14 DAY TRIAL // Recent reports concerning Steve Jobs' physical wellbeing have wiped off quite a few Apple "points" from the stock scoreboard. Ever since Jobs appeared at WWDC 08 this year, looking "thin," the press, partners and shareholders have been asking themselves: "is Steve's cancer back?" Well, according to Mr. Apple CEO himself, the answer is no, it isn't.
A New York Times report reveals that Steve Jobs, Apple's Co-Founder and CEO, isn't by far that ill. In fact, the man is as vivid and acidic as we all know him, especially when something bugs him. And something does, according to Joe Nocera from the New York Times.
The author claims he got a call from Steve Jobs himself who revealed to him what he wouldn't reveal even to shareholders. You can ask Steve why, because we're all out of the loop here. So here's what Nocera got out of Steve:
On Thursday afternoon, several hours after I'd gotten my final "Steve's health is a private matter" - and much to my amazement - Mr. Jobs called me. "This is Steve Jobs," he began. "You think I'm an arrogant [expletive] who thinks he's above the law, and I think you're a slime bucket who gets most of his facts wrong." After that rather arresting opening, he went on to say that he would give me some details about his recent health problems, but only if I would agree to keep them off the record. I tried to argue him out of it, but he said he wouldn't talk if I insisted on an on-the-record conversation. So I agreed.
Because the conversation was off the record, I cannot disclose what Mr. Jobs told me. Suffice it to say that I didn't hear anything that contradicted the reporting that John Markoff and I did this week. While his health problems amounted to a good deal more than "a common bug," they weren't life-threatening and he doesn't have a recurrence of cancer. After he hung up the phone, it occurred to me that I had just been handed, by Mr. Jobs himself, the very information he was refusing to share with the shareholders who have entrusted him with their money.
You would think he'd want them to know before me. But apparently not.
We're left to understand that Jobs couldn't care less about shareholders' opinions on his health. On the other hand, it is obvious he is sensitive to how the world sees him. Why do you think Steve Jobs chose to reveal the truth about his health this way?