I'm gonna have to agree and say that the hyperbole about what this man accomplished is over-the-top. He didn't change the world in any meaningful way. He made great products, and that's about as far as his influence extends to the world.
The guy who invented the toilet "changed the world". Mark Zuckerburg has changed the world far more than Steve Jobs. Sometimes people need a reality check.
Perhaps I'm a little too young to fully understand the history here, and yeah he's had his influence on computing in many ways. But so have a lot of other people who were far more influential that have wallowed in obscurity. Correct me if I'm wrong, but macintosh didn't usher computing into the mainstream. Up until the ipod, apple has always been a very niche company.
He's as popular as he is precisely because he's charismatic and filthy rich. He embodies the "New American Dream" (wealth and fame). That's why we have so much reverence for him. Then we exaggerate his actual impact on the world to square with our inflated reverence.
The Macintosh wasn't the first personal computer the same way the iMac wasn't the first all-in-one, or the iPod wasn't the first MP3 player: it wasn't, except for most people, it was. It wasn't anything fundamentally new or special, but it changed everything.
As for influence... True, lots of people have been strongly influential. Take Tim Berners-Lee, who invented HTTP, HTML, and the first web browser... On a NeXT, a computer built by one Steve Jobs.
Why do you(or the president) think exaggerating his accomplishments is warranted or even tasteful?
It's not 100% true, I know plenty of people with no apple devices, who don't care at all about apple or it's products.
Personality cults like this are embarrassing, and a major weakness for critical thinking. Celebrate the man for what he did, not some deified hero icon.
Even if you don't own anything made by Apple and don't care at all about it, it's hard to deny that it has had a major influence on computing, and through that on the modern world in general.
If we can't honestly appreciate the incredible magnitude of the effect this man had on our world today of all days, when will we be able to?