The week of Fourth of July in the U.S. is a short work week and one where most people are on vacation, or at least thinking about it. So let’s take a break from the day-to-day stress of work and worry, and think about other things as well – things like innovation.

The following was first published in October 2011 in EDA Confidential, just a few days after Steve Jobs passed away.

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Pop Pop iPop …

Over the last 60 years, three wildly different anarchists have grabbed the Common Man by the throat, forced him to take off the blinders, stop signing on the bottom line, and cease obsessing about crossing those damn t’s or dotting those accursed i’s. In so doing, these three more than any others of their time redefined the modern zeitgeist and created 20th Century Man, a hominid unrecognizable from any that came before.

And, because the risks of fomenting chaos often – and perversely – generate great rewards, these guys also raked in an outsized share of the cosmic pie and were anointed, respectively, Prince of Pop, King of Pop, and Potentate of iPop.

It wasn’t all goodness and light, however; the Fates insisted on having the last word in the unscripted and tumultuous glories of the three. Clearly flying too close to the sun, not a single one of them lived to see a 60th birthday.

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