Steve Wozniak is a legend in the tech space, and for justifiable reasons. In his recent years, he has turned into more of a celebrity spokesperson than a tech luminary, though, and has stayed in the public eye through appearances on TV, in films, and speaking at conferences.
In a recent conference in Vienna, the WeAreDevelopers tech conference, Woz took the time to answer questions not only about the history of Apple, but also provide his thoughts on some recent developments in tech and with Apple’s biggest competitors.
Along with providing his thoughts on Facebook and Gmail, the Woz spoke fondly of Ethereum.
While many “celebs” and visionaries have bemoaned Bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general, Woz seems to get it. The man who helped drive Apple’s success from behind the scenes may not be a hardcore investor or enthusiast, but he does see the potential in it, and keeps some of the cryptocurrency he’s found on his various computers just to play around with ways to use it.
(He famously sold most of the Bitcoin and Ethereum he found on his machines several months ago, and was scammed out of much of his remaining Bitcoin this past February, but still apparently has enough to “experiment with paying for different things.”
It sounds like he sees more in Ethereum than being a fun digital piggybank, though. He described it as a platform similar to how he saw Apple when they began, and that he believes it has the potential to become just as influential.
In addition to cryptocurrency, Woz shared about his distrust and renouncement of Facebook — and not only for its recent privacy reasons. By removing Facebook and no longer using it, he spoke of giving up “friends” and certain conversations forever, but in return immediately seeing less targeted ads.
Woz also spoke of his distrust for Gmail and its pervasiveness and use as an account all over the Internet.
Even though he’s no longer actively developing in the tech world, Wozniak certainly seems to be keeping up on it. It will be interesting to see if any new developments arise with Ethereum due to his endorsement, or if perhaps his tech education initiative, Woz University, will start offering courses related to it.
