I left Apple in April of 1984, pretty soon after the introduction of the Mac.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I had been doing MP3 players and handheld computers since 1990-1991, and so they sought me out because of my experience. And about 18 generations of iPod and three generations of iPhone later, I decided to leave Apple.
I started working at Apple about 18 months after I bought my Apple II.
I've been a Mac guy for almost my entire adult life. I wrote my first college papers on a typewriter, but by the end of my freshman year - almost 20 years ago - I was on an IBM PC. Then, in 1984, I found the Mac, and I never looked back.
Every company that made computers when we started the Mac, they're all gone.
I love all things Apple and have done since 1996.
I was lucky - I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents' garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years, Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees.
Think of the first Apple II being shipped in 1977. It took almost a decade for it to land in my school where I could see it.
I was fortunate that I came out to the Valley in 1979, when I came out to go to Stanford Business School, and my very first assignment as a teaching assistant for an investments professor was to - he told me go down to this computer company in Cupertino called Apple.
With the greatest of respect, I have watched Apple from the day it started. I was publishing magazines about the Apple II before most people had ever heard what a personal computer was.
As far as Apple goes, it was a different company every few years from the time I joined in 1984.