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this program is brought to you by
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Stanford University please visit us at
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it now gives me great pleasure to
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introduce this year's commencement
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the chief executive officer and
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co-founder of apple and Pixar Animation
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Studios Stanford University has been
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characterized since its founding by a
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willingness to be bold and to strike out
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in New Directions and this is a
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characteristic very much shared by
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today's speaker a Pioneer and Visionary
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for almost three decades his name and
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the companies he has founded have been
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synonymous with Innovation and
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creativity as a young boy growing up in
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Los Altos Steve Jobs came of age at the
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Valley while still in school he attended
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lectures informally at Stanford as well
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as at ulip Packard where he spent his
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working after graduating from high
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school he left California to attend Reed
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College a a trek through India and a
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short stint as a video game designer for
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followed soon after his return to the
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1974 he became a regular along with
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Steve WN at meetings of The Homebrew
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Computer Club held at the Stanford
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Center it was not long before the two of
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them had built the prototype for the
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Apple One the apple one was was very
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fast at the time reading and writing 4
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kilobytes in about 20
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seconds about 20,000 times slower than
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today the Apple 2 was faster still but
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more importantly introduced color
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monitors into the Home
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Market in the mid 1980s the Macintosh
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became the first truly userfriendly
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personal computer you didn't have to be
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an expert to set it up or to load
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software or to transfer information
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applications and the mouse offered point
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and click convenience and opened the
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door to computer Literacy for
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everyone I still remember the amazed
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faces of onlookers as they saw a
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computer that was completely different
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from the personal computers of that
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day Steve also co-founded Pixar
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Animation Studios which has
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revolutionized the film industry in its
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Short history with brilliant use of
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technology and produced two Academy
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award-winning films Toy Story and
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Nemo since his return to Apple eight
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years ago Steve has reinvented the
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company once again extending its Vision
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to music and new digital media
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iTunes have changed the way we listen to
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organize store and purchase our music
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and in my case the way I often read
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books now songs we love are just 99
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Cents and a completely legal click
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away I photo and iMovie revolutionize
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the ability of consumers to organize
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edit and display digital photography and
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video putting capabilities that once
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cost thousands of dollars into the hands
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User Steve is also widely recognized for
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his ability to create an Innovative
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environment inside apple as well as an
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external company image that is equally
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Innovative just think about Apple's
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marketing campaigns over the past three
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decades a promotional flyer in 1976 six
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showed Isaac Newton sitting under a tree
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just as an apple was falling by with the
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catchy exhortation to bite
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apple there was an iconic Super Bowl
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humor an iconic Superbowl commercial
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telling us that the Macintosh was on the
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horizon and assuring us that we would
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1984 wouldn't be like
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1984 and in the late 1990s we saw
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banners and billboards featuring Pablo
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Picasso Albert Einstein Martha Graham
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and mahat m Gandhi all urging us to
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different Steve Jobs understands that
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creativity and Innovation start by
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differently he has a deeep rooted belief
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in the power of Education to train
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transform lives coupled with the desire
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to make the world a better
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place from the earliest days of apple he
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worked to develop Partnerships with
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Educators and get computers into
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schools for almost three decades he and
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his companies have provided invaluable
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technology and support to schools and
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communities increasing accessibility to
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information for Learners of all
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ages more than 100 years ago in
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describing his vision for a new
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University Leland Stanford wrote the
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imagination needs to be cultivated and
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developed to assure success in
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life Stanford clearly understood that
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technical knowledge was only the
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starting point for creation and
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Discovery Steve Jobs understands that
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the computer is a very powerful tool in
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a technical sense but that it true power
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lies in the ability to unleash the
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imagination and creativity of the
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user as he explained to the New York
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Times in a 1997 interview the Macintosh
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turned out so well because the people
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working on it were musicians artists
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poets and historians who also happened
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to be excellent computer
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scientists and last fall a business week
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reporter asked how he manages for
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Innovation his answer was deceptively
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simple we hire people who want to make
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the best things in the
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world Steve Jobs personifies the spirit
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and creativity that have characterized
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this University since its founding 114
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years ago and we are pleased to have him
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here today please join me in warmly
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welcoming this year's commencement
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you I'm uh honored to be with you today
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for your commencement from one of the
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finest universities in the
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told uh I never graduated from college
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and uh this is the closest I've ever
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graduation today I want to tell you
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three stories from my life that's it no
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stories the first story is about
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dots I dropped out of Reed College after
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the first six months but then stayed
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around as a drop in for another 18
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months or so before I really
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quit so why' I drop out
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it started before I was
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born my biological mother was a young
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unwed graduate student and she decided
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adoption she felt very strongly that I
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should be adopted by college graduates
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so everything was all set for me to be
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adopted at Birth by a lawyer and his
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wife except that when I popped out they
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decided at the last minute that they
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girl so my parents who were on a waiting
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list got a call and in the middle of the
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night asking we've got an unexpected
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baby boy do you want him they said of
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course my biological mother found out
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later that my mother had never graduated
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from college and that my father had
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never graduated from high school she
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refused to sign the final adoption
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papers she only relented a few months
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later when my parents promised that I
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would go to college this was the start
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life and 17 years later I did go to
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college but I naively chose a college
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that was almost as expensive as
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Stanford and all of my workingclass
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parents savings were being spent on my
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college tuition after 6 months I
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couldn't see the value in it I had no
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idea what I wanted to do with my life
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and no idea how College was going to
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help me figure it out and here I was
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spending all the money my parents had
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saved their entire life
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so I decided to drop out and trust that
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it would all work out okay it was pretty
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scary at the time but looking back it
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was one of the best decisions I ever
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made the minute I dropped out I could
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stop taking the required classes that
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didn't interest me and begin dropping in
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on the ones that looked far more
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interesting it wasn't all romantic I
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didn't have a dorm room so I slept on
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the floor in friends rooms I return Coke
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bottles for the 5-cent deposits to buy
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food with and I would walk the seven
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miles across town every Sunday night to
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get one good meal a week at the Hari
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Krishna Temple I loved it and much of
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what I stumbled into by following my
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curiosity and intuition turned out to be
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Priceless later on let me give you one
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example Reed College at that time
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offered perhaps the best calligraphy
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instruction in the country throughout
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the campus every poster every label on
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every drawer was beautifully hand
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calligraphed because I had dropped out
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and didn't have to take the normal
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classes I decided to take a calligraphy
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class to learn how to do this I learned
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about serif and Sans serif type faces
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about varying the amount of space
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between different letter combinations
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about what makes great typography
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great it was beautiful historical
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artistically subtle in a way that
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science can't capture and I found it
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none of this had even a hope of any
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practical application in my
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life but 10 years later when we were
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designing the first Macintosh computer
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it all came back to me and we designed
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it all into the Mac it was the first
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computer with beautiful
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typography if I had never dropped in on
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that single course in college the Mac
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would have never had multiple typ faces
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or proportionally spaced fonts and since
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Windows just copied the Mac it's likely
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that no person computer would have
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them if I had never dropped out I would
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have never dropped in on that
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calligraphy class and personal computers
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might not have the wonderful typography
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that they do of course it was impossible
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to connect the dots looking forward when
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I was in college but it was very very
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clear looking backwards 10 years later
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again you can't connect the dots looking
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forward you can only connect them
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looking backwards so you have to trust
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that the dots will somehow connect in
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your future you have to trust in
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something your gut Destiny Life Karma
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whatever because believing that the dots
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will connect down the road will give you
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the confidence to follow your heart even
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when it leads you off the well-worn path
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and that will make all the
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difference my second story is about love
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loss I was lucky I found what I love to
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do early in life was and I started Apple
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in my parents garage when I was 20 we
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worked hard and in 10 years Apple had
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grown from Just the Two of Us in a
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garage into a $2 billion company with
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over 4,000 employees we just released
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our finest creation the Macintosh a year
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earlier and I just turned
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fired how can you get fired from a
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started well as Apple grew we hired
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someone who I thought was very talented
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to run the company with me and for the
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first year or so things went well but
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then our visions of the future began to
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diverge and eventually we had a falling
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out when we did our board of directors
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sided with him and so at 30 I was out
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and very publicly out what had been the
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focus of my entire adult life was gone
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devastating I really didn't know what to
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do for a few months I felt that I had
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let the previous generation of
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entrepreneurs down that I had dropped
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the Baton as it was being passed to me I
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met with David Packard and Bob noise and
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tried to apologize for screwing up so
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badly I was a very public failure and I
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even thought about running away from the
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valley but something slowly began to
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dawn on me I still loved what I
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did the turn of events at Apple had not
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changed that one bit I'd been rejected
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but I was still in love
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and so I decided to start
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over I didn't see it then but it turned
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out that getting fired from Apple was
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the best thing that could have ever
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happened to me the heaviness of being
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successful was replaced by the lightness
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of being a beginner again less sure
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about everything it freed me to enter
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one of the most creative periods of my
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life during the next 5 years I started a
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company named next another company named
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Pixar and fell in love with an amazing
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woman who would become my wife Pixar
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went on to create the world's first
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computer animated feature film Toy Story
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and is now the most successful Animation
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world in a remarkable turn of events
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Apple bought next and I returned to
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Apple and the technology we developed at
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next is at the heart of Apple's current
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Renaissance and Loren and I have a
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together I'm pretty sure none of this
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would have happened if I hadn't been
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fired from Apple it was awful tasting
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medicine but I guess the patient needed
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it sometime life sometimes life's going
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to hit you in the head with a brick
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don't lose faith I'm convinced that the
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only thing that kept me going was that I
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loved what I did you've got to find what
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you love and that is as true for work as
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it is for your lovers your work is going
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to fill a large part of your life and
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the only way to be truly satisfied is to
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do what you believe is great work and
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the only way to do great work is to love
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what you do if you haven't found it yet
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keep looking and don't settle as with
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all matters of the heart you'll know
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when you find it and like any great
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relationship it just gets better and
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better as the years roll on so keep
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settle my third story is about
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death when I was 17 I read a quote that
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went something like if you live each day
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as if it was your last someday you'll
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right it made an impression on me and
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since then for the past 33 years I've
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looked in the mirror every morning and
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ask myself if today were the last day of
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my life would I want to do what I am
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about to do today and whenever the
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answer has been no for too many days in
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a row I know I need to change
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something remembering that I'll be dead
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soon is the most important tool I've
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ever encountered to help me make the big
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choices in life because almost
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everything all external expectations all
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Pride all fear of embarrassment or
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failure these things just fall away in
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the face of death leaving only what is
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truly important remembering that you are
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going to die is the best way I know to
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avoid the Trap of thinking you have
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something to lose you are already naked
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heart about a year ago I was diagnosed
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with cancer I had a scan at 7:30 in the
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morning and it clearly showed a tumor on
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my pancreas I didn't even know what a
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pancreas was the doctors told me this
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was almost certainly a type of cancer
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that is incurable and that I should
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expect to live no longer than 3 to 6
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months my doctor advised me to go home
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and get my Affairs in order which is
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doctor's code for prepare to die it
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means to try and tell your kids
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everything you thought you'd have the
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next 10 years to tell them in just a few
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months it means to make sure everything
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is buttoned up so that it will be as
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easy as possible for your family it
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goodbyes I live with that diagnosis all
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day later that evening I had a biopsy
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where they stuck an endoscope down my
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throat through my stomach and into my
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put a needle into my pancreas and got a
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few cells from the tumor I was sedated
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but my wife who was there told me that
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when they viewed the cells under a
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microscope the doctor started crying
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because it turned out to be a very rare
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form of pancreatic cancer that is
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curable with surgery I had the surgery
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and thankfully I'm fine now
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this was the closest I've been to facing
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death and I hope it's the closest I get
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for a few more decades having lived
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through it I can now say this to you
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with a bit more certainty than when
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death was a useful but purely
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concept no one wants to die even people
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who want to go to heaven don't want to
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die to get there and yet death is the
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destination we all share no one has ever
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escaped it and that is as it should be
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because death is very likely the single
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best invention of life it's life's
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change agent it clears out the old to
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make way for the new right now the new
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is you but someday not too long from now
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you will gradually become the old and be
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cleared away sorry to be so dramatic but
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true your time is limited so don't waste
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it living someone else's life don't be
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trapped by Dogma which is living with
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the results of other people's thinking
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don't let the noise of others opinions
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drown out your own inner voice and most
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important have the courage to follow
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your heart and intuition they somehow
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already know what you truly want to
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become everything else is
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secondary when I was young
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there was an amazing publication called
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the whole earth catalog which was one of
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the Bibles of my generation it was
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created by a fellow named Stuart brand
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not far from here in Meno Park and he
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brought it to life with his poetic touch
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this was in the late 60s before personal
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computers and desktop publishing so it
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was all made with typewriters scissors
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and Polaroid cameras it was sort of like
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Google in paperback form 35 years before
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Google came along it was idealist istic
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overflowing with neat tools and great
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Notions Stewart and his team put out
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several issues of the whole earth
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catalog and then when it had run its
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course they put out a final issue it was
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the mid1 1970s and I was your
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age on the back cover of their final
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issue was a photograph of an early
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morning Country Road the kind you might
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find yourself hitchhiking on if you were
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adventurous beneath it were the words
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stay hungry stay foolish it was their
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farewell message as they signed off stay
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hungry stay foolish and I have always
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myself and now as you graduate to begin
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a new I wish that for you stay hungry
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stay foolish thank you all very much
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the proceeding program is copyrighted by
22:04
Stanford University please visit us at
