 "Photo: Mark Zahnlecker")
Steve Wozniak spoke at Laxson Auditorium Jan. 27 to tell students, faculty and resident “Wozniaks” how he invented the personal computer and “had fun doing it.”
Chico Performances and the College of Business put on the lecture, said Daran Goodsell, marketing coordinator for Chico Performances.
Business students had the opportunity to meet Wozniak earlier at a dinner put on by the College of Business, said senior Alison Davis, a business administration major.
“He’s so humble and you’d think somebody like that is just full of themselves,” she said. “He just wants to do what he likes and doesn’t really care about the fame.”
Junior Austin Hagerman, applied physics major, was excited to be in the presence of such a notable icon, he said.
“I’ve always been a computer enthusiast since I was really little,” he said.
Wozniak was responsible for launching Apple’s first line of products, including the Apple I and Apple II computers, Wozniak said. He also helped create the popular Macintosh computer.
Apple’s line of recent products includes the iPod, iPhone and the soon to be released iPad, Wozniak said.
The iPad will be a great tool for students to use in their everyday lives, he said.
Wozniak’s mission was to put affordable and user-friendly computers in the hands of every-day consumers, he said.
“The purpose of technology is to give us better lives and to me that means better homes,” Wozniak said. “Technology should serve people.”
He was always interested in technology and had the chance to explore it through his father, an engineer, Wozniak said.
“That feeling that you can reach out and touch another part of the world is such a powerful feeling,” he said.
He met his future business partner, Steve Jobs, while they were in their early 20s, Wozniak said. They had attended the same high school, but were four years apart.
“He was very much more of a true hippie,” he said. “He would eat seeds and walk around in bare feet.”
Wozniak was determined to design his own computer, which contained no case, power supply, screen or keyboard, he said. Wozniak gave the computer out for free to his friends without any copyright of the technology.
Jobs had the idea of selling the design commercially, Wozniak said.
They pitched his design to Wozniak’s employer at the time, Hewlett Packard, but were turned down five times, he said.
To build his computer, the Apple I, Wozniak sold his HP 35 Scientific Calculator and Jobs sold his van, Wozniak said.
The only computer store in the Bay Area at the time agreed to sell their computer, he said.
The Apple II was revolutionary because no one ever thought color would be available at a low cost, Wozniak said.
Following a small plane crash in 1981, Wozniak was recovering from short-term amnesia and decided he did not want to immediately return to Apple, he said. It was important for him to finish his degree in electrical engineering and computer science.
With its graphics, early Macintosh computers were seen as toys, he said. The use of color graphics was ahead of its time.
After the lecture, audience members waited in the overcrowded lobby carrying Wozniak’s book, “iWoz” and old Apple computers to be signed by him.
Wozniak is currently the Chief Scientist at Fusion-io and is involved in various philanthropic ventures devoted to hands-on learning in school, he said.
Wozniak has also become known by his television appearances, such as ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars.”
“I have a new book in the works,” Wozniak said. “‘How to Dance the Mamba.’”
Tegan Silva can be reached at
tsilva@theorion.com
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