The image from Apples website today.

Apple has confirmed that Steve Jobs passed away on Wednesday (US time) due to pancreatic cancer.

He was 56.

And the world now turns to discuss what ‘Fortune 500’s CEO of the Decade’ has achieved. In short, no matter your outlook on the Apple brand, it has been complete technological dominance. Apple is the biggest technology company in the world, worth more than $300 billion.

It has redesigned some of the most popular gadgets and reimagined what technology can do for us.

Steve, for his part, was the founder of the company. A brilliantly sharp man who didn’t follow trends, but tried to imagine what people needed before they needed it. He left the company in the late 80s after much friction but was welcomed back as the ‘Prodigal son’ in the late 1990s when Apple lost its way.

That’s when the tech magic happened. He took control of the design and marketing process with ruthless ideology and the result was the iPod. The music player that launched an array of products that people are still using today.

His former rival Bill Gates, who founded Microsoft, had this to say:

Wired had this obituary:

Worth a read. Steve Jobs worked almost until his death.

Here’s an ad from Apple’s 1997 ‘Think Different’ campaign.

How will you remember the man?