November 13, 2014--T-Shirts Make the Man

Like so many other things in Silicone Valley this trend likely started with Steve Jobs, for many years Apple's guiding genius.

Once, twice a year he would stride out on stage at their headquarters in Cupertino, CA, for a show-and-tell that featured the latest iPod, iPad or iPhone. Prior to that this was not what traditional CEOs did to launch their latest products. They would hang back in their corner offices and leave it to the sales and PR people to announce new Game Boys or office software.

Jobs, super salesman and egoist that he was, did this himself in dramatic fashion--in dark ambient light with only him, the Apple logo, and the newest MacBook Pro theatrically illuminated. And rather than appearing in a bespoke suit and Turnbull & Asser shirt and tie, he wore lived-in jeans and a body-revealing black mock-turtleneck shirt with the sleeves pushed up.

This became just as much his signature look as Gloria Steinem's aviator glasses or Donald Trump's comb-over. It also set the tone for other IT magnates. Everyone from Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer to Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg subsequently took to rolling out new products and services casually dressed. Zuckerberg shows up in his legendary hoodie or, more recently, in his Steve-Job's jeans and short- or long-sleeved T-shirt.

As reported in Tuesday's New York Times, Mark Zuckerberg, in spite of appearances, thinks a lot about his--if I can call it that--attire.

He wears an identical gray T-shirt every day. He said, "I want to clear my life so I have to make as few decisions as possible beyond serving this community." (My italics)

I get it--not having to think about clothes clears his mind. He avoids the angst of needing to think should it be the gray T-shirt again or maybe a blue or black one. It also saves closet space--one drawer is all he needs for a half dozen or so.

In the Times piece he did acknowledge Steve Job's inspiration--well and good--but claimed he is also influenced sartorially by Barack Obama.

Yes, he did comment about the "simplicity" of Obama's wardrobe. He didn't elaborate, but I suppose he means that Obama always turns out in one of his signature navy or dark gray Hart Shaffner Marx suits. Like Zuckerberg that too enables the president to make as few decisions as possible while serving the community. In his case that community being the United States of America.

In the meantime I worry about poor Steve Ballmer, former CEO of Microsoft, and Eric Schmidt, chairman of Google. Both are far from buff, a bit roly-poly and though they try to look sleek and youthful, when they appear on stage to reveal the latest in cloud computing or Google Glasses in their version of Jobs-Zuckerberg outfits, they look a bit disheveled.

But at least they don't try to stuff themselves into T-shirts.

June 24, 2013--Ed Iacobucci

Some people know how to live, others how to die, and then there are those very few who know how to do both.

Ed Iacobucci was in that rare, latter category.

Anyone who knows anything about the history of computing and big data knows about Ed's life's work--first, as the leader of the IBM team that developed the OS/2 operating system that ultimately made personal computing possible; and then as founder and CEO of Citrex, which provides server and desktop virtualization, software-as-a-service, and cloud computing technologies, including Xen open source products.

Many of the original founding members of Citrex had participated in the OS/2 project. Ed's vision was to build OS/2 with multi-user support. IBM was not interested so he left and was offered a job at Microsoft as chief technical officer of its networking group; but he turned it down to start Citrex.

Rona and I got to know Ed as a breakfast companion at the Green Owl in Delray Beach. We know lots of regulars there, and enjoy and love many of them; but when we would spot Ed at the counter working on the crossword puzzle we knew the morning would for certain get off to a good start.

He was fun, he was informed, he was interesting, he was provocative, he was playful, creative, and optimistic. Just what one would expect of someone who had been so professionally inventive and successful. But unlike many who were, Ed was as comfortable talking with Ernst the chef as he was with Harvey, the owner of a local insurance agency. When Ed was ready to leave for work, unique among all of us, he would always head for the kitchen to let the staff know how much he enjoyed the food and to ask how things were with them.

Just last week we learned that he was terribly ill and in hospice care. His wife Nancy told us that he had been battling pancreatic cancer for the past 16 months.

I was shocked and almost before expressing my concern, blurted out, "How could that possibly be? We saw him as recently as a few months ago and he was the same old Ed."

"He didn't want to burden anyone with his struggle," she said. "He didn't want to be treated as a sick person. He wanted to keep living as normally as possible until that was no longer possible."

"For what it's worth," Rona said to Nancy, "he achieved his goal. All we noticed was his hair loss. Other than that he was fully himself. He told us he shaved his head to inspire his employees. He told them, he said to us--clearly not sharing the truth of his condition--that he would keep doing that until his new company, VirtualWorks, achieved a certain level of profitability."

"That was Ed," Nancy said when she called to tell us he had died, "He was as inspiring at the end as he was during the 20 years we were married. And I wouldn't trade those years for anything, with all the ups (and some were very big) and downs (these also could be very substantial)."

"We know," I said, "He, and you, rode that roller coaster with great spirit and style. I can only imagine what all those years were like with him. I too wanted my 20 years of Ed."

"One story and then I have to go," Nancy said, sounding as good as one could be in these dreadful circumstances, "You know he was a big Miami Heat fan and wanted to live long enough to know how they did in the finals. The seventh and deciding game was Thursday night. I had the TV on in the bedroom and though he was losing consciousness every few minutes he would ask the score. It was a close game and not decided until the end of the fourth quarter. When time ran out, he awoke again and I was able to tell him the Heat won. He smiled and patted the bed next to him, indicating he wanted me to join him. Which I did. I held him in my arms and after a few sweet moments he stopped breathing."

"Same old Ed," Rona said through her tears.