Tim Cook: The Cursed Child

COMMENT  |  I’ve just finished reading the new Harry Potter story, a play called Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. 

It’s rather good, if not as well-written as one might like. My big problem with it, though, was its dependence on nostalgia — every few scenes came another cameo by a character from the earlier stories, or a reminiscence about the events of the past. Relatively little of it is actually new adventure.

Don’t worry, I’ll get to the part where this is about Apple shortly.

The title of the story is a little bit ambiguous — who, exactly, is “the Cursed Child”? Reading most literally, it’s Cedric Diggory, Harry’s schoolmate who was killed (using the “killing curse”) in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Much of the story rests on the attempt to go back in time and save him.

(Apologies if that’s a spoiler — I figure if you haven’t read the new Harry Potter by the time you’re reading this, you probably don’t care that much.)

However, the title could also refer to Harry’s son, Albus, cursed with the weight of expectation that comes with being the son of Harry Potter. Equally, it could refer to Scorpius Malfoy, son of Draco, who lives under the shadow of persistent rumours about his parentage. There are other candidates, but to mention them would be to spoil perhaps too much.

Reading the story, though, got me thinking about the weight that rests on the shoulders of Apple chief executive Tim Cook. It’s now five years since he took the reins from Apple founder and demigod Steve Jobs, and he still lives in that long shadow.

Mostly it’s not his fault. Jobs was unconventional and brilliant, where Cook seems a much more conservative, steady style of leader. Where Jobs was unpredictable and mercurial, these are not words often used about Cook. It’s the way he is, and no-one should expect him to be otherwise.

What that means is that a technology press gallery accustomed to the drama and excitement that came with speculating about Jobs’ next move feels unsatisfied by the relative predictability of following Cook’s Apple. They — we — pick on him for that, and it’s not overly fair. In that respect, the irony of this column does not escape me.

Some of it is Cook’s fault, though. He’s done as much as anyone to create and perpetuate Jobs’ mythic status. 

I have read that he does not occupy Jobs’ old office, instead staying in the room he worked in as COO, while the CEO office remains empty — like a sort of shrine. I don’t know if this is true or not — some things on the internet are just made up, apparently — but if it’s not, Cook should perhaps make some attempt to dispel it. If it is true, it’s kinda creepy.

Speaking of creepy, a story has emerged in connection with an upcoming biography of Jobs that, back in 2009, when Jobs was suffering side-effects from his cancer treatments, Cook offered to donate part of his liver for a transplant.

Now, I’m pretty sure that isn’t considered standard corporate practice, even in California. Offering a part of a vital organ is something reserved for family and loved ones — not your boss. You might feel a visceral admiration for your employer, but to express it with actual viscera seems to me a step beyond the norm.

Of course the response to that is to say that Apple is more than a company, it’s a family, and Jobs was more than a boss, he was a friend — a father even.

And that right there is the problem.

The idea of Apple as a sort of cult worked fine when Jobs was there to fill the role of Messiah, but it doesn’t work in his absence — and an empty office only serves to draw attention to that absence. Jobs was a terrific CEO — extraordinary, even — but he’s gone and has been gone for five years. No spell and no time-turner can change that. He wasn’t the company’s father, he was its boss — and bosses, unlike fathers, can be replaced.

No more nostalgia. Time now for new adventures.  

Matthew JC Powell is a technology commentator, philosopher and father of two, in no particular order.