"It's a little like a spaceship landed."

parislemon:

Steve Jobs goes to Cupertino City Hall to make the case for Apple’s new proposed headquarters. This is easily the most fascinating city council meeting ever. A few things:

1) Jobs is still officially on medical leave, but he clearly felt strongly enough about this new campus that he wanted to give this presentation. Solo.

2) This was just a day after his WWDC keynote.

3) Holy shit that is one of the most amazing-looking buildings I’ve ever seen.

4) “There is not a straight piece of glass in this building.”

5) It will definitely be the most amazing corporate headquarters ever seen. Jobs says that he thinks they have “a shot at building the best office building in the world.” ”I really do think architecture students will come here to see this.”

6) I can only assume the “Infinite Loop” or some variation will transfer over. (The old campus will remain as well.)

7) The campus will feature apricot orchards and 6,000 trees — just like the landscape from when Jobs was young (and growing up in the area).

8) It will house 12,000+ employees — in one building.

9) Apple wants to have a power center on campus that will be the primary power source (with natural gas and other unnamed sources of energy). The city’s electric grid would be the back-up power source. 

10) Jobs hints that they would also have an auditorium on campus that may be large enough so that they may not have to go to San Francisco to do big events. 

11) When asked if Apple would offer the city free WiFi (like Google does in nearby Mountain View), Jobs smiles and says that if they’re paying taxes, he thinks the city should take care of those things. Then he quips, “Now, if we can get out of paying taxes, I’ll be glad to put up a WiFi network.”

12) “I think we bring a lot more than free WiFi.”

13) Jobs kicks things off by talking about his love for HP back in the day, and describes the time he called Bill Hewlett when he was 13, who eventually gave him a summer job. (This new campus will be built on HP’s old campus.)

14) The mayor pulls out his iPad 2 at one point and gushes about it — then begs for Jobs to build an Apple Store in Cupertino (Jobs declines because he doesn’t think it will be successful enough due to low traffic).

15) Every council member is absolutely eating out of Jobs’ hand. (“Thank you so so much.”) At the end, the mayor asks that everyone give Jobs a big round of applause. 

16) Ground would break on the project next year. It would be completed in 2015.

17) There is no way this doesn’t get approved.