I never met Steve Jobs. Now that he is gone, I never will. But I know what he was worth; so do millions of others like me who have used and experienced Apple products such as the iPhone or the iPad of today or the Macintosh computers of the 1980s. He was a man who did not invent products. He merely sold a new experience.
The computer had already been invented and brought into offices by the time he and his friend dropped out of college to start working in their garage. But what they did was to fashion a computer that would be friendly to users and could display text in the various fonts that one would see in print. Form was important for Steve Jobs. He knew it was important for his customers too.
He did not invent the device to play your music. Sony did so with its Walkman. Apple only went one better and smaller with its iPod.
He did not invent the mobile phone; but the iPhone, when it debuted three years ago, completely changed the perception of what the simple hand-held device could do.
No longer was it just a plain device to talk into; it was one that could take pictures and mail them directly to your friends, play the music you wanted, browse the Web, pick up the podcast of the sitcom you missed on telly, and guide you with a map through a city you did not know. All of that power integrated into an elegant device that fitted your palm.
He did not invent the tablet computer. But the iPad that Apple introduced in January 2010 has outsold them all. He had great products all right, but Mr Jobs knew that he had to keep consumers happy if he wanted them to keep coming back again and again.
I had picked up an iPhone 3G three years ago on a Vodafone contract in India. It came with a two-year warranty, but began to malfunction when I was travelling in London a couple of months before the warranty ran out.
Gadgets are hard to repair these days, I knew, and I had not carried the warranty papers on the trip. So I took the phone gingerly to the Apple store on Regent Street, contemplating the huge bill that awaited me.
I was directed to a jaunty young staff member in a blue T-shirt who took one look at my dysfunctional phone. Sorry, I can't get it to work, he said. Do you have a warranty, he asked. I am sorry I don't have the card, I said. Don't worry, he replied, and plugged the device into his computer.
He instantly could read my phone's origin and its date of purchase, and confirmed it was indeed under warranty. No worries, he declared, and in a trice he was handing over to me a brand new phone.
Plugged again into my iTunes account, it soon had all the information I had in the old phone. And I had to pay nothing.
I have since returned to the store to buy the iPad, an iPod (for my daughter) and an iPhone 4.
A man is known by the company he keeps, goes the adage. I got to know the company and I believe I know the man.