Elsewhere on the web:
“Steve knew that Walter was a credible biographer and that he’d get to the truth—and that’s precisely why Steve chose him,” says Andy Cunningham, a consultant who was Jobs’s public relations handler during his early years at Apple and at his second startup, NeXT Computer. “I don’t think Steve ever denied his faults. He knew what kind of person he was.”
To a great extent, so did everyone else. It has been reported many times that soon after co-founding Apple, Jobs lied about the paternity of his eldest daughter Lisa, claiming in court documents that he couldn’t be the father because he was infertile. (He later accepted responsibility, and she spent much of her childhood living with Jobs). There were countless stories of his poor treatment of employees during his early years at Apple, as well as the public humiliation of his ouster from the company in 1985. Add to the list Jobs’s participation in the backdating of stock options more than a decade ago, which turned out to be far more onerous than backdating by executives at other companies who were forced to resign or even sent to prison.
Hopefully he left them something after he died, or at least his wife did something for them. Steve Jobs was a disgusting lying cheat. He claimed credit for Wozniack's work when they worked at Atari and Steve accepted bonuses, promising to split them with Woz, and never did. He only got worse since then. What a scumbag.
No, it was not. . . The stock options to Jobs were not onerous at all, they cannot be, They had been authorized at a Board of Directors' meeting in August but we're not actually issued to Jobs until sometime in December, after the end of the current Fiscal year, which ended on the last Saturday in September. The Board's authorization became null and void at the end of that fiscal year and would require another Board meeting to re-authorize the warrants under the new Sarbanes Oxley laws.
It was decided by the Board Treasurer and the Company controller to merely backdate the issue date and the strike price—which was actually higher than had they kept it at the strike price of the original December date, meaning Jobs would have to pay more for the stock when he exercised the grant, making less money on the spread—to the Monday before the end of the fiscal year. Jobs was not involved in the decision at all. Four Board members including the Board secretary made a Board minutes entry which showed a telephone Board meeting and vote "re-authorizing" the issuance, and back-dating which used to be a common practice prior to SOX, which never took place.
The only effect such a stock warrant grant has is a dilution of the already outstanding shares when and if dividends are paid. Apple did not start paying dividends to stockholders until after Jobs' death in 2011. In addition, the minuscule dilution such a warrant grant issued to Steve Jobs p, who took a $1 a year salary, considering the immense value he was responsible for adding to the company is a picayune reward.
The Stock grant in question was never exercised by Jobs, since at his request, that warrant grant was voided well before its five year maturity was reached and replaced by another, properly dated, of another type with a higher strike price even yet. Jobs was not driven by money. I have gone over this time and again on FreeRepublic and posted the details as well as sworn testimony. There was NOTHING illegal about it except the fake Board meeting and those officers were canned.
In other companies where prison terms and resignations resulted, the stock backdating involved plots to defraud the stockholders in failing companies and we're done with the involvement of the beneficiary. In this case, Jobs had properly recused himself from the decision on his compensation package and it had been properly decided by a Board committee.