![]() From the start of his career-which is to say, for his entire adult life-he has radiated a mesmeric presence, his “reality-distortion field.” But as Jobs makes clear today, Apple’s reality is no longer in need of much distortion. The cliché of Jobs as rock star is, of course, hoary to the point of enfeeblement. “We’ll very shortly be in three businesses and a hobby,” Jobs replies, projecting the mildest affect he can muster-yet still the crowd is goggle-eyed, as if Bono were in the house. The stage in question is at the Four Seasons in Carlsbad, California, where Jobs has come this afternoon in May for The Wall Street Journal conference “D: All Things Digital.” Dressed in his customary uniform-black mock turtleneck, faded 501s, running shoes-Jobs sits across from Journal technology columnist Walt Mossberg, who commences with a simple question: Having recently changed its named from Apple Computer to Apple Inc., exactly what business is the company in? After three decades as Silicon Valley’s regnant enfant terrible, Jobs has suddenly, improbably, morphed into its presiding éminence grise. The senescence on display is jarring, but it’s also fitting. ![]() A caricaturist would draw him as a hybrid of Andre Agassi and Salman Rushdie. His striking facial features-the aquiline nose, the razor-gash dimples-are speckled with ash-gray stubble. But now, at 52, his hair is seriously thinning, his frame frail-seeming, his gait halting and labored. Well into his forties, Jobs appeared to have pulled off some kind of unholy Dorian Gray maneuver. The second thing you think is, no, not old: He finally looks his age. He saunters out onstage, and the first thing you think is, man, Steve Jobs looks old. Illustration by Default Photo: Harald Franzen/Zuma Press
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