It’s rare for someone to stay at one company for so long. Especially in Silicon Valley. But if we have to read something into this perhaps that team isn’t as powerful inside the company post Steve Jobs as people outside the company think it is. Or maybe with the emphasis to services these guys see the future at Apple as not new kick ass must have products but what service Apple can get people to pay a monthly fee for. Industrial designers have nothing to do with that.
The ID team supposedly, from what I've read online, still has over-riding power over Engineering in the decision process. In other words, they kind of make the call on the design trend and Engineering has to follow through on that. This, to me, is a problem because it should be the other way around or they have to have equal power to work on the products.
As for Services, I'm pretty sure the design process comes from the graphic and UX designers, not the ID team. Industrial Designers in Apple don't do User Interface or software based projects.
I think considering that Ive is the last original member, this is probably a hint of what's to come and it's the beginning of him about to walk out Apple's door eventually. It wouldn't surprise me if he does and it's something he should've done a long time ago. I mean we're talking about FOUR veterans that just or are about to leave. That's a big hit to the team. I can understand if they had to leave due to other obligations outside of Apple such as working for AirBnB and/ or to retire, but there's something being 'unsaid' on the real reason (s) so I'm getting this hunch that this is either tied in to being burnt out or they were privy to future plans of Apple and didn't like what they saw, deciding to get out before the SHTF.
Maybe under Steve Jobs ID was most important but are they still? Doesn’t seem like anybody outside the company knows. And as Apple transitions more to services ID will be less and less needed.
They have as many or more physical products on the shelves as they have in the last two decades, and no sign of that changing despite "services". Why would that cause physical objects to be "less needed"?
Probably. Jobs had services like iTools/Mobile Me to enhance customer's experiences on Macs/iPhones, and thus their lives. Cook sees those same services as a cash cow, nothing more.
iCloud is free. iWork is free (if that's what you mean by iTools?).
Probably. Jobs had services like iTools/Mobile Me to enhance customer's experiences on Macs/iPhones, and thus their lives. Cook sees those same services as a cash cow, nothing more.
iCloud is free. iWork is free (if that's what you mean by iTools?).
“Recent departures from Apple's Industrial Design group mean that no one remains from the original group that began to turn around Apple's fortunes.”
Except for Jony Ive, who Steve Jobs discovered in the ID team when he returned to Apple. The iMac was the first product that began to turn around Apple’s fortunes, and Jony’s work was very much a part of that design.
Maybe it has to do with the fact that Tim Cook wants to make TV shows and rent magazines and music instead of making objects to be purchased.
So, going where the growth market is, instead of where the growth market is not? Makes sense.
In 2018 Huawei added 50,000,000 units to its 2017 sales which in turn were up 50,000,000 units from 2015.
It has just announced record breaking Q1-19 unit sales.
All without full access to one of the largest handset markets in the world, in a truly saturated Android market which, YoY, has even contracted recently.
I believe there is plenty of iPhone growth to be had. The problem is what is on offer and the prices.
With 80% of the market there to be taken, the problem isn't that there is no growth potential. The problem is Apple.
There might be some changes this September to correct that situation.
The hubris in this article just makes me more concerned.
The problem is, Apple has to design a system with the first priority being limitation. It has to limit itself to using whatever gimmick they come up with that walls in the user to Apples hardware ecosystem. To prevent people from just slamming in their own cards and processors into 3rd party modules like eGPU’s.
I imagine it will be a T2 type thing sold as ‘security for the user’... but in all actuality it will be security for Apple profits. This would be the deathknell for the Pro and make it a non-starter.
No way they want to miss out on GPU, RAM, CPU upgrade monies.
The cheese grater was the perfect modular Mac. Pros could upgrade it however they wanted. Apple changed the design for more profits - not user friendliness. They danced around this that entire interview.
I smell flop 2.0 on the horizon.
Maybe the new team can design products that are easier to repair. Like stop using glue to hold the battery in place on the macbooks. Make keyboards that don't get mess up with a grain of sand. etc etc.
Maybe the new team can design products that are easier to repair. Like stop using glue to hold the battery in place on the macbooks. Make keyboards that don't get mess up with a grain of sand. etc etc.
I didn't want to say it because I mostly like Apple and don't want to second guess the obvious hard work of a skilled and talented team of experts, but it did cross my mind that a changing of the guard may not be a bad thing. After all, the departing members are the people who brought us:
soldered-on RAM and storage that can't be upgraded
an all-in-one computer that requires removing a glued-on screen to service
glued-in batteries
a high-quality speaker with no input jack
inconsistency and incompatibility between iPad accessories (i/o and Pencil)
the thermally-constrained trashcan Mac Pro
a years-long development cycle for the replacement Mac Pro
the first keyboard ever to fail completely since the days of the typewriter.
Their successes -- of which there have been many -- have been tempered by some whopping whoopthies. Nobody's perfect and ANY team is going to experience unintended negative results from time to time, but most of the things users are complaining about were deliberate choices, not unfortunate accidents.
On this forum we like to say that Apple knows its users better than anybody. I'm starting to wonder if we're right about that.
On one hand, we say things like upgradability and serviceability only matter to tinker geeks, and "average users" don't care about those things. Yet many characteristics of Apple's hardware are clearly not implemented with the "average user" in mind.
The average user would be perfectly happy with affordable solid state storage, and probably wouldn't choose to pay the high premium associated with having the fastest storage possible.
An average user probably doesn't care about P3 color accuracy.
An average user sees USB-C as an inconvenience because it requires adapters.
A quick-look at the biggest selling external monitors indicates average users don't care about super-high resolution screens.
There are other examples, but you get the point.
On one hand, Apple seems to be designing machines for what might be described as "high-end" applications -- for people who DO care about the examples I cited above -- but then make design decisions that I would argue are contrary to the interests of that market, like compromising upgradability, serviceability, and even reliability.
Who is Apple trying to please -- a mass market for appliance computers, or a higher-end market of discriminating users? Right now it isn't clear to me. Maybe the design team is getting conflicting objectives from above, and that's why they're throwing in the towel.
bitmod said: https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/06/transcript-phil-schiller-craig-federighi-and-john-ternus-on-the-state-of-apples-pro-macs/
The hubris in this article just makes me more concerned.
The problem is, Apple has to design a system with the first priority being limitation. It has to limit itself to using whatever gimmick they come up with that walls in the user to Apples hardware ecosystem. To prevent people from just slamming in their own cards and processors into 3rd party modules like eGPU’s.
I imagine it will be a T2 type thing sold as ‘security for the user’... but in all actuality it will be security for Apple profits. This would be the deathknell for the Pro and make it a non-starter.
No way they want to miss out on GPU, RAM, CPU upgrade monies.
The cheese grater was the perfect modular Mac. Pros could upgrade it however they wanted. Apple changed the design for more profits - not user friendliness. They danced around this that entire interview.
I smell flop 2.0 on the horizon.
On the other hand, we could take for earnest that their statements regarding following actual pro working flow and the several years diving into this that they may actually come up with some good ideas. I'm not betting money on anything because I really don't know anything about what's going to happen (and neither does anyone else here), but I am bewildered by these missives on how Apple will (in advance) screw everyone over again. I'd like to give them a bit more credit than that, especially given they actually spoke outlaid for years on what they're doing in this space. If they come up with nothing after that, I'll start worrying about their ability to parse their environment.
allright, you mean we got done with da Vinci, ready to enjoy Picasso next?
seriously, 5G handset will be different for hardware requirements - most important in transmission,speed, latency, connectivity(handover), etc. ID change might be a good thing to out of the existing format (but not essence..). IMHO.
Comments
They have as many or more physical products on the shelves as they have in the last two decades, and no sign of that changing despite "services". Why would that cause physical objects to be "less needed"?
iCloud is free. iWork is free (if that's what you mean by iTools?).
Except for Jony Ive, who Steve Jobs discovered in the ID team when he returned to Apple. The iMac was the first product that began to turn around Apple’s fortunes, and Jony’s work was very much a part of that design.
It has just announced record breaking Q1-19 unit sales.
All without full access to one of the largest handset markets in the world, in a truly saturated Android market which, YoY, has even contracted recently.
I believe there is plenty of iPhone growth to be had. The problem is what is on offer and the prices.
With 80% of the market there to be taken, the problem isn't that there is no growth potential. The problem is Apple.
There might be some changes this September to correct that situation.
The hubris in this article just makes me more concerned. The problem is, Apple has to design a system with the first priority being limitation. It has to limit itself to using whatever gimmick they come up with that walls in the user to Apples hardware ecosystem. To prevent people from just slamming in their own cards and processors into 3rd party modules like eGPU’s. I imagine it will be a T2 type thing sold as ‘security for the user’... but in all actuality it will be security for Apple profits. This would be the deathknell for the Pro and make it a non-starter. No way they want to miss out on GPU, RAM, CPU upgrade monies. The cheese grater was the perfect modular Mac. Pros could upgrade it however they wanted. Apple changed the design for more profits - not user friendliness. They danced around this that entire interview. I smell flop 2.0 on the horizon.
Hopefully they all are still doing what they love somewhere.
- soldered-on RAM and storage that can't be upgraded
- an all-in-one computer that requires removing a glued-on screen to service
- glued-in batteries
- a high-quality speaker with no input jack
- inconsistency and incompatibility between iPad accessories (i/o and Pencil)
- the thermally-constrained trashcan Mac Pro
- a years-long development cycle for the replacement Mac Pro
- the first keyboard ever to fail completely since the days of the typewriter.
Their successes -- of which there have been many -- have been tempered by some whopping whoopthies. Nobody's perfect and ANY team is going to experience unintended negative results from time to time, but most of the things users are complaining about were deliberate choices, not unfortunate accidents.On one hand, we say things like upgradability and serviceability only matter to tinker geeks, and "average users" don't care about those things. Yet many characteristics of Apple's hardware are clearly not implemented with the "average user" in mind.
There are other examples, but you get the point.
On one hand, Apple seems to be designing machines for what might be described as "high-end" applications -- for people who DO care about the examples I cited above -- but then make design decisions that I would argue are contrary to the interests of that market, like compromising upgradability, serviceability, and even reliability.
Who is Apple trying to please -- a mass market for appliance computers, or a higher-end market of discriminating users? Right now it isn't clear to me. Maybe the design team is getting conflicting objectives from above, and that's why they're throwing in the towel.