During his speech at a conference in Lexington, Kentucky last month where he received the Alltech Humanitarian Award, the creator of the first Apple I computer Steve Wozniak spoke incredibly highly on Samsung’s first virtual reality headset, the Gear VR. “It takes you to other worlds. It’s so real. It’s everywhere you look. That one gets me emotional,” said the pioneer of the 1970s personal computer revolution.
The renowned electronics engineer, programmer, and inventor also expressed his slight disappointment with the fact that Apple still hasn’t released a VR headset of its own design. Wozniak revealed that he’s hoping the company he co-founded is at least currently working on a VR device that’s more advanced than the ones we currently have on the market. Other than that, the legendary inventor also commented on Google’s artificial intelligence endeavors, stating he isn’t really afraid of their implications and describing the tech giant’s goal as a good one despite the fact that it could signify a quite significant loss of privacy of its users. The technology enthusiast did admit he has some concerns regarding AI. As he put it, a person is nothing more than a collection of brain connections, so if all of those connections got mapped out on the web that then proceeds to remember them faster and more accurately than an actual person, a question of whether we’re more present on the web or in real life emerges. “It’s a scary thought,” Woz admitted.
During his conference speech in Lexington, Woz also touched upon the recipe for success in the tech industry of the 1970s and claimed it hasn’t changed much until this day. As he explained, he probably wouldn’t be where he is today and wouldn’t have achieved what he has today if he started Apple with a huge financial injection because few people think about affordability when they don’t have to. Other than that, Wozniak singled out the passion for developing new and exciting creations as an integral part of the success in the tech industry. “I just wanted people to see my engineering,” he said, adding that back in the day, he wasn’t hiding his designs in some underground lab but was instead freely giving them out, trying to get them noticed and appreciated.