Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computers, one of the world's reigning geniuses, has died at the age of 56 after his eight-year battle with pancreatic cancer. The visionary who revolutionized movies and music and in countless ways how we talk to each other on this planet every day.



The news sent a jolt around the globe and we even heard of spontaneous gatherings outside the Apple stores as people got together just to remember him and his dreams. And reactions are flooding in, including from Robert Iger, the President and Chief Executive Officer of our parent company, the Walt Disney Company, who spoke of his friend and colleague, who was of course also creator of Pixar, the movie studio and a member of the Disney Board.



And here is what Bob Iger said:

"His legacy will extend far beyond the products he created or the businesses he built. It will be the millions of people he inspired, the lives he changed and the culture he defined. Steve was such an original with a thoroughly creative, imaginative mind that defined an era. Despite all he's accomplished, it feels like he was just getting started."



And now ABC's Bill Weir remembers the towering legacy of Steve Jobs.



Before he put a virtual world at our fingertips -- "and we call it the iPad."



Before he turned household tools into objects of desire -- "Today Apple is going to reinvent the phone."



Before he changed the way we are entertained -- "And you can watch it on you iPod."



A 20-year-old Steve Jobs launched a revolution from his parents' garage. With buddy Steve Wozniak, they set out to move the power of the computer from the laboratory to your lap. "The penalty for failure for going and trying to start a company in this valley is not existent."



And his brimming confidence was validated when they launched the Macintosh. "We worked hard and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a two-billion-dollar company with over 4,000 employees."



But the 80s brought a power struggle with Apple's board, and Jobs was soon fired from the company he founded. "And so at 30, I was out and very publicly out. What had been the focus in my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating."



But he did not wallow. And in his 30s, he met his wife, started another computer company called NeXT, and took over Pixar, changing animation forever. "My name is Woody, and this is Andy's room."



In 1996, Apple bought NeXT, and soon Jobs was back in charge, leading a digital renaissance. After his return, Apple stock soared more than 7,000%, turning that garage startup into one of the most valuable companies in history. And in a valley of geniuses, his myth grew into Thomas Edison meets Willy Wonka proportions, building anticipation for invention shrouded in secrecy.



"Are you using that currently as your phone?"

"I haven't been able to, cause I can't take it out public."



While keeping his life fiercely under wraps, not even his board knew of his pancreatic cancer. "I just wanted to mention this."



And he didn't reveal he’d had a liver transplant until after the procedure. "I now have a liver of a mid-20s person who died in a car crash."



Through life, while his body grew frail, that mind, that drive, never quits. A standing ovation welcomed his surprise appearance at the spring launch of the iPad 2, but then came this letter in August.



"I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties, I will be the first to let you know," he wrote, "Unfortunately, that day has come."



He was the man who had peered into the future, seeing how we’d work and play 20 years before we'd ever hold the proof.

"Everything will be portable. People want large, color screens so they can put photographs on. People want motion video."



And when the body began to fail, he was driven anew -- by the clock and that burning need to build something great.



"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything, all external expectations, all pride, all fear and embarrassment of failure, these things just fall always in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important."

Steve Jobs苹果之父