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Jobs: 'I'll spend my dying breath destroying Android'

Threatened $40bn war over rival mobe OS, slated Google

Never one to pussyfoot around his deep hatred for rivals and traitors, Steve Jobs chucked some choice epithets at Google boss Eric Schmidt and his products after the Apple-Google rift opened in 2007.

Android made Jobs furious, according to snippets from a new biography Steve Jobs as reported by AP. When the Google mobile OS launched in November 2007, 10 months after the iPhone in January of that year, he accused Schmidt of copying the Jesus mobe and committing "a grand theft".

"I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apple's $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong," Jobs said.

"I'm going to destroy Android, because it's a stolen product. I'm willing to go thermonuclear war on this," Jobs told biographer Walter Issacson in an interview in 2010, following the launch of a new 'droid-powered HTC handset.

Schmidt had served on Apple's board all the way through the launch of the iPhone, so Jobs took the Android development as a betrayal, arguing that Apple never interfered with Google's core business.

Jobs' strong opinions on Google products were not confined to mobile; he described all their products outside of internet search as a pile of excrement. Google Docs came in for some heavy criticism.

And perhaps worst of all ... Jobs compared them to Microsoft. Tweeting AP journo Michael Liedtke reported:

Jobs told Page Google had been putting out too many products "that are adequate but not great. They're turning you into Microsoft". Ouch

For those interested in the personal relationships between the men who shaped tech world, before he died earlier this month, Jobs hadn't (at least publicly) forgiven Schmidt, but had warmed to Larry. Larry had gone to Jobs for advice on being a great CEO.

Liedtke added:

Jobs says he initially wanted to say "f-you" to Page, but remembered how Bill Hewlett [had] advised him when he was young

Steve Jobs, published by Simon & Schuster, will go on sale on Monday. ®

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