When asked by Time magazine about the difference between art and technology, Jobs said, “I’ve never believed that they’re separate. Leonardo da Vinci was a great artist and a great scientist. Michelangelo knew a tremendous amount about how to cut stone at the quarry. The finest dozen computer scientists I know are all musicians. Some are better than others, but they all consider that an important part of their life. I don’t believe that the best people in any of these fields see themselves as one branch of a forked tree. I just don’t see that. People bring these things together a lot. Dr. Land at Polaroid said, ‘I want Polaroid to stand at the intersection of art and science,’ and I’ve never forgotten that. I think that that’s possible, and I think a lot of people have tried.”
Interview at the All Things Digital D5 Conference, Steve and Bill Gates spoke with journalists Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg onstage in May 2007.
Kara Swisher: The first question I was interested in asking is what you think each has contributed to the computer and technology industry— starting with you, Steve, for Bill, and vice versa. Steve Jobs: Well, Bill built the first software company in the industry. And I think he built the first software company before anybody really in our industry knew what a software company was, except for these guys. And that was huge. That was really huge. And the business model that they ended up pursuing turned out to be the one that worked really well for the industry. I think the biggest thing was, Bill was really focused on software before almost anybody else had a clue that it was really the software that— KS: Was important? SJ: That’s what I see. I mean, a lot of other things you could say, but that’s the high-order bit. And I think building a company’s really hard, and it requires your greatest persuasive abilities to hire the best ...