Woz Sounds Off On Innovation, iPhones & More

In advance of his keynote address at ScanSource's ImpactNow event next month, Wozniak recently spoke with Everything Channel about everything from the economy's future to iPhones.

Predictably, his answers are unpredictable, and it's an appetizer for what solution providers are in store for when they will get the chance to ask Wozniak anything they want during an interactive session at next month's Impact Now event. The following are excerpts from the conversation:

With the financial market flailing, I have to ask you what you think of the bailout and what's happening on Wall Street. Do you think the government is making the right moves?

I have to be honest, I'm not a big stock market guy. People are talking about it, so I've heard about it. I'm not really surprised. The stock market has been going up and down all my life. We have five years, 10 years, off and on. This one didn't really surprise me. I've watched the national debt increase. You can't keep borrowing and borrowing and not expect something to happen. I'm a little pessimistic because I don't like to be in big debt. Now that you can barely pay the increase in the interest, you have to tighten up.

Do you think technology can still help companies, in that it can help them reduce costs and become more efficient?

The problem is it's not technology. Technology is just a tool. The key to it is what you do with technology. You can have a computer that runs 10 times as fast, 20 times as fast, but there's no more work getting done if you don't change the methods you have to get the work done. For the last 20 or 30 years, the computer business has been nothing more than replacements and upgrades. That, to me, seems kind of elastic. Can you postpone an upgrade for a year? That's not going to help you run your business better or worse.

Do you think people will be more tight with their IT spending the rest of the year?

In terms of what people will buy for Christmas, people already have their iPods. What's so new now that didn't exist before? These are tough times for the industry, but we've gone through it before. I don't think it will be anything like the dot-com bust. In 2003, San Jose lost population for the first time in its history. Right in the heart of Silicon Valley. I don't think that will happen again.

What technologies or products or companies excite you today? Who is really ahead of the game?

For the long term, Google is on a really good path. There's a major source of wealth to come from companies in the environmentally friendly [sector]. Google will go into that so much in the next decade.

Do you think selling "green" technology is a sound business decision for solution providers, our readers, or is it more hype?

I'm not talking about a "green" computer. What's a "green" computer anyway? Is it less computer? It's about making a good business decision. It's being a little more polite to the environment. If you buy less, if you buy a smaller car, that doesn't necessarily mean you're going to save the environment. If you have a little more money by buying an electric car, does that money go to a second car? How does that help? The cost of manufacturing that car creates pollution too. If you have some little piece of equipment, there is a cost to build, there's a dollars to joules ratio. You have to do your homework. I think only deep engineers and analysts can do that. I think you find out that you really save little.

So utilizing green technology has certain costs and risks associated with it? For example, it's like driving 10 extra miles to save 5 cents per gallon on gas. The gas it takes you to get there doesn't make up for the savings.

A lot of people don't like to hear the total analysis. They want to pick out one green thing and stick with that. Solar cells on your roof cost more energy to make than you will save by using them It's a difficult question to answer.

Do you feel there is as much innovation in technology today as there was five or 10 years ago? With so much consolidation in the industry, sometimes we worry that big companies don't have to be as innovative as they once were.

There is innovation in things you don't expect. Most companies and technologies that you're familiar with, that [lack of innovation] is true. But there will always be people with creative abilities. Look at the way someone designs their MySpace pages, or creates videos for YouTube. Creative energy still finds a way to get out. But it's been an awful long time in the computer space since there's been any real innovation.

In this space there's all kinds of little tiny products you can sell enough to be a business. Some are developed by one little guy in his house or garage. It might be a USB charger in the shape of a bunny rabbit. There is some of that innovation, but it's not deep, deep stuff. As soon as this industry became a $1 billion industry and big companies had resources to pour in, it became difficult to do something worthwhile today. Often the surprises we see are based on new atomic-level technology. There are some nano-technology approaches today. It might be a new photo-switching computer circuit. But big companies will miss it because it doesn't have value to them.

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