No New Cancer for Steve Jobs

So he was sicker than they let on, but it's not cancer, thank goodness:

No New Cancer for Steve Jobs
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Apple CEO Steve Jobs' recent health problems are not life threatening and are not due to a recurrence of cancer, the New York Times reported today.

But their cause was more serious than a "common bug," said the Times' Joe Nocera in his business column. That's the phrase that Apple representatives had been using to describe Jobs' malady. In depicting Jobs' health problem that way, the company was going beyond its notorious penchant for secrecy, Nocera charged.

"By claiming Mr. Jobs had a bug, Apple wasn't just going dark on its shareholders. It was deceiving them," he wrote.

Apple representatives did not immediately return inquiries seeking comment today.

Nocera's column was the result of his own reporting and a conversation with Jobs that the iconic CEO insisted be off-the-record.

Jobs had surgery in 2004 to treat a rare form of pancreatic cancer. But, Apple didn't disclose the cancer to shareholders until after the surgery - some nine months after the company's board first became aware of it, according to an article in Fortune magazine earlier this year.

Jobs' gaunt appearance at Apple's developer conference in San Francisco last month set off speculation that his health was imperiled or that his cancer had returned. Given the company's lack of disclosure the previous time he battled cancer, assurances from company representatives in recent weeks that Jobs simply suffered from a "common bug" didn't quiet the concern among investors...