple Computer with Steve Jobs in 1976. Thirty years later he released his autobiography, "iWoz: How I Invented the Personal Computer, co-Founded Apple and Had Fun Doing It." Hear Susan get beyond the book and deeper than Google deets to explore one of the most generous and down-to-earth icons of Silicon Valley. Hear how technology shaped his world view; why he believes inventors are like artists and what the greatest technical challenges are that face the current generation. Hear Steve's opinion on the "Technology Divide" (i.e. the so-called 'racial ravine') and how he adopted the Los Gatos school district, providing students and teachers with hands-on equipment. Find out what one gadget he'd take if he were marooned on an island...you'll be surprised!
Uncover Steve's list of inventions. Hear what he'd say today to Paul Terrell, owner of The Byte Shop who gave Apple their start with a $50,000 order. Find out what he learned in his 30s', 40's and now where his passion for technology stands today in his 50's. Discover the one thing that pushed him hardest in his life (so far) and which of his prestigious awards he most values. Find out about his wide-ranging philanthropic work - from founding the Silicon Valley Ballet, the Tech Museum, the Children's Discovery Museum, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and launching Shoreline Amphitheater with Bill Graham. Woz even has a street in San Jose named after him - "Woz Way" - hear how that landed for him when he found out.
Understand his love of anagrams, repetitious phone numbers and vanity license plates and what they all share in common. Hear about Dial-A-Joke and Phone Phreaking with his Blue Box. Learn about his new love, Segway Polo and his team The Silicon Valley Aftershocks. Woz sets the record straight on what Us Magazine reported about him dating comedienne Kathy Griffin and if he did indeed buy her that flashy ring you see in the press photos. Track him on his Hard Rock memorabilia collection and his most guilty pleasure. Hear about his favorite concert he ever attended besides his own US Festivals in the 80's - Roger Waters' "The Wall" tour. See why it was magical. Then Suz and Woz discuss the "Tyranny of Good Intentions: How Prosecutors and Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice."
This two part series tracks Steve's history, his current passions and gets deep into some of his beliefs about technology, philanthropy and what's most important in life. Don't forget to listen to part one. Enjoy!
Transcript
Transcript
Susan Bratton: Welcome to Dishy Mix, I’m your host Susan Bratton, and you have been enjoying a two part with Steve Wozniak, better known as Woz. He’s the inventor of the Apple computer, the founder of Apple computer, and the author of a new book with Gina Smith called, I Woz: How I Invented The Personal Computer, Co-founded Apple and Had Fun Doing It. Our computer geek turned cult icon has spent a solid hour telling us about his amazing life. We’re going to learn all kinds of things from philanthropy to dating to gadgets to Segway Polo to the Us Festivals, his famous, his favorite rock concert and more.
Steve Wozniak: I don’t know that the role of schools per se is to teach us to be prepared for the technical future. I think that’s something they leave you to get on your own.
Steve Wozniak: I think they accept the computer being such an important tool in our academic life. Some of it has to be done in school and some of it is done in school.
Steve Wozniak: It’s strange, a very weak computer, you know, in the right mind can do just as much as the most powerful brand new modern computer there is.
Steve Wozniak: I ran into some people who were doing a lot of conceptualizations of what kind of projects would teach children this and that about the world, about society, you know, and how to work and what were good healthy projects, and it was really an investment in the people more than in the institution itself.
Steve Wozniak: But this particular show, the music was, there was something coming in my ears, an outdoor amphitheatre that had never hit it before, the most, to be so beautiful to sound like a record with headphones and even better, how did they get that quality, I have no idea. They had, I found out later they had speakers behind us, so the sound was coming from more directions than just the front of the stage.
Susan Bratton: So Steve, welcome back. Thank you so much for taking time to be on the show two times. I really appreciate it. Here’s my first question: What would you take with you if you were marooned on an island, the one piece of technology you’d most like to have with you? And it can’t be a satellite phone.
Steve Wozniak: Yes, a deck of cards.
Susan Bratton: Deck of cards? That’s not technology.
Steve Wozniak: Yeah, sure, well anything that has been created to give us, you know, entertainment or more out of life I call technology. In other words, if you figure out a way to assemble a table with one less step, that new method is a technology. So cards are almost a technology. I mean, I can say my computer like a play card…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: but I need power.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: I sort of don’t visualize power on an island.
Susan Bratton: No power.
Steve Wozniak: And I think cards would keep me entertained the most. I think a lot of people would say “Give me a pencil and paper. I could just write my ideas forever.”
Susan Bratton: Yeah, yeah. I think I would do that too. That’s a great one. So you have been a real philanthropist and one of the areas that you’ve made some significant investments in is, both with your time and your money, is that you’ve kind of adopted the Laskata School District, you’ve put a lot of money and hands-on teaching and donations for state of the art tech equipment. So how do educational institutions now need to prepare our children for the technical future? What do you see in schools today that’s missing and what do we need to do?
Steve Wozniak: Boy, that’s such a difficult one because I don’t know that the role of schools per se is to teach us to be prepared for the technical future. I think that’s something they leave you to get on your own. I mean when I was in school we actually had driver training right in our schools…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: with the simulators and all, but now even those sort of things are just relegated to the side and academics is more learning about things that are historic, like mathematics is historic, history’s historic, music, whatever, just learning the things that can be written down that are sort of know, and something like technology, how do you adapt to things changing, they don’t have to, see that’s not a normal class in school. You know, how do you explore a device and get the most use out of it? I think that requires if you have long classes, I taught classes to fifth through ninth graders for eight years and what I taught was how to make your homework look good, but it was 200 hours a year to teach all of the techniques to use a computer very well and the kids learned it very well. And most people think, oh computer literacy is to shove a computer in front of them and 20 minutes later they know what to do. Keyboarding, learning to type at an earlier age I think has helped a lot.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm, mm hmm. Do you thing that schools need to teach technology and keyboarding and computer usage skills or do you think it’s better left at home? What’s your personal opinion?
Steve Wozniak: I think they accept the computer being such an important tool in our academic life. Some of it has to be done in school and some of it is done in school. You know how to basically, you know, expertise on just searching for information to learn and to write reports about it. So I think a little bit occurs in school, but the, the vast majority of us, we’re all such different people, the computer takes us to so many places in the world, you know, better left to home. You know, sure in home it’s more just an entertainment tool, but you know, every kid has to get homework done and the computer is the main way to do it. So I don’t know that it has to be taught that much in school. Now the ability to create new ideas, new programs, computers that do different things than they did before, robots someday, oh I wish that were in school.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: But, you know, that’s like are we going to teach computer science to our kids, only maybe one in a hundred person needs to be really well educated in computer science to make our society go forward. So that, it often gets left out. It’s a very fun topic, it’s almost like a type of logic, a certain mathematical mind will do better at, but, and it’s all from a category schools don’t put a high priority on.
Susan Bratton: You know one of the things that I worry about is the technology divide, the so-called racial ravine. If we don’t teach it in school, are we going to leave behind children who are disenfranchised from a financial perspective?
Steve Wozniak: Well if you’re talking about teaching people to design computers and understand how they’re built inside…
Susan Bratton: I’m talking about using…
Steve Wozniak: we don’t need that for everyone.
Susan Bratton: No, but I’m talking about teaching children how to use computers, if usage and…
Steve Wozniak: Yeah, the usage. Not only that, just the availability…
Susan Bratton: Yup.
Steve Wozniak: of computers, although it’s strange, a very weak, you know, in the right mind can do just as much as the most powerful brand new modern computer there is.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: So there’s some equalizing that we don’t even see, even older computers, ten year old computers, you know, can be hooked up and used right and really get a person a long ways today with what we normally do; communications and information searches and school work and even to some extent entertainment.
Susan Bratton: So I want to move on to some of your philanthropy. I know by reading your bio that you founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation, you were the founding sponsor of the Tech Museum, you’re a part of the Silicon Valley Ballet, maybe even a founder of that and the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose. You’ve put a lot of money into a lot of local endeavors. I’d like to know what’s been the most rewarding philanthropic project with which you’ve been involved.
Steve Wozniak: I would say probably the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose, although The Tech and the Ballet are very important to me, that’s the city I was born in, and I always feel like I want to give back to the place that I was born, I would go back to my schools and, you know, pay for a, you know, a baseball diamond to be built here or, you know, contribute computers or whatever. I always feel good about, you know, my community that I came from.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: And San Jose is very, very dear to my heart and always will be.
Susan Bratton: And I love how right in front of the Tech Museum is Woz Way, the street that’s named after you.
Steve Wozniak: Yes, yeah, we had a mayor Tom McKennery and he had all these plans for downtown and really helped get a lot of the museums we just talked about and the ballet, helped get it accomplished and as San Jose was changing it’s look, and in that time they were building this street that would go in front of a park that was going to hold the Tech originally and the Children’s Discovery Museum, and he came up with the suggestion of naming it Woz Way, and I was just so enamored. I’m not a developer, normally developers get to name the street.
Susan Bratton: Yeah. You know, I remember the first time I turned onto Woz Way and realized it was there and it was named after you, and I was so pleased by that. I wasn’t even aware that you were a progenitor of the Children’s Discovery Museum or the Tech Museum or any of those things. I mean, I probably could of assumed that you would have put some money into those things, I never even made that connection. I was a consumer who knew about you as the cult icon, driving onto the street named after you, and I can’t tell you how pleased I was that you got that level of recognition.
Steve Wozniak: Something like a tech museum, there are people who have ideas about children and what their needs are, and I cared a lot about children, but I wasn’t one of the really super idea people. You know, I mean I was certainly more ahead of others because it was my big interest in life, but really I had, I had a lot of money, you know, a lot more than you’d ever need and I thought, I ran into some people who were doing a lot of conceptualizations of what kind of projects would teach children this and that about the world, about society, you know, and how to work and what were good, healthy projects, and it was really an investment in the people more than the institution itself.
Susan Bratton: Steve, we’re going to take a short break to thank our sponsors, and when we come back I have a question about being a little bit country and a little bit rock and roll. I’m your host Susan Bratton, we’re with Steve Wozniak and we’ll be right back.
Susan Bratton: We’re back. Thank you so much again our sponsors for helping us have a great Dishy Mix with Steve Wozniak. You know, that is a beautiful segway to the US festivals that you did. You put for two years you did a big concert out in I think it was San Bernadino, right?
Steve Wozniak: Yup.
Susan Bratton: And I was able to pull up the ’82 and ’83 schedule of performers, and I’m just going to read some of these off for listeners. You had everybody from The Ramones to Oingo Boingo, The B-52’s, The Talking Heads, The Police, Eddie Money, Santana, The Cars, The Kinks, Pat Benatar, Tom Petty, The Grateful Dead, Jimmy Buffet, Jackson Brown, Fleetwood Mac. That was 1982. 1983 was amazing, it was a beautiful lineup, everybody from Wall of Voodoo to The Flock of Seagulls to Men at Work, it was very 80’s. Ozzy Osbourne and Judas Priest and, oh gosh, just so, just great people.
Steve Wozniak: Yeah, it was a great experience and I was trying to create one of these great things that young people will be influenced by.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: You know, and the sort of thing you look back in your life, you have a few experiences that touched you and changed your life so much, and there’s a gentleman who was at the 1982 US festival, I think he was at both, and he was in the Navy at the time and it just affected him so much seeing especially our technology exhibits, our education program and now he’s become very wealthy and he wants to contribute and put back and put on another US festival.
Susan Bratton: The US Festivals and the way you had the tech component and things like that really remind me of Burning Man. Have you ever been to a Burning Man?
Steve Wozniak: I have not been to the Burning Man, it does remind me a lot of Burning Man also…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm, mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: and sort of people who would go, I’m just, I’m passed the age a little bit more middle type person, so I don’t got to the, you know, a lot of the Burning Man. A lot of the, being around the weird people, it’s need to be around them, but I certainly wouldn’t be one of them.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm, mm hmm. And so if you had to do another US Festival today, what kind of music would you program into it? What do you love now?
Steve Wozniak: I would actually not choose individual pace and the first US Festivals were not done based upon my musical tastes…
Susan Bratton: Right, you like country.
Steve Wozniak: it’s sort of which groups are touring. You know there’s a lot of, you know, you get some people that know how to put on concerts that are going to attract a lot of people. But we would go for still, mainstream type music that’s not really ruckus and not really pushing, you know, pushing people on nasty towards society. We go for good stuff, you know, Paul McCartney type stuff, U2 type stuff and, you know, get some of the top bands to, you know, try to present a good image of people working together, you know, we can really take our society forward. We have themes like that for original US festivals.
Susan Bratton: So I know that when we were prepping for our interview today I asked you what your favorite concert that you ever saw was. You said it was Roger Waters doing The Wall tour at Shoreline Amphitheatre probably about 2003. Is it that you’re a Pink Floyd fan or Roger Waters or what was it that touched you about that? You’ve probably been to so many concerts, including producing your own.
Steve Wozniak: I’m not a, I’m not a Pink Floyd fan per se real heavy. I like some of their music from the past who’s meant stuff to me. No, I go to an awful lot of concerts, and, you know, one’s that have some special touch that grabs me, some incredible lights, or, or the, they dress it up like musicals, you know, they put on skits that go along with their songs and wear costumes and all that. What really affected me the most…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: was this particular show, the music was, there was something coming to my ears at an outdoor amphitheatre that has never hit it before, the most, to be so beautiful, to sound like a record with headphones and even better, how did they get that quality, I have no idea, they had, I found out later they had speakers behind us, so the sound was coming from more directions than just the front of the stage. And how they got this unbelievable, you know, feeling that music can give you that, it was just so unusual, it was just too real.
Susan Bratton: So it was a magical acoustic moment for you more than anything else.
Steve Wozniak: Yes, that’s a better way to say it.
Susan Bratton: And didn’t, didn’t you also fund the Shoreline Amphitheatre?
Steve Wozniak: Yes, yes, Bill Graham and I, we’re equal partners in the regional, you know, money to fund the, that project. But I felt, I, the reason that I jumped in, they were having trouble getting all their funding and I jumped in because I knew that, you know, most of the tickets, more people were now in the South Bay…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: and so many people in the South Bay where I grew up were driving all the way up to San Francisco to see a big concert, and this was, I just knew it would be successful.
Susan Bratton: What I read about you is that originally you like country music more than you liked rock and roll, but you told me that you love to collect hard rock memorabilia, t-shirts and blankets and back packs and shot glasses and all that stuff. How did you end up loving to do hard rock? Where’d that come from?
Steve Wozniak: Hard Rock Café.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: Not hard rock. Hard Rock Café.
Susan Bratton: Right, Hard Rock Café, sorry, yeah, thank you.
Steve Wozniak: I grew up with rock and roll. No, I grew up with rock and roll.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: Around the time we started Apple I was, I got influenced by a rare radio station that played not the standard, you know, studio promoted hits, but they played good music and it was called K-fast in Gilroy, and it really changed my whole music style towards the country folk singer/songwriter style more than anything else, and that’s what I was in even when I did the US festivals, that was my own personal type of music.
Susan Bratton: Right.
Steve Wozniak: And now I like it all. I like everything.
Susan Bratton: And what do you do with all this Hard Rock stuff? Do you have like a big room full of shot glasses and Hurricane glasses or what are you doing with it?
Steve Wozniak: I, I did but over time and some house moves it sort of got put more into boxes and, boxes in closets in the hallway, you know, full of Hard Rock t-shirts and stuff. I have medallions in cupboards out in the garage, the little, the Hard Rock medals that they sell, the pins. So yeah, I still do, every once in a while, and you know, there weren’t that many Hard Rock’s, I got to a point in my life where one year I went to every Hard Rock in the world…
Susan Bratton: Wow.
Steve Wozniak: and after that I never wanted to travel again. I think I went 15 years without using my passport. I was so tired from travel.
Susan Bratton: It’s exhausting, yeah.
Steve Wozniak: But now there are so many Hard Rock’s you can never do all of them in the world, there’s just too many, but every once in a while I’m in a new city for the first time and I look up to see if there’s a Hard Rock in that city and I’ll just go there, have, you know, I don’t even like the food, but I’ll just have something, buy a t-shirt and bring it home. I actually wear them, I wear my Hard Rock t-shirts.
Susan Bratton: Well, it’s funny, I was thinking about Hard Rock just this week, I blogged about them before I even knew you liked Hard Rock, actually last week, because Hard Rock just did one of the most innovative advertising programs in the podcasting world that’s been done thus far, so they’re still innovating, which I like to see as a brand, you know, continuing to move that brand forward.
Steve Wozniak: And I’ll have to tell you, if you’re going around the world and eating in all of them, and I’ll only eat a couple of things, you know, usually chili and nachos and, but I’ll tell you, the best food, Hard Rock food in the world is in Paris, they’re known for food, it’s the best.
Susan Bratton: Yum. Well that’s good to know. I think that’s the last place I’d go if I was in Paris.
Steve Wozniak: Boy I’ll tell you, they’ve got these thick cheeses and, oh.
Susan Bratton: Well you know, speaking of podcasting, here’s another thing that I read, tell me if this is true. I read that after hearing a podcast of an interview on the Larry King Show you began dating comedienne Kathy Griffin. Is that true?
Steve Wozniak: I didn’t hear the podcast, I heard the show live on XM Radio.
Susan Bratton: Oh, on XM Radio.
Steve Wozniak: I’m not sure Kathy understands that it is broadcast live on radio even though it’s a TV show.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: And I was driving my car, and I did hear her on there, and I like her jokes. I laughed at them and then I saw her on some local show, but I though I was getting tickets to a folksinger, like Patty Griffin or something.
Susan Bratton: Oh, I like Patty Griffin, yeah.
Steve Wozniak: And, and eventually I just read an article that said we were dating, her publicity department had gotten to work on it or something and it was just totally a shock to me at first, but we’ve met and we like each other and we get together and we’re going to be getting together more.
Susan Bratton: Well now, one of the things that I know about you, a little secret that I know about you is that in addition to being very generous, you like to give women very flashy rings. And I did see in Us magazine that Kathy had on a very flashy ring attributed to you. Was that yours?
Steve Wozniak: No, no.
Susan Bratton: She didn’t, you didn’t give her a flashy ring?
Steve Wozniak: I didn’t even notice it on her, no. No, it was actually (unintelligible) jewelry I think.
Susan Bratton: That’s so funny, isn’t it?
Steve Wozniak: It’s, no I don’t like to give big flashy jewelry, no.
Susan Bratton: I like to get big flashy jewelry. Just to set the record straight here, even though you don’t like to give it, I really like to get it.
Steve Wozniak: I actually like fun, different, unique, joke jewelry. You know, I’m wearing a ring right now, it’s Mokume Gane, it’s a real special process for making rings.
Susan Bratton: What is Mokume it sounds Hawaiian?
Steve Wozniak: It’s actually, it’s factored Japan, samurai sword days and it’s a type of, you push metal through other metals to get patterns to appear and it’s, it’s sort of, I think it means ‘eye of wood’, Mokume means ‘eye of wood’ and Gane means ‘metal’. So it’s a metal thing but it kind of in the end looks like it has a wooden pattern, but it’s really different metals engaging, you know, interacting with each other.
Susan Bratton: That sound really beautiful, I’m going to have to Google that.
Steve Wozniak: Yeah, it’s like a tricky technology, that’s what I like about it.
Susan Bratton: Right.
Steve Wozniak: I order rubber rings that flash that cost a dollar and like they, you squeeze them and they start flashing all these colors. I love jokes like that.
Susan Bratton: Now see, I think, I don’t think you should discount Burning Man. Everybody wears that kind of stuff at Burning Man. I think you might have to fly in and check it out and fly back out again ‘cause I really think it would appeal to you.
Steve Wozniak: Oh, I know Burning Man people, there’s all sort of people that thinks the way I do a lot but…
Susan Bratton: Yeah, that’s what I think.
Steve Wozniak: Well, I don’t have to go there to have my fun.
Susan Bratton: Now I know, I know that you were in a terrible plane accident. You, do you still fly small planes or you don’t even bother anymore?
Steve Wozniak: No, I flew them after the accident because to me I did not have an accident…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: I had the type of, my head go hit hard enough that I lost all the memories of it…
Susan Bratton: I know, terrible.
Steve Wozniak: even for these five weeks, so I have no feelings of pain, being in hospitals, anything associated with an accident that’s bad.
Susan Bratton: So you’ll still…
Steve Wozniak: So it was easy for me, I got in another plane and there was no anxiety. And I, no, I stopped flying because I decided that my life was getting busy enough that I was going to be able to fly people out to lunch now and then, but I didn’t have the time to put a huge amount of hours into flying to up my rating, to, you know, signal engines, instrument ratings, that sort of thing, double, you know, twin engines. And if you’re, if you don’t really have time to be improving your skills it’s sort of just phony to stop at the first easy level.
Susan Bratton: Now you fly around on segway polo machines, I guess. I don’t know what you call it, a segway that you ride and play polo in. You’re part of the Silicon Valley Aftershocks. I love that name.
Steve Wozniak: There weren’t many things because you can’t really be compared to others and it avoids a lot of, you know, conflict, it avoids a lot of, you know, trying to beat the other guy, a competition, and so segways are neat and a lot of us geeks get our, got segways when it first came out, they were just so different…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: To me, it’s now become such a part of my life that it often replaces my big huge car. I pop on a segway, I go down my hill and in 15 minutes I’m in town. I drive into a theatre, watch a movie, bring the segway back home, and I got to skip the big world, the big car thing. I’m a real simple type person, almost a minimalist…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: and I get to skip now, you know, accelerator pedals and seat belts and seats and mirrors and adjusting this or going to get your car washed and then parking, finding parking and then still walking across the street to the theatre. I get to skip that whole big hassle.
Susan Bratton: Yeah. That sounds like a lot of fun. I’ve never ridden a segway, but I’d really like to. Now how could someone come out and watch segway polo? Do you play often?
Steve Wozniak: Yes, we have a, a group puts as a website, segpolo.com…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: and we have announcements of when we play. We generally play the first and third Sunday’s of the month at a park in Sunnydale, usually Ponderosa Park.
Susan Bratton: That sounds like fun.
Steve Wozniak: And we play at 10 in the morning on a Sunday…
Susan Bratton: Okay.
Steve Wozniak: and we rent the parks, sometimes we play at 11, right now we’re starting most of our games at 11am…
Susan Bratton: Yup.
Steve Wozniak: And we, people come out and we’ll train them on phase, we swat new people, we instantly start teaching them how to ride a segway, let them scoot around a while, and then we put them right into a game. And you can’t do anything the first day you’ve ridden a segway.
Susan Bratton: Yeah, you have to get good.
Steve Wozniak: But they come back, they play another time and they come back and some of them become pretty good players. It only takes a couple of times and they’re right in with us.
Susan Bratton: Well I’m going to bring Taylor down to Ponderosa Park and we’re going to watch you ride around on your segway. I’ve got to meet you now. Sounds like fun.
Steve Wozniak: Newcomers yesterday playing segway polo with us and they did well. You know, I mean the ball would come, they’d have trouble knowing how to get their segway around to get a shot at it…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: so we’ll back off the beginner…
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: and let them make sure they get their shot.
Susan Bratton: That’s sweet. Really fun, I can’t wait to see it. So you’ve been very generous with your time. I am going to let you go. I have one last question for you. You’ve received a lot of amazing awards. You were awarded the Kilby award, which is an award for embracing the spirit of creativity for the benefit of humanity. You were, I love that, you were also inducted into the Inventors Hall of Fame. You were awarded the Hines Award for Technology. You also got the National Medal of Technology by the president of the United States in 1985 and that was Ronald Reagan. That’s the highest honor bestowed on America’s leading innovators. You’ve, I bet that’s not even all of the awards that you’ve gotten.
Steve Wozniak: No, actually there’s hundreds and…
Susan Bratton: Hundreds?
Steve Wozniak: I, I, there’s so many that I just put them around the house and I never have one place for them…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: and I can’t even find them sometimes. The important thing is not having the award, it’s having done something good.
Susan Bratton: Yeah.
Steve Wozniak: Whatever the awards based on.
Susan Bratton: And is there a particular honor of distinction that you most values, is there one that really touched your heart and if so, why?
Steve Wozniak: Delta’s only one. I have a couple of honorary degrees from universities, I have distinguished alumni, engineering alumni medal from Berkeley that means a lot to me. The National Medal of Technology does mean a lot to me, very lot ‘cause Steve Jobs and I got it the first year they gave it.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: I’m in the National Inventors Hall of Fame. That’s one you can only get into if you’re a real inventor that worked with a sautering iron in a laboratory. You can’t be a businessman…
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: and get into that one.
Susan Bratton: Mm hmm.
Steve Wozniak: And I, if I went down the list there’s probably a few special ones that I’m forgetting right now but really mean a lot to me. The highest one was really more for my teaching hands-on than for my technology because they really, they cared about a certain thing in you that really wanted to help people hand to hand, you know, it was very important. (unintelligible) the Hines one for that one. And the Kilby award I’m glad you mentioned because a lot of people don’t know that Jack Kilby invented the integrated circuit along with Gordon Moore and Bob Noyce, sort of like the were two teams, two different teams and he just, he was just the ultimate engineer, just a pure engineer working at things from an engineering term and that’s what I wanted to be my whole life. That was an important one, but so many and of them are so outstanding, so good, some are like lifetime achievement awards. I get in the hall’s of fame for consumer electronics and other groups, and they all mean a lot to me now. Originally, you know, “Oh, great, another award, another award. I don’t know if I want it, don’t know if I want it, don’t know if I want it. I don’t need an award. But now, you know, every time I get one I just feel so honored, it’s like a special day, I smile and I’m just honored to hold it on a stage or whatever. They mean a lot.
Susan Bratton: They do mean a lot. Steve you’re an extraordinary man and you’ve given so much of yourself your whole life, and I just want to thank you so much for being who you are and for the generosity that you’ve brought in addition to that big beautiful brain of yours that’s letting us all have personal computers, and hopefully like me, Apple computers on my desktop. Thanks so much for your time today. It was good to get to know you better. You’re a darling, darling man and I just really appreciate it.
Steve Wozniak: Well thank you also and I hope to be, you know, a good example to other people that they follow when you do those sort of good things.
Susan Bratton: You’re an amazing example, and so thank you. I will see you out at Ponderosa Park the next time you play and I wish you very happy holidays.
Steve Wozniak: Okay, wonderful, same to you.
Susan Bratton: Thanks Steve.
Steve Wozniak: Bye, bye.
Susan Bratton: Bye, bye. This is your host Susan Bratton, and you’ve had an amazing opportunity to hear from Steve Wozniak. I hope I did you good by and asking really important questions that you’d like to know about Steve that you couldn’t find elsewhere, and I hope you have a great day and you’re inspired by this truly extraordinary man. Thanks so much.