Steve Jobs – photo credit: Matthew Yohe – Wikipedia
COULD STEVE JOBS OF APPLE COMPUTERS HAVE SUCCEEDED IN CITY OF SKOPJE?
By Sasha Uzunov
The legacy of one of the greatest geniuses the world has ever known, the late Steve Jobs, is that we have hi-tech mobile phones and computers that have allowed the average person to become a reporter of world events. This legacy together with the advent of social media has brought dramatic global political changes. But the question I would like to pose is could Steve Jobs have succeeded in Skopje, the capital city of the Republic of Macedonia?
THE ANSWER IS NO
The answer is a very obvious NO. Putting aside the lack of economic incentive, from a cultural perspective Steve Jobs would never have been able to do anything. So hypothetically if by some miracle the European Union or some other body was to pour a bag of gold or a fistful of dollars into Macedonia…there would still be no Steve Jobs.
WHY?
Firstly, Steve Jobs dropped out of university in his homeland of the United States. In status conscious Macedonia, run by the over-credentialed, City of Skopje cultural elite, Steve Jobs would have suffered ridicule for being an “uncultured peasant (nekulturen selanec).”
Secondly, Steve Jobs was not the off-spring of Macedonia’s former communist ruling elite, and in post-communist Macedonia, not belonging to any of the major political parties, he would never have been able to open his mouth, let alone create or invent anything.
Thirdly, in order to conform to the City of Skopje ruling and cultural elite and in order to “belong socially” he would have had to spent most of his time hanging out in cafes (kafic or kafani) chain-smoking and listening to Bijelo Dugme or Ceca of Serbian Turbo-folk music fame, and indulging in conspiracy theories and blaming everyone, including the government, the state, the CIA, the Vatican, the KGB, aliens etc for his predicament.
An example of Macedonian style nanny statism is Ana Stojanov(a) who did a Master’s degree at Cambridge University, Britain, in child psychology and then returned to her homeland of Macedonia complaining about not being given a chance, that is a comfy public service job in an office!
Link to The Nanny State – Macedonian style article
But we know that Steve Jobs spent a lot of his time doing “uncool things” like tinkering in his parents’ garage trying to invent a computer. The City of Skopje elite would have perceived him as being crazy, even though many of them use his products, I-phones and Apple computers.
Fourthly, and this ties in with the previous point: Steve Jobs would have been punished by the City of Skopje cultural elite enforcers for being curious, for asking questions, for taking things apart and simply trying something different. He would have been hit over the head with “pravopis,” the obsession with speaking correct and formal Macedonian even though the elite itself does not practice what it preaches.