Afterward in the demo area, Jobs asked me what I thought of Ping. “It sucks and it’s going to be a failure and, most of all, Chris Martin hurts my ears,” I replied. He grimaced. Martin was a friend of his. But after a few back-and-forths, Jobs said, “You’re probably right.” He acknowledged that Apple was following in the social space and not leading, a fact he hated as much as he hated Facebook and Myspace. I can tell you very few figures in positions of power like Jobs ever admitted even the slightest mistake to me that readily.
