A stylus? Here's why Apple is defying Steve Jobs

By , John Johnson

Published November 05, 2015

The new Apple Pencil rests on top of the iPad Pro. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg)

One of the Apple announcements getting a lot of attention is the company's $99 stylus—called the Apple Pencil—for the iPad Pro. As Apple watchers were quick to point out, Steve Jobs himself hated the idea.

"Who wants a stylus?" he asked in 2007. "You have to get em', put em' away. You lose them. Yuck." And in 2010, he said, "If you see a stylus, they blew it." ABC rounds up some of the immediate, snarky reactions, like this.

A Gizmodo blogger sees the development as a sign that Tim Cook and his team "feel confident enough in their own leadership to ignore the now very infamous words of Jobs." More importantly, it looks like a good product, one that's a "necessity if Apple wants to compete for the business of design and engineering professionals who need a stylus to do their jobs on a tablet." And at the Verge, a blogger notes that it's a much different world now than when Jobs first condemned the stylus.

"What's missing from the reactions is the obvious acknowledgment that Jobs was not only talking about using a stylus with an entirely different product—the 3.5-inch iPhone 1—but he was referring to both styluses and screens that have been blown out of the water by newer technology." For one thing, the iPad Pro has a nearly 13-inch screen.

Competitors such as Microsoft and Samsung already have similar technology on the market, and Cook is showing that he's OK playing catch-up when he thinks the time is right.

Still, it's a notable shift. As Fast Company declares in its headline about the Apple Pencil, "The Steve Jobs Era Is Over." (More on Apple's new toys here.)

This article originally appeared on Newser: A Stylus? Why Apple Is Defying Steve Jobs