This is a response to another article that made the comparison. Given that neither Apple nor Jobs have suggested Jobs is an Edison, and given that I haven’t heard anyone calling Jobs an Edison outside of the article this author cites, I’d call this “Feeding a troll.”
Sure, one person called Jobs an Edison, but it doesn’t feel particularly worthy of a reply, much less of a spot on the HN front page.
Both men led organizations that took the "raw materials" of their generation and created end-to-end solutions that very quickly dominated the market.
In Edison's time the interesting innovations were happening at the first-order level. Now most of the interesting innovations are happening higher up the technological food chain.
Steve Jobs became big by being right most of the time. Edison became big by being a bully with questionable business practices. DC vs AC anyone?
If there is one person you could compare Jobs to, this would be Henri Ford, who's vision also combined existing technologies into something new, brilliant, making something simpler, more useful and more accessible for the large public.
No he did not. He always talked about "we at apple", and always gave credit to the engineering and designer teams.
The story of Wozniak and Jobs is widely known, Jobs described Wozniak on more than one occasion as a brilliant engineer and that without him, Apple would not have existed.
To clarify, I was agreeing that Tesla was beyond them all. :)
The area where Jobs has done what no one else has -- made technology into art we love to buy, use and enjoy, and opened the world up to connecting, sharing and creating, is in the same spirit of what Tesla brought into the world with his innovations with electricity.
I think we can agree that Electricity is a little more fundamental to day-to-day raising the quality of more people's lives in this world than a phone, computer, or ipad. It might be less and less each day, but I still think electricity can transform everyone's life.
So Jobs is idea/credit snatcher Edison, and Tesla owns them all. I can agree with this.
The one things Jobs has done that no one has is changed how the masses use technology in such a short period of time. I don't think many fall into that category.
Sure, one person called Jobs an Edison, but it doesn’t feel particularly worthy of a reply, much less of a spot on the HN front page.