Ben Chase
John Siracusa“We are dealing with not one but two unreliable narrators: Musk and Isaacson himself.”
https://www.theverge.com/2023/10/1/23895069/walter-isaacson-biography-musk-review
To everyone who replied to my post about Isaacson’s terrible Elon Musk biography to tell me that his Steve Jobs biography was also bad: I agree. Here’s what I had to say about it at the time: https://hypercritical.fireside.fm/42
42: The Wrong Guy
John Siracusa and Dan Benjamin discuss Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Steve Jobs (Part 1).
Merlin Mann@siracusa The Gold Standard.
Timm Schoof@hotdogsladies @siracusa text book! TEXT BOOK!!!
Joe Cotellese@siracusa what did you think of Becoming Steve Jobs?
@JoeCotellese I haven’t read it yet.
Michael Sliwinski@siracusa @JoeCotellese You should, it’s really good. But then again, I’m counting on you reading the new Musk biography and dissecting it on @atpfm for our amusement - OR make it a member-only episode? Just on the book itself? Kinda Hypercritical ad 2023?
Son of a Sailor
Jason Nickel
Todd Vaziri@siracusa awww one of the epic episodes
River@siracusa It was a perfect episode name in 2011 and it’s still perfect now.
Ned Holbrook
Chancerubbage@siracusa it was excruciating to even the most casual Mac fan that we knew so many more interesting things Steve than Isaacson even began to reveal. So many knew, thought and felt, ‘This isn’t very good, is it’?.
ysamjo@siracusa Here's a version with the follow-up https://medium.com/hyperlinked/john-siracusa-tells-us-what-is-wrong-with-the-steve-jobs-biography-49dd0aa6fd19
lukeburrage@ysamjo You might enjoy "Hypercritical by Topic" https://lukeburrage.com/hypercritical-by-topic/
Dr. Ward has moved@siracusa I have thought several times how nice it is that people are realizing something you stated a decade ago.
I suspect that is a larger theme in your life, as well.
Steve@siracusa Thank you, listening to this brightened my afternoon and reminds me why I should listen to more past episodes of Hypercritical.
Daniel@siracusa Just got to the bit where you talk about Isaacson not being worried that he’ll forever be linked to Steve Jobs because “it’s only one of many biographies I’ve written”. 😬😬😬
Talk about being correct for all of the wrong reasons.
Freehours9@siracusa @danbenjamin @danbenjamin The Hypercritical episode names have duplicated episode numbers for some reason. Shows in the RSS feed as well.
Trai Guzie@siracusa great classic Ep and I still agree with everything after reading it myself.
Also why would he agree to do a biography midway through someone’s career/life?!
Austin*@siracusa the wrong guy?
anxious_relative@siracusa I thought of your takedown as soon as I read this title - you’ve only been more vindicated with time!
Watson@siracusa current seemingly working link to "The Wrong Guy".
42: The Wrong Guy
John Siracusa and Dan Benjamin discuss Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Steve Jobs (Part 1).
charlesesmith@siracusa Every review I've read about this seems to indicate that he doubled down on everything that sucked about the Jobs book.
TheEJJ 🇨🇦@siracusa Hypercritcal, episode 101: No, seriously, the wrong guy.
Janne Ojaniemi@siracusa his biography of Steve Jobs was such a wasted opportunity. Just so mediocre. “Becoming Steve Jobs” by Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli was way better.
KBSez ✅Isaacson is a hack.
His piece of shit Steve Jobs biography was a travesty. SOOOO much completely wrong, so much stupid insinuation and so much poorly reported. He's an ass.
(BTW: If you want an EXCELLENT, authoritative and well written biography of Steve, get BECOMING STEVE JOBS by journalists Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli. )
Whine Spectator
Sean@siracusa outstanding article. It portrays Issacson as very naive.
@siracusa it’s amazing that Elon told him that SpaceX was the only company that can launch unhackable satellites and Isaacson seemingly took it at face value and did no work to verify it at all.