What would make you leave Apple?

[Skwoodge]

Hyperbolic? I don't necessarily disagree. Apple has obviously been exceedingly successful over the last 15 years. But personally at least (I don't want to speak for others), I'm not sure I would say that Apple is the leader in UI or UX anymore. A failure? No, obviously. But no longer undisputed champ.

This is your opinion, yes. What's better? Windows? The 400 flavors of Linux? Which Linux? I use macOS 90% of the time and Windows and Linux for work-related things and macOS is so far above and beyond the other two for me that it's not even on the same scale. macOS has always felt like home to me ... for decades now.

I honestly do believe Apple's one-time obsession with minimalism and thinness has hurt them in this regard. Butterfly keyboards, a dearth of ports, and examples of unintentionally bending iPhone 6 models...

We're going back to the iPhone 6? Really? And I agree butterfly keyboards were annoying, but that's not an issue anymore. I rather enjoy all the power that Apple is able to smash into such thin laptops. It's been a huge blessing for my photography business to be able to carry with me a literal workstation with a battery life that lasts all day and has the same power when I'm traveling as it does when I have it plugged in at home. I'm not sure what you mean by a lack of ports. The ports all have absurd bandwidth that allows me to connect whatever I want. When I'm traveling and have a hundred trillion devices I just bring a USB C hub that gives me enough bandwidth to connect them all.

And that's just the hardware side. I know this is an unpopular opinion, because everyone loved iOS 7 (or at least they certainly seemed to come around to it), but the obsession with minimalism hurt them from a software standpoint, too. Arguably, even more so.

iOS has never been more usable and customizable than it is right now. iOS wasn't so great back in the day. I used to be a jailbreaker myself, but 90% of the features I jailbroke my phone for are now on iOS.

In my mind, that all stems from that same paradigm. Tim Cook as CEO has a monopoly on neither good decisions nor bad. But in my view, he failed to maintain a lead. And the reason for that was self-inflicted.

I wholeheartedly disagree.

This is not a screed against Liquid Glass. Apple started down the wrong path long before that. If anything, Liquid Glass is a passable, if half-assed, attempt to salvage it.

I love liquid glass, as do most of the people in the thread with the poll asking about liquid glass.

We'll see what Ternus can (or is willing) to do.

I'm excited to see what direction Apple goes next year.

 

[GregoryPeckEPA]

We'll see what Ternus can (or is willing) to do.

Ternus during the keynote next week.

 

[ProbablyDylan]

Forum rules prevent me from honestly answering the question. That said, they seriously need to cut it out with the ads. Ads in News, ads in Maps, ads in the App Store (that you're forced to use), ads for iCloud in Settings.

What's next? "Give the gift of iPhone" ads in Messages when texting an android user?

 

[Skwoodge]

Forum rules prevent me from honestly answering the question. That said, they seriously need to cut it out with the ads. Ads in News, ads in Maps, ads in the App Store (that you're forced to use), ads for iCloud in Settings.

What's next? "Give the gift of iPhone" ads in Messages when texting an android user?

If they're going to do ads, it should only be for people not paying for any iCloud services. People paying for iCloud services shouldn't have to see ads. It's ridiculous. I don't agree with any ads even on the free tier though ... Apple doesn't need anymore money.

 

[conmee]

It's funny you mention Mercedes because all through the mid 2010s their QA plummeted while their price exploded. Both trajectories deviated so sharply that it began to hurt them financially but that was the goal: to see just how much they could cut and for how long before it came back and bit them. I recall my prof in uni talking specifically about their brand the shenanigans they were pulling at the time.

It works because there is a significant delay in public discovery that can extend beyond 5 years. Large appliance manufacturers started doing this around 2016 and the public didn't catch on till about 2022 where now we know that it's nigh impossible to buy a washer or dryer that will last like one's made in 2005! Data collection is absolutely insidious!

The mid-2010s were when Mercedes finally started climbing out of the hole they dug with the Chrysler acquisition (1998-2007). They bit off more than they could chew and models from that timeframe were the foundation for poor quality and owner dissatisfaction down the line. Keep in mind that prior to the late 90s, Mercedes was run by engineers and they had a reputation for “over-engineered” and expensive vehicles. The famous 1991-1998 S-Class (W140) aka “the tank” almost sank the company during development according to some reports and resulted in a number of exec and design chief turnovers. That said, the W140 rules. No self-respecting dictator or drug lord would want to be seen driving in anything else. 😉

By the mid-2010s however, they introduced some new models that dramatically improved quality with Chrysler DNA/models out of their system. The 2009 C-Class (W204 with the M272 V6), the 2010 E-Class (W212), and 2014 S-Class (W222) were well received and won various auto industry awards. The first year or two of these models suffered some teething pains but were much better in terms of quality to their predecessors. But by the mid-cycle refresh/facelift for all these vehicles (2013-2017) all three platforms were rock solid.

I do agree their downmarket shenanigans such as introducing the A-Class (2018 in North America) and various compact and compact/smaller SUV variants (GLA, GLB, GLC, etc) hurt the prestige and quality aspect of the brand to a degree as those vehicles try to hit a certain MSRP. But the average age of a Mercedes owner 20 years ago was over 50yo so I understand trying to appeal to a younger/newer generation. But their execution wasn’t great and that probably gave your professor fodder for class discussion.

Oh, and to stay on topic, I’m never leaving the Apple garden! 🙂