iWoz review

I got >iWoz on Friday of Labour weekend and finished it yesterday.

It is the autobiography of Stephen Wozniak, the man who invented the personal computer. He invented the Apple I and II computers which started off the revolution. The book pretty much chronicles his early years through to leaving Apple and setting up another company making programmable remote controls.

As with much of Woz's stuff, it is pretty much like reading a transcript of a taped conversation. As such I found it very easy to read, although he did recover topics and subjects a fair bit - including pretty much repeating the entire section about setting up the CL9 company. I'm not sure if that was intentional or bad editing?

It was a fantastic insight into how Woz created the early Apples, and how he got involved with electronics from an early age. Along the way he clears up a few misconceptions about himself.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone, but particularly those with a technical bent. Woz comes across as a highly intelligent yet down to earth kinda guy - a little quirky, but the sort of guy you would love to sit down and shoot the breeze with. I get left with the impression that had the success with Apple not come around and he had lived his life working for HP, he would be just as happy as he is today. To him the money has little or no significance, it's engineering that he loves and would do it all again for free.

I think that in a nutshell says a lot about the guy.