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Ever since Steve Jobs passed Apple has gone downhill :(
- Thread starter techsavvy01
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Well, I would say football team would be a lot more successful if a coach ran the players...controlling the areas where the feet hit the ground than if, say, a really good accountant or GM ran the players.
[doublepost=1517196466][/doublepost]
Eh, that’s the curse of every publicly-traded company. The poisoning urge to always grow. That’s like expecting a man or woman to keep running faster, jumping higher, thinking smarter, as they grow. Just not possible. In mature markets like cars, computers, mobile devices, I truly think they’ve all jumped the shark and we are now just in the period of change for the sake of change, hoping to keep growing. Absolutely none of us could know for sure what Steve would do today, but I think many of us are willing to bet large sums of money that Steve would not ever have approved some of the change for sake of change that is a real problem at Apple nowadays. I’ve said this a dozen times, and everything others and I say here is just rinse and repeat. But as far as producing real vision and meaningful stretch in a tech company, that is just not happening at Apple today, and that doesn’t seem to be disproven very well in this thread.
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Steve could stand up to the board because he saved Apple and because his ego was massive. It’s very rare that a CEO can do that today.
I liked him, but if he was still alive, I would place higher odds that they would have pushed him out instead of him still leading the company today. The reason it happened before is the reason it happens all the time.
I liked him, but if he was still alive, I would place higher odds that they would have pushed him out instead of him still leading the company today. The reason it happened before is the reason it happens all the time.
Really? Even with Apple’s massive growth, taking of market share, and “finally success” with Steve starting 12+ years ago, you think Steve would have done something to mess himself up and get ousted? I know this is all conjecture.
Oh, and I’m also willing to bet large sums of money that Apple would not be giving up on computers now if Steve were still around.
This is normal when the founder of the company is dead. Every individual is different. Any company starts as a private asset with a certain vision and as long as that founder is there in the board the business follows a certain pattern, once that person steps down / passes away naturally that company is not going to continue the way it had once.
The same happened with every other company where the founder is not running the business anymore.
Eg - Microsoft.
The modern tech industry hasn’t been around long enough for us to experience this much and therefore we don’t really know what the typical trajectory would be for a company when such an event takes place. I guess we will see with Apple.
Your last paragraph - I was thinking about that myself, but more broadly - the entire "big industry" "information age" "dot.com millionaire" broader picture is still very young (last 50 or 100 or 150 years, depending on how you want to look at it). Just as the world keeps repeating conflicts & financial disasters...maybe we'll never learn how to sustain growth in a controlled fashion w/o relying on periods of utter tomfoolery, for which I think Apple is in the middle of as a result of Timmy and Jony. ~2003-2013 Apple was the underdog undiscovered overlooked ugly duckling that blossomed into this amazing can't-do-wrong must-have belle of the ball (other than perhaps charge a bit too much compared to PC's) that truly did most things right. Jump to post-2013 and, acknowledging that Apple had only so much low hanging fruit to exploit better than all competitors, most everything I could point to at Apple now is either contradictory (turning their backs on computers it seems; implementing truly unintuitive and unnatural UI across their products, reducing ease of use by constant reduction of hardware flexibility) or just plain confusing (iPhone 6, 7, 8, X fraternal quadruplets for sale simultaneously while still limiting laptop hardware options to minimalism-first as if everyone lives their lives crossing rain forests by foot and needs as light and small a laptop as possible; nothing truly innovative within their current product line such as a expandable-hardware laptop or combo ipad/MacBook with dual-boot iOS/OS or "durable iphone" (think sports Walkman) that's not so fixated on shiny thinness but durability and maybe modularity). Instead Timmy just keeps letting Jony remove hardware and thickness. Hopefully they rebound just like the American automotive industry did. They went from offering utter bloated unattractive crap from the 80's to 00's and now (finally) can compete on the world stage, producing items customers truly want and not what American automotive thinkers THOUGHT what consumers wanted.
In the same context I found this video really interesting and thought the creator tried to explain things well.
Truly interesting video, thanks for sharing. It does a good job of guessing/thinking why Apple's method is good for them; if indeed it hit the mark 100%, I could see Apple management requiring new hires to watch it 10x in a row on their first day on the job, after which the new hire would be pretty molded and ready to march towards eliminating more technology for the sake of more transparent technology since the customers will take what we shall give them.
It reminds me of how the army molds soldiers - a very unique method that makes 100% sense when applied within their ranks and which might even apply for how to handle truly unruly, unkept young people out in the "real world"...but which applied wholesale directly out in the "outside" would not transfer quite so smoothly, IMHO. My initial thoughts however, after watching it:
If Apple were our parents, then arranged marriages would be the norm.
If the automotive industry followed this rule of removing the unnecessary as well as the interface between user and technology, then "surprise and delights" would never have hit the showroom. Things like dimming interior mirrors, soft-open/close cupholders, hidden cubbies, gifts in the mail after purchase, etc.
If Apple ran human nature, we'd not be permitted to the ebb & flow that makes life interesting...society moving from cities to suburbs then back to loving the city/urban experience...from white powdered wigs to handlebar mustaches to clean shaven to long hippie hair to 24/7 midnight shadow to man buns and hipster beards. Instead we'd all be clean-shaven head to toe by now. No distracting hair to muss with.
"Technology is the enemy, a distraction, a sort of confusion. Consumers don't care about RAM or the method, they're just drawing, or reading, or listening..." That made a lot of sense when removing Intel stickers from a laptop, introducing an iPod so that consumers could no longer touch a CD, DVD, or cassette, or removing the need to seek out drivers when attaching a new device to a computer....or making those computers a sleek dull, simple grey so that the rich, intuitive, gorgeous screen content could truly shine! If Apple produced the world's pizza, they'd assume all users are OK with a processed-ingredient flash-baked pie using materials sourced 6 months prior from China & Argentina. After all, we don't care how we get it, what's in it, or maybe even how it looks. We care just how it tastes, and maybe also, the plain fact that we could get it.
Apple's already stripped as much detail as possible from iOS/OS screens short of going black/white/greyscale...has that been a good thing? Apple's moving aggravatingly towards stream-focused music/video on the phone...has that been a good thing for those of us with mostly music from 1960's-1980's albums & cassettes from eastern Europe that's not available in iTunes...and for those users who prefer an instant "on" playback vs. waiting for streaming to buffer for each tune?
Apple insists on stripping out technology while pushing the limits. Hey I love not having to lug around my 1000 cd's in order to have access to a particular song 24/7. But apparently without their realizing it, they've made the method of accessing certain content much more intrusive and much less enjoyable than before. I've already critiqued streaming and the elimination of headphone jacks, but also: iTunes 12 and after has been utter garbage that's distractingly bad to use, same for the base Music & Podcast iOS apps to where the technology actually gets in the way. So where does that leave them, now that they're proudly in the spot they have us in? Will they next impose their will onto how my music sounds? Forced EQ changes? Imposed metronome clicks? Zero allowed pause/silence between songs? I'm being serious (mostly).
It's well known how the push in the auto industry towards push-button radio controls resulted in enough backlash to realize that most (or enough) consumers still prefer a round, touchable knob for volume (and secondarily/preferably for tuning also, but mostly volume). Will that urge ever go away if Apple/automotive makers move towards touchscreen volume controls?
So the video tries to justify "why, Apple?" Are we to just buy into it? Too much is never too much?
Funny plug at the end for SquareSpace too, that seemed odd!
Good video, thanks for posting. Sounded like me for the first 1/4 of it, completely.
It did a good job at a rather believable & creditable guess as to why Apple does what it does and why it's good for them. That they think change can happen only one way, their way.
It doesn't consider why that's good for the consumer. Just like Apple. How about that.
[doublepost=1517255949][/doublepost]One additional comment: Just like how the auto industry has resorted to 50 year old designs for fresh ideas (isn't it amazing that some of the most iconic vehicles are now based on their 1960's designs...Mustang, Camaro, Corvette stingray, VW bug...like we've run out of ideas? At least those cars don't look like every other car does nowadays), I fully expect Apple to come back around some point to a more detailed, flowery, pretty UI, as well as a re-introduction of the clickwheel iPod. Speaking for myself, I detest using my iPhone for music. Hate the touchscreen interface, hate the storage limitations (yo Apple, some of us do think about storage space & storage type), and hate the thought of losing headphone jacks and not being able to use some significant quality-corded headphones I own that aren't going to stop being useful anytime soon.
Saw the clickwheel iPod as the thumbnail image for that video and reminded me of how I miss the clickwheel iPod, just like I prefer a round, turnable button in my truck for volume.
As soon as Jony Ive/Apple runs out of things to remove from iPhones/macbooks to where they are a detail-less grey unibody screenless piece of aluminum or glass, I bet they'll eventually be forced to add things back in as "new & amazing tech." One can only hope.
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Truly interesting video, thanks for sharing. It does a good job of guessing/thinking why Apple's method is good for them; if indeed it hit the mark 100%, I could see Apple management requiring new hires to watch it 10x in a row on their first day on the job, after which the new hire would be pretty molded and ready to march towards eliminating more technology for the sake of more transparent technology since the customers will take what we shall give them.
It reminds me of how the army molds soldiers - a very unique method that makes 100% sense when applied within their ranks and which might even apply for how to handle truly unruly, unkept young people out in the "real world"...but which applied wholesale directly out in the "outside" would not transfer quite so smoothly, IMHO. My initial thoughts however, after watching it:
If Apple were our parents, then arranged marriages would be the norm.
If the automotive industry followed this rule of removing the unnecessary as well as the interface between user and technology, then "surprise and delights" would never have hit the showroom. Things like dimming interior mirrors, soft-open/close cupholders, hidden cubbies, gifts in the mail after purchase, etc.
If Apple ran human nature, we'd not be permitted to the ebb & flow that makes life interesting...society moving from cities to suburbs then back to loving the city/urban experience...from white powdered wigs to handlebar mustaches to clean shaven to long hippie hair to 24/7 midnight shadow to man buns and hipster beards. Instead we'd all be clean-shaven head to toe by now. No distracting hair to muss with.
"Technology is the enemy, a distraction, a sort of confusion. Consumers don't care about RAM or the method, they're just drawing, or reading, or listening..." That made a lot of sense when removing Intel stickers from a laptop, introducing an iPod so that consumers could no longer touch a CD, DVD, or cassette, or removing the need to seek out drivers when attaching a new device to a computer....or making those computers a sleek dull, simple grey so that the rich, intuitive, gorgeous screen content could truly shine! If Apple produced the world's pizza, they'd assume all users are OK with a processed-ingredient flash-baked pie using materials sourced 6 months prior from China & Argentina. After all, we don't care how we get it, what's in it, or maybe even how it looks. We care just how it tastes, and maybe also, the plain fact that we could get it.
Apple's already stripped as much detail as possible from iOS/OS screens short of going black/white/greyscale...has that been a good thing? Apple's moving aggravatingly towards stream-focused music/video on the phone...has that been a good thing for those of us with mostly music from 1960's-1980's albums & cassettes from eastern Europe that's not available in iTunes...and for those users who prefer an instant "on" playback vs. waiting for streaming to buffer for each tune?
Apple insists on stripping out technology while pushing the limits. Hey I love not having to lug around my 1000 cd's in order to have access to a particular song 24/7. But apparently without their realizing it, they've made the method of accessing certain content much more intrusive and much less enjoyable than before. I've already critiqued streaming and the elimination of headphone jacks, but also: iTunes 12 and after has been utter garbage that's distractingly bad to use, same for the base Music & Podcast iOS apps to where the technology actually gets in the way. So where does that leave them, now that they're proudly in the spot they have us in? Will they next impose their will onto how my music sounds? Forced EQ changes? Imposed metronome clicks? Zero allowed pause/silence between songs? I'm being serious (mostly).
It's well known how the push in the auto industry towards push-button radio controls resulted in enough backlash to realize that most (or enough) consumers still prefer a round, touchable knob for volume (and secondarily/preferably for tuning also, but mostly volume). Will that urge ever go away if Apple/automotive makers move towards touchscreen volume controls?
So the video tries to justify "why, Apple?" Are we to just buy into it? Too much is never too much?
Funny plug at the end for SquareSpace too, that seemed odd!
Good video, thanks for posting. Sounded like me for the first 1/4 of it, completely.
It did a good job at a rather believable & creditable guess as to why Apple does what it does and why it's good for them. That they think change can happen only one way, their way.
It doesn't consider why that's good for the consumer. Just like Apple. How about that.
[doublepost=1517255949][/doublepost]One additional comment: Just like how the auto industry has resorted to 50 year old designs for fresh ideas (isn't it amazing that some of the most iconic vehicles are now based on their 1960's designs...Mustang, Camaro, Corvette stingray, VW bug...like we've run out of ideas? At least those cars don't look like every other car does nowadays), I fully expect Apple to come back around some point to a more detailed, flowery, pretty UI, as well as a re-introduction of the clickwheel iPod. Speaking for myself, I detest using my iPhone for music. Hate the touchscreen interface, hate the storage limitations (yo Apple, some of us do think about storage space & storage type), and hate the thought of losing headphone jacks and not being able to use some significant quality-corded headphones I own that aren't going to stop being useful anytime soon.
Saw the clickwheel iPod as the thumbnail image for that video and reminded me of how I miss the clickwheel iPod, just like I prefer a round, turnable button in my truck for volume.
As soon as Jony Ive/Apple runs out of things to remove from iPhones/macbooks to where they are a detail-less grey unibody screenless piece of aluminum or glass, I bet they'll eventually be forced to add things back in as "new & amazing tech." One can only hope.
A very well written and well thought out response there. However, I’d just like to point out one glaring difference here. Auto industry and computing industry aren’t the same and the analogy doesn’t really fit well. In fact most manual control in the auto industry has now been computerised.
I have to agree with one point in the video, consumers don’t know what they want because really average people don’t have enough grasp of the technology behind all this to even fathom what’s possible.
Since you drew the analogy with auto industry, let me point out the direction even that industry has taken - automated cars. Once we acquire the ability to actually deploy self driven cars in large quantities, things will be removed from even basic cars. Starting from steering, break, mirrors, etc because you won’t need those. You’ll just sit in the vehicle and tell it where to go. The limitation is technology at this point. Once we catch up, that’s it. Removal of certain things will be inevitable.
So yes, big corporations will ultimately define how we live our lives and this has been happening since the day of industrial revolution. It will not change. In fact, if it does change then progression will come to a halt.
Ha thanks, I didn't plan any writing, I just spoke off the top of my head.
I don't know that I agree with your disagreeing with my analogy. Most manual controls in the auto industry have definitely NOT been automated, maybe except for the virtual elimination of manual transmissions. As far as I know, we're all still driving our cars except for many models having parallel-parking assist and some higher-end models having certain lane-holding, emergency-braking automatic functions. We're still using & interacting with our cars for the technological powerhouses they continue to be, "taking" certain functional benefits, entertainment benefits, and even status benefits from them just like our phones & computers & mobile devices.
I don't disagree with what will happen when cars essentially become smaller versions of driverless busses or taxis. At that point, quite possibly the entertainment factor from driving will be taken out of play (or replaced with...the passenger taking their eyes off the road and getting infotainment/function from whatever media/device they use at home or work), but still leaving the function & likely the status components still in play today.
I think you should give customers a bit more credit for knowing what many want. Not always, but definitely more often than Apple seems to consider. I'm personally glad Apple ditched the optical drive and spinning harddrive...I love my MacBook air. I may never be glad they forced me to go sans headphone jack on my next MacBook...or sans border on my iPhone, making it awfully hard to add a protective case... Or...I could go on but I'd be rehashing. Unless, you believe there's never any going too far, there's never any too much stretch by a company. I think we're in that "a bit too far" zone with Apple and I'm apprehensively curious where it will go from here.
Back to cars, let's extend your thought a bit farther, a good technique for when designing something -- keep pushing to the extreme in a certain direction and see if the idea still works. See how far you can keep going and things still work...or see if a point is quickly reached where things suddenly do not make sense. What if Apple goes hog-wild and fits their macbook functionality in a watch. No ports, no keyboard, no jacks, no large screen, no charting port. You have it with you always but, instead of flipping open a macbook and starting working in 5 seconds, you have to find a monitor, link it, and turn it on, find a keyboard and link it (or carry those with you...like a Macbook...), then possibly connect to wifi or use cellular data since your watch has no sizable SSD. What if you wanted to use any dime-a-dozen headphone set or speakers to listen to something? What if you had data on a flash drive? What if you had to charge your watch but with the push towards smaller/thinner/better, you have no wireless charging station with you. I know this is all made-up but once again, something I think Apple fails to consider nowadays: How far is too far, or can they never go too far?
They're awful close, IMHO to too far, or dabbling too unnecessarily.
Pushing my "design technique" of pushing an idea to an extreme and seeing if it makes sense: Can Apple go as far as they want with technology and we as consumers who largely don't know what we want should just accept it?
Ha thanks, I didn't plan any writing, I just spoke off the top of my head.
I don't know that I agree with your disagreeing with my analogy. Most manual controls in the auto industry have definitely NOT been automated, maybe except for the virtual elimination of manual transmissions. As far as I know, we're all still driving our cars except for many models having parallel-parking assist and some higher-end models having certain lane-holding, emergency-braking automatic functions. We're still using & interacting with our cars for the technological powerhouses they continue to be, "taking" certain functional benefits, entertainment benefits, and even status benefits from them just like our phones & computers & mobile devices.
I don't disagree with what will happen when cars essentially become smaller versions of driverless busses or taxis. At that point, quite possibly the entertainment factor from driving will be taken out of play (or replaced with...the passenger taking their eyes off the road and getting infotainment/function from whatever media/device they use at home or work), but still leaving the function & likely the status components still in play today.
I think you should give customers a bit more credit for knowing what many want. Not always, but definitely more often than Apple seems to consider. I'm personally glad Apple ditched the optical drive and spinning harddrive...I love my MacBook air. I may never be glad they forced me to go sans headphone jack on my next MacBook...or sans border on my iPhone, making it awfully hard to add a protective case... Or...I could go on but I'd be rehashing. Unless, you believe there's never any going too far, there's never any too much stretch by a company. I think we're in that "a bit too far" zone with Apple and I'm apprehensively curious where it will go from here.
Back to cars, let's extend your thought a bit farther, a good technique for when designing something -- keep pushing to the extreme in a certain direction and see if the idea still works. See how far you can keep going and things still work...or see if a point is quickly reached where things suddenly do not make sense. What if Apple goes hog-wild and fits their macbook functionality in a watch. No ports, no keyboard, no jacks, no large screen, no charting port. You have it with you always but, instead of flipping open a macbook and starting working in 5 seconds, you have to find a monitor, link it, and turn it on, find a keyboard and link it (or carry those with you...like a Macbook...), then possibly connect to wifi or use cellular data since your watch has no sizable SSD. What if you wanted to use any dime-a-dozen headphone set or speakers to listen to something? What if you had data on a flash drive? What if you had to charge your watch but with the push towards smaller/thinner/better, you have no wireless charging station with you. I know this is all made-up but once again, something I think Apple fails to consider nowadays: How far is too far, or can they never go too far?
They're awful close, IMHO to too far, or dabbling too unnecessarily.
Pushing my "design technique" of pushing an idea to an extreme and seeing if it makes sense: Can Apple go as far as they want with technology and we as consumers who largely don't know what we want should just accept it?
Completely understand what you mean. However, most of everything in a modern car is actually controlled by computers. The steering, break etc might seem “manual” but in reality all of that are controlled by the ECU. The steering and breaks are just different UX for the user. They do the same thing as pressing buttons. The actual command is being carried through by a computer. So even when it’s a manual car, it’s still really not. You just get a bit different experience, more like a different UX, with the gearbox and shifting etc. It’s like using Android instead of iOS. The actual operation is same but the way to do it is different. If you know what I mean.
If you’re interested, here are a couple of good links for you to understand what I mean in detail.
https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-drive-by-wire-534825
https://auto.howstuffworks.com/under-the-hood/trends-innovations/car-computer.htm
I see what you mean by pushing it too far. I felt exactly the same about the headphone jacks and depending on the user this can be a real deal breaker. I think the issue boils down to the fact that sometimes Apple takes away a feature without properly solving the problem in a better way. But then i think, if they don’t then as an industry we won’t move forward.
I mean Bluetooth has always been around and I’ve had Bluetooth headphones as well in the past but until Apple took it away from the iPhones, they weren’t really a thing and since then the price of average Bluetooth headphones / speakers have dropped and not only that, there are decent quality headphones out there in the market for affordable price, which wasn’t the case earlier.
Apple has this power of changing markets. Be it their marketing strategy or their way of doing things or just the general perception, they have done it many times before starting with personal computing, to iPod / online music industry, to iPhone / smartphones in general, to watch / wearable tech and now the AirPods and HomePod. So far it feels like they know what they’re doing.
But every tech company has this phase of rise and fall. I’ll wait and see what they come up with next. It will be interesting.
Ps. I stuck with my iPhone 6 for 3 years for the headphone jack alone. But then had to move on and got myself a pair of AirPods and surprisingly they do the intended job rather well.
I talk too much sometimes here.
So here's a quick thought instead.
2003-early 2013 interaction with Apple products:
1. Buy
2. Enjoy 100% out-of-the-box. (2003-2005 ipods (3 of them), 2006 mac pro, 2010 iPhone 4 & iPad, and 2013-era Macbook Air)
Today's (and future) interaction with Apple products:
1. Buy
2a. Enjoy 75% out-of-the-box as-is, or:
2b. Purchase the following to use your item fully, or as easily as your prior model:
Or wait 2-5 years until Airpods and USB-C are commonplace, though by that time your $1100 phone or MacBook HairThin is pretty old tech and susceptible to being bricked by the next iOS or OSX update, while the latest Apple thing available that runs smoothly on the latest iOS/OSX is optimized for tech that's another 2-5 years out.
According to that video, Apple wants to stretch even when it hurts or overlooks consumer sentiment.
What if each new Apple product from now on lives in this constant zone of stretch with a noticeable sense of pain that doesn't go away quickly and where you're not able to enjoy it to its fullest extent out of the box like I could with my iPad in 2010 or iPhone 4 before that.
Did Jony & Tim's parents buy them shoes 2 sizes too large every 6 months as young children?
Just ponder that. Sure feels that's what we're in for.
So here's a quick thought instead.
2003-early 2013 interaction with Apple products:
1. Buy
2. Enjoy 100% out-of-the-box. (2003-2005 ipods (3 of them), 2006 mac pro, 2010 iPhone 4 & iPad, and 2013-era Macbook Air)
Today's (and future) interaction with Apple products:
1. Buy
2a. Enjoy 75% out-of-the-box as-is, or:
2b. Purchase the following to use your item fully, or as easily as your prior model:
i. headphone adapter to use all your many existing headphones and music sources using 1/8" jacks in the car, garage, basement, work office, etc.
ii. $$ Airpods if you want to catch up to where Apple thinks you need to be (and charge while using headphones, which I do 90% of the time when at work)
iii. Y-adapter/dongle if you want to charge & use wired headphones simultaneously
iv. Dongle to use your many SD cards
v. USB-C to 3.0 hub to use your $$$ non-USB-C hardware (and more than 1 at a time)
vi. USB-C to display port or DVI dongle
vii. USB-C to Ethernet dongle
viii. USB-C/magsafe replicator, to re-institute one of Apple's best (but now removed) tech.
ix. Or just buy all new USB-C external drives, optical drives, microphone interfaces, etc.
The point is: per Apple, if users today want to conveniently enjoy their latest Apple hardware product to its fullest extent they'll need to further invest in new $$ items (and many of them) if not instead relegate their prior $$ and still very useful hardware unusable. And carry around, at minimum, a few adapters or dongles to make their uber-thin uber-portable item a bit more clunky when portable-ing it around.ii. $$ Airpods if you want to catch up to where Apple thinks you need to be (and charge while using headphones, which I do 90% of the time when at work)
iii. Y-adapter/dongle if you want to charge & use wired headphones simultaneously
iv. Dongle to use your many SD cards
v. USB-C to 3.0 hub to use your $$$ non-USB-C hardware (and more than 1 at a time)
vi. USB-C to display port or DVI dongle
vii. USB-C to Ethernet dongle
viii. USB-C/magsafe replicator, to re-institute one of Apple's best (but now removed) tech.
ix. Or just buy all new USB-C external drives, optical drives, microphone interfaces, etc.
Or wait 2-5 years until Airpods and USB-C are commonplace, though by that time your $1100 phone or MacBook HairThin is pretty old tech and susceptible to being bricked by the next iOS or OSX update, while the latest Apple thing available that runs smoothly on the latest iOS/OSX is optimized for tech that's another 2-5 years out.
According to that video, Apple wants to stretch even when it hurts or overlooks consumer sentiment.
What if each new Apple product from now on lives in this constant zone of stretch with a noticeable sense of pain that doesn't go away quickly and where you're not able to enjoy it to its fullest extent out of the box like I could with my iPad in 2010 or iPhone 4 before that.
Did Jony & Tim's parents buy them shoes 2 sizes too large every 6 months as young children?
Just ponder that. Sure feels that's what we're in for.
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Yes, it is all starting to seem eerily familiar. The loss of focus, mess of a product line, overpricing, chasing markets outside their core, long-time users grumbling and jumping ship....etc, etc. The big difference now is that they have a ton a cash to blow on bad ideas and thus we are in for a long, slow decline.
When it comes to mobile I'm your dead average user and I would need to buy none of these things.
Funny, if done right, I'd think chasing markets outside their core is something where more is needed...but where it needs to include that "secret sauce" of picking the right "thing" and executed in a way that's meaningful now AND fun to use now. Apple feels too heavy-handed currently in the "customer must change and have more courage and tolerance for discomfort" expectations... Not all customers want to be part of a development process, and not all of us desire to ever have a white, cold, silvery metal Christmas tree, Jony... I think it's fair to say the iPod & iPhone fall into the category of being once way out of Apple's core...upon introduction they were easy to use and where the customer could use 100% of it right out of the box via intuitive design & usable, accessible features. No need to go buy an external keyboard or dongle to fully utilize your earlier iPhones, iPods, iPads... Those days are GONE and it's sorely felt.
There's just way, way too much over-thinking and forced reinvention of highly-matured, already-highly-refined products in vain attempts to "create" something new and meaningful...way, way too much unnecessary plastic surgery now like iOS7's unnecessarily over-reinvented made-up UI...OSX's dumbed-down non-Apple-looking UI, MacBook/iPhone's steady obliteration of hardware interfaces that make something user-friendly, convenient, fun, & flexible to use (ports, jacks, plugs, buttons, etc).
Lots of rehashing I know, but this apparent disregard for "pleasing the customer w/o asking them to change" is something I never felt from 2005-2013, and something that I think is new to the Apple history before 2005. I don't know enough about Apple pre-2005 to say whether these current priorities considered to be controversial & questionable by so many is something that was their calling card before 2005.
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On the flip side of all of that, Apple is not getting heading toward 1T because:
- They are alienating their current customer base
- not attracting new customers
- not make products people like using
- their customers have an emotional attachment to an Apple of past
- customers have the same negative opinion of iOS 7 and later
