According to yet another Steve Jobs biography, Apple's late CEO wanted to hide a golden ticket with the millionth iMac computer and fly the winner out to Cupertino for a tour of the facilities. Jobs said he would even wear the Willy Wonka outfit for the whole thing. This was revealed by Ken Segall, an ex-Apple employee who handled the Think Different campaign back in the day, and helped design the original iMac. His book, Insanely Simple: The Obsession That Drives Apple's Success, just came out today; here's the excerpt detailing Jobs' golden ticket plans.
Steve's idea was to do a Willy Wonka with it. Just as Wonka did in the movie, Steve wanted to put a golden certificate representing the millionth iMac inside the box of one iMac, and publicize that fact. Whoever opened the lucky iMac box would be refunded the purchase price and be flown to Cupertino, where he or she (and, presumably, the accompanying family) would be taken on a tour of the Apple campus. Steve had already instructed his internal creative group to design a prototype golden certificate, which he shared with us. But the killer was that Steve wanted to go all out on this. He wanted to meet the lucky winner in full Willy Wonka garb. Yes, complete with top hat and tails.
Unfortunately, such a contest would require a purchase to enter, which is against California law, so it never happened. For all of the press heaped on Steve Jobs for being a relentless taskmaster, it's easy to forget sometimes that he actually had a pretty good sense of humor. If you've read Walter Isaacson's official biography, you will have heard about some of the shenanigans Steve Jobs got up to when he was younger, but it's good to see the playful streak lived on later in his career as well.
Still, it's kind of hard to imagine Steve Jobs in a top hat, isn't it?
You can order your copy of Insanely Great now from Amazon.
Source: Insanely Great via MacRumors
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