I have never been an Apple fan boy. My computer life started on MS-DOS, and viewing technology as purely a way to get things done, I tend not to jump technology platforms unless something forces it on me. I do have a dated iPod I use when working out and love iTunes because it unites two of my passions - music and research. But that is about it for any Apple products.

Nonetheless, I had started a creativity-oriented blog post for today, but couldn't see running it given the news. While I tend to not conform the blog's writing schedule to current events, it would be ridiculous on an innovation and creativity-focused blog to simply march ahead with whatever the next blog post was without at least a moment of "blog silence" for Steve Jobs.

Because whether or not I've been on the Apple bandwagon all these years, you have to acknowledge Jobs' incredible disruptive, creative genius in business, design, and leadership.

For that, I will always be in awe.

There are very few people hard-wired the way Steve Jobs was.

For the rest of us, it comes down to trying to figure out if there are tools to push our thinking down comparably disruptive paths - minus the brain matter and perspective Steve Jobs had to look at the world with such an elegantly disruptive mentality.

So while Steve Jobs' passing doesn't hit me with a critical fear of future cool product deprivation, it hits me because an amazing creative business genius is gone today. - Mike Brown