Why Silicon Valley, though? Silicon Valley in California is like the home of the world's largest technology corporations. The movie chronicles the life of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs from the conception of their products up to their success. The movie is in the style of an interview with flashbacks to supplement the story. The movie shows how Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, students of University of California, Berkeley and Harvard University, respectively, made ways for their dreams to be fulfilled.
The story of Steve Jobs started with him and Steve Wozniak running through the students' riot against war in 1971 and Jobs claiming that they (the two Steves) were the real revolutionaries, what with their computer. They decided to drop out of school and focus on their project. With many developments and enhancements later and a rejection from IBM, they were approached by Mike Markkula in their garage-turned-workplace and thus, Apple Inc. was created. It was not sunshine and flowers at first but they made the company successful. And with this success came Steve's worsening attitude. He left his pregnant girlfriend and threw tantrums at his employees. Although Apple was his brainchild, he was forced to leave the company.
Bill's part of the movie started with classmate Steve Ballmer describing him as someone who prefers to spend time with his computer over studies and girls. Like Jobs, Gates dropped out of school to focus on his computer. After many talks and hardships, Gates established Microsoft. Running a practically unknown company was hard for Gates. Interestingly, Apple became curious of Microsoft. Gates took this chance to gain the approval of Jobs to work with them because, according to him, Apple would be unstoppable if they have Gates' programs. Jobs took the bait and it was a win-win situation, with Microsoft also gaining more fame. Gates took advantage of this merger to develop his computer in hopes of surpassing Apple. And surpass he did.
The movie ended with Steve Jobs being rehired to Apple after the latter acquired the NeXT Computer by Jobs. Bill Gates continued to soar, becoming the world's richest man.
If there's one thing I learned from this film, it would be that Steve Jobs is a jerk and Bill Gates is a wise, wise man. I know it's a film and it's exaggerated, but still. Steve Jobs is a controlling man; throwing tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants. What gentleman leaves his long-time girlfriend when she gets pregnant, and insist that it's not his? It came to the point that Steve Wozniak, his bestfriend and partner, gave up on him. Speaking of Wozniak, why don't people recognize him? He was in charge of the engineering and technical stuff while Jobs was the business-minded one. Technically, he made the apple computers and devices. Where would Apple be without him? As for Bill Gates, I admire his guts. He was able to make Jobs be part of his plans without Steve knowing (at first, that is). He was like, if you can't beat them, join them, then beat them. Well played, Bill, well played.
It seems that there's another thing I learned. A person's highest educational attainment does not determine his success. Knowledge, skills, talent, and determination make a person successful. Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are perfect examples. They were not able to finish their studies but with the combination of those mentioned above they are now big names in the digital world.
Well, that's all for now for this long review.
I told you I liked it!
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