OBITUARY: Steve Jobs (1955-2011)

Of course I never met Steve Jobs but he still had an amazing effect on my life.

I still remember the date: December 4th 1999. That was the day I bought my first Apple product.

It was a Blueberry iMac. I loved it. It just worked. Straight from the box, it worked. No effort, no installing countless disks. Within minutes I was online from home for the first time ever.

Before that, I had been using an Atari for music stuff - notation was done on a program called Sharpscore, which was good but a bit buggy, and sequencing using Cubase. My old Atari was great for music things but it wasn't the way ahead.

My iMac had, what was then, a huge hard drive (a whole 8GB!) and, because it was in the days before broadband had arrived, it announced it was connecting to the Internet with that fanfare of pings and pings and white noise that will surely be remembered as one of the most important sounds as we reached the new Millennium.

For the creative industries there is no other choice. Apple computers are the ONLY ones worth bothering with.

Apple products have made being a musician much easier and PCs have, and still, trail in their wake.

Since then I have had MacBooks and a more recent iMac, various iPods, several iPhones and an iPad. I've used my Apple TV to stream movies from computer to TV. I've bought books and magazines digitally. My life has been totally transformed by Apple. They've made life simpler and easier and they've done it better than anyone else.

Sure, I've been accused of being a Fanboy I'm not. So many who snipe at Apple products do so having either never tried them or simply from a position of jealousy. And even if I was a fanboy, doesn't it make sense to be a fan of things that are just so good. As near to perfect as is possible?

But, of course, Steve Jobs was more than just Apple. As a parent, Pixar and their innovations have enriched the lives of my children. Toy Story, Finding Nemo, Wall-E and Up! to name just four of their movies, will be remembered as some of the greatest movies ever made.

Steve Jobs was an inspirational figure, who took a whole generation and made them realise that it was right to dream. His products have changed lives in a positive way. His contribution to society will not be forgotten.