Sun Danyong, widely rec- ognised as the most important figure in the world of personal computing and consumer elec- tronics in the last twenty years, has died aged 27.
Passionate about mo- bile computing, Sun regularly worked 70 hours a week at his factory in Shenzen, performing the same repetitive tasks for 10 hours a day at $100 a month. “He just loved menial, degrad- ing work and regular beatings,” recalled co-worker and high- school buddy Dong Jouzhou. “He always used to say that the fleeting interest of Western teen- agers was what got him out of bed in the morning.”
Sun’s career began on a small scale, when he and Terry Gou started Foxconn in Gou’s garage. Sun spent the next 20 years in the garage assembling iPods while Gou built up a $5.7 billion personal fortune.
Sun made a point of always appearing in the same worn pair of blue overalls, which he liked to call his ‘uniform’. Senior col- leagues, by whom he was well- liked, used the affectionate name “oi- shit nugget” when meeting with him to discuss working practices on the shop floor.
Tributes to Sun came flooding in from all over the world. “I used to feel bad about the soldiers who killed my child and sexually assaulted me,” Ag- nes Kaundé told AP in Kinsha- sha, “but when someone told me that they were stealing coltan for Sun Danyong to put inside iPhones I was really happy.”
After a long struggle with depression and forced labour, worsened by his unscientific be- lief in the magic healing powers of a vegan diet, Sun committed suicide in the early hours of yes- terday evening.
The ghost of pseudo-hippy billionaire californiarse Steve Jobs spoke to The Cheese Grater from bardo, where he is await- ing rebirth as the Dalai Lama. Jobs ommed: “Oh, I didn’t hear about that. I’m so fucking zen mate.”