I suppose most people know that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs has something wrong with his health again, something serious enough that he’s taking three months off, and serious enough to cause widespread suspicions that he’s not being candid about it.
Nearly three years ago, having survived pancreatic cancer, he gave the commencement address at Stanford which immediately became recognized as a classic. Someone sent me a copy of the text, and I sent it around to people on my send-interesting-stuff-to list. Many, many people said how much they liked it, and how it changed their opinion of Jobs for the better.
But the best thing that occurred still puts a lump in my throat. My brother sent it on to a friend whose daughter wanted to study art in college but her parents had been insisting she study something horribly practical and boring, can’t remember what. As a result of them reading the piece, they let her study what she wanted!
Isn’t that lovely? Think what a chain of people it took – Jobs himself, the person who sent out the piece, me, my brother – to get that little girl her freedom! When I heard that, I sent it out to my list again, just in case someone who needed it — as ammunition, perhaps? — hadn’t seen it, or had forgotten it. And here it is again.
The original link is http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html
and it’s still active, or was Friday morning when I tried it. For your convenience I also include a copy here.