Steve Jobs is often described as some sort of technological visionary. And, to give him his due, his vision of the Mac as ‘the computer for the rest of us’ is something that he’s pursued with single-minded intensity over the years.

But his greatest asset is probably the famous ‘Steve Jobs reality distortion field’ – the ability to charm anyone who listens to him into going along with whatever idea or product he’s trying to sell.

That’s how the barefoot Jobs sold his first order for 50 Apple I computers to an electronics store in California in 1975. And that’s how he whipped the crowd into a frenzy at the launch of the first Macintosh in 1984.

His return to Apple in 1997 was greeted like the Second Coming and he stunned the entire industry when he announced at the Macworld Expo that he’d done a deal with Microsoft that not only settled all their outstanding legal disputes, but also ensured that Microsoft would continue to develop the Mac version of Microsoft Office and invest a handy $150m in Apple at the same time. He may be an arrogant sonofabitch but only Steve Jobs could have pulled that off.

A few months later he unveiled the iMac with a similarly theatrical flourish – and the rest is history.