I forget the source but I remember a story about an ipod prototype being shown to Steve Jobs, where they deliberately showed him a flawed early model that he could evaluate and reject, allowing him to realize what should be fixed. Then when they showed him their improved solution he would be better able to accept it, feeling that he was a part of the thinking that improved the design.<p>Steve Job&#x27;s name was on a number of patents - I expect however that a significant amount of those reflect his involvement though this sort of &quot;handling&quot;, where it was important to draw him into a consensus by letting him think through a design problem that was probably already solved.