I see Gruber is doing an emergency podcast with Ben Thompson about this news. Because of course what is needed is more hot takes that aren’t fully formed.
Cook really dropped the ball not having a succession plan in place. It’s nuts having this group now report to Williams. Nuts. Ive was there for 25 years and your telling us he did not groom a successor for arguably the most important function within Apple? This is a breakdown in corporate responsibility
Almost as bad as having the head of HR run Retail
Ive has evidently been checked out for years. Why did Cook not get better ahead of this?
I'm sure Cook has some kind of plan in place, but because he's pretty useless, he might not have a very good one. Cook's not a leader. He can't skate to where the puck will be, even within internal Apple people management. People crediting him with the success of the iPhone and AW post Steve are doing Steve a disservice, it is well known Steve had lots of products in the pipeline before his death, Tim is riding Steve's coat tails, spending more time using Apple as a political vehicle than being a CEO. Tim's only answer to falling sales is increased prices. Which results in falling sales, so increase prices... And so on. Tim isn't an innovator, he's an operations guy. A very good operations guy, but that's where he should have stayed. I think Federighi would be much, much better as head of Apple.
> “He's forming his own design firm, and Tim Cook is very clear on how he'll be contributing to Apple going forward. ‘Apple will continue to benefit from Jony's talents by working directly with him on exclusive projects, and through the ongoing work of the brilliant and passionate design team he has built’”
2013: "Scott Forstall will be leaving Apple and will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook in the interim.”
Do you think Scott got more than a birthday card from Cook since leaving the company?
I'm not saying there's bad blood, but this is just corporate-speak. Ive is out.
Don't think so. Saying Forstall would be an interim advisor is quite different from saying Apple will be a client of Ive's independent company. The "interim" for Forstall apparently lasted about one morning. I suspect they'll ask Ive to do work on more theoretical projects. What he probably wants to get out of is another generation of iPhone. Been there; done that.
Cook really dropped the ball not having a succession plan in place. It’s nuts having this group now report to Williams. Nuts. Ive was there for 25 years and your telling us he did not groom a successor for arguably the most important function within Apple? This is a breakdown in corporate responsibility
Almost as bad as having the head of HR run Retail
Ive has evidently been checked out for years. Why did Cook not get better ahead of this?
How do you know Cook didn't have a succession plan? We are not privy to the inner workings at Apple. Jony Ive has been stating for years in public that he'd like to move back to the UK. As was said in the article "Apple as an institution probably knew when it promoted Ive to Chief Design Officer in 2015." After 30 years with the same company, I'd imagine there are other things that Apple doesn't make that he'd like to work on. This was not unexpected, and it's naïve to imagine that one of the most successful companies in the world does not have a succession plan. This was well known for quite a while within Apple, and they waited until the "right" time to publicly announce it. All the gloom and doom is unfounded.
Jonathan is not walking away. He was pushed. The runway is now clear for Scott Forstall return.
Why would Forstall return? Steve Jobs has returned because he was an entrepreneur, we can’t charge Forstall with such a burden. I don’t deny his talent and contribution but I don’t see Apple in such a critical position as to issue calls to old comrades.
If Forstall was so important how come no other tech company has hired him since he left Apple?
Cook really dropped the ball not having a succession plan in place. It’s nuts having this group now report to Williams. Nuts. Ive was there for 25 years and your telling us he did not groom a successor for arguably the most important function within Apple? This is a breakdown in corporate responsibility
Almost as bad as having the head of HR run Retail
Ive has evidently been checked out for years. Why did Cook not get better ahead of this?
How do you know Cook didn't have a succession plan? We are not privy to the inner workings at Apple. Jony Ive has been stating for years in public that he'd like to move back to the UK. As was said in the article "Apple as an institution probably knew when it promoted Ive to Chief Design Officer in 2015." After 30 years with the same company, I'd imagine there are other things that Apple doesn't make that he'd like to work on. This was not unexpected, and it's naïve to imagine that one of the most successful companies in the world does not have a succession plan. This was well known for quite a while within Apple, and they waited until the "right" time to publicly announce it. All the gloom and doom is unfounded.
When did Jony Ive ever say he wanted to move back to the UK? Do you have a quote from him?
Jonathan is not walking away. He was pushed. The runway is now clear for Scott Forstall return.
Why would Forstall return? Steve Jobs has returned because he was an entrepreneur, we can’t charge Forstall with such a burden. I don’t deny his talent and contribution but I don’t see Apple in such a critical position as to issue calls to old comrades.
If Forstall was so important how come no other tech company has hired him since he left Apple?
Doesn’t he work as a consultant for Snapchat?
No idea. Even if he was, being a consultant for Snapchat is a pretty big step down from being a SVP at Apple. But maybe he didn’t want another big corporate role.
> “He's forming his own design firm, and Tim Cook is very clear on how he'll be contributing to Apple going forward. ‘Apple will continue to benefit from Jony's talents by working directly with him on exclusive projects, and through the ongoing work of the brilliant and passionate design team he has built’”
2013: "Scott Forstall will be leaving Apple and will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook in the interim.”
Do you think Scott got more than a birthday card from Cook since leaving the company?
I'm not saying there's bad blood, but this is just corporate-speak. Ive is out.
Except when Forstall left he barely got a mention by Cook and was not quoted in Apple’s press release at all. Ive was plus gave an interview to discuss it. Of course that doesn’t mean this isn’t just an exit strategy. But the announcement is very different to what happened with Forstall.
Well I would argue/speculate the difference is Forstall was fired, and Ives is just bored out of his mind and amicably departed.
Anyway I hope you're right. I'm an Ives fanboy; I know the iOS 7 thing was controversial, but ultimately it had to happen. iOS 6 (and Bondi Blue era Mac OS) were embarrassingly garish, this shit had to grow up. Keyboard reliability aside, I love modern Macbooks. Ives brought us the future, full stop.
Cook really dropped the ball not having a succession plan in place. It’s nuts having this group now report to Williams. Nuts. Ive was there for 25 years and your telling us he did not groom a successor for arguably the most important function within Apple? This is a breakdown in corporate responsibility
Almost as bad as having the head of HR run Retail
Ive has evidently been checked out for years. Why did Cook not get better ahead of this?
How do you know Cook didn't have a succession plan? We are not privy to the inner workings at Apple. Jony Ive has been stating for years in public that he'd like to move back to the UK. As was said in the article "Apple as an institution probably knew when it promoted Ive to Chief Design Officer in 2015." After 30 years with the same company, I'd imagine there are other things that Apple doesn't make that he'd like to work on. This was not unexpected, and it's naïve to imagine that one of the most successful companies in the world does not have a succession plan. This was well known for quite a while within Apple, and they waited until the "right" time to publicly announce it. All the gloom and doom is unfounded.
When did Jony Ive ever say he wanted to move back to the UK? Do you have a quote from him?
Jonathan is not walking away. He was pushed. The runway is now clear for Scott Forstall return.
Why would Forstall return? Steve Jobs has returned because he was an entrepreneur, we can’t charge Forstall with such a burden. I don’t deny his talent and contribution but I don’t see Apple in such a critical position as to issue calls to old comrades.
If Forstall was so important how come no other tech company has hired him since he left Apple?
Doesn’t he work as a consultant for Snapchat?
No idea. Even if he was, being a consultant for Snapchat is a pretty big step down from being a SVP at Apple. But maybe he didn’t want another big corporate role.
And if he does, it's either telling that his UI design expertise is poor or Snap don't listen to him. Snapchat's UI is terrible.
I see Gruber is doing an emergency podcast with Ben Thompson about this news. Because of course what is needed is more hot takes that aren’t fully formed.
Speaking of Ben Thompson, he posted a great write-up on Jony Ive leaving. Much better than Gruber's take
Cook really dropped the ball not having a succession plan in place. It’s nuts having this group now report to Williams. Nuts. Ive was there for 25 years and your telling us he did not groom a successor for arguably the most important function within Apple? This is a breakdown in corporate responsibility
Almost as bad as having the head of HR run Retail
Ive has evidently been checked out for years. Why did Cook not get better ahead of this?
How do you know Cook didn't have a succession plan? We are not privy to the inner workings at Apple. Jony Ive has been stating for years in public that he'd like to move back to the UK. As was said in the article "Apple as an institution probably knew when it promoted Ive to Chief Design Officer in 2015." After 30 years with the same company, I'd imagine there are other things that Apple doesn't make that he'd like to work on. This was not unexpected, and it's naïve to imagine that one of the most successful companies in the world does not have a succession plan. This was well known for quite a while within Apple, and they waited until the "right" time to publicly announce it. All the gloom and doom is unfounded.
When did Jony Ive ever say he wanted to move back to the UK? Do you have a quote from him?
> “He's forming his own design firm, and Tim Cook is very clear on how he'll be contributing to Apple going forward. ‘Apple will continue to benefit from Jony's talents by working directly with him on exclusive projects, and through the ongoing work of the brilliant and passionate design team he has built’”
2013: "Scott Forstall will be leaving Apple and will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook in the interim.”
Do you think Scott got more than a birthday card from Cook since leaving the company?
I'm not saying there's bad blood, but this is just corporate-speak. Ive is out.
Except when Forstall left he barely got a mention by Cook and was not quoted in Apple’s press release at all. Ive was plus gave an interview to discuss it. Of course that doesn’t mean this isn’t just an exit strategy. But the announcement is very different to what happened with Forstall.
Well I would argue/speculate the difference is Forstall was fired, and Ives is just bored out of his mind and amicably departed.
Anyway I hope you're right. I'm an Ives fanboy; I know the iOS 7 thing was controversial, but ultimately it had to happen. iOS 6 (and Bondi Blue era Mac OS) were embarrassingly garish, this shit had to grow up. Keyboard reliability aside, I love modern Macbooks. Ives brought us the future, full stop.
If you’re an Ive fanboy, maybe you should learn to spell his name.
Also, there was next to nothing wrong with iOS 6’s visual design. My iPhone 4 still runs it because I refused to cripple and uglify it with iOS 7. Every time I use it, I see how beautiful it is compared to today’s ugly iOS. Low contrast UI elements, flat Corel Draw-style oversimplified clipart icons, and borderless text as buttons isn’t the future. It’s a massive detour from the beauty, intuitiveness, and readability that put Apple on top with iOS and iPhone. We have pocket-sized print-level resolution displays with fantastic color capabilities, and the current over-simplistic UI skin barely takes advantage of this.
By the way, that’s all it is: a skin. The only actual GUI change was the control center; everything else is the same UI elements, reskinned as harder to look at (and lacking any visual cues as to what the control is). Dark mode might help, marginally, but it too looks like a clumsy shift to mere tone/color opposites, not a mode made with curated design choices.
I see Gruber is doing an emergency podcast with Ben Thompson about this news. Because of course what is needed is more hot takes that aren’t fully formed.
And from Ben Thompson, his least impressive guest who has the least understanding of what makes Apple, Apple. (His bio says he's worked for Apple and Microsoft both, but he constantly sounds like a PC guy not getting Apple). Blah.
Gruber is becoming more of a pearl clutcher ever since he joined Marco Arment's Techie Echo Chamber of Doom, Worry, and Concern (tm).
Jonathan is not walking away. He was pushed. The runway is now clear for Scott Forstall return.
Why would Forstall return? Steve Jobs has returned because he was an entrepreneur, we can’t charge Forstall with such a burden. I don’t deny his talent and contribution but I don’t see Apple in such a critical position as to issue calls to old comrades.
If Forstall was so important how come no other tech company has hired him since he left Apple?
Doesn’t he work as a consultant for Snapchat?
No idea. Even if he was, being a consultant for Snapchat is a pretty big step down from being a SVP at Apple. But maybe he didn’t want another big corporate role.
Someone on Twitter posed the theory that Tim Cook is actually dissing Ive but is letting Apple pundits do the dirty work for him. That basically Gruber and others all want continued access to Apple so if they’re being at all critical it’s tacitly approved from Apple HQ. I think this is the worst of the hot takes I’ve seen so far.
Comments
Anyway I hope you're right. I'm an Ives fanboy; I know the iOS 7 thing was controversial, but ultimately it had to happen. iOS 6 (and Bondi Blue era Mac OS) were embarrassingly garish, this shit had to grow up. Keyboard reliability aside, I love modern Macbooks. Ives brought us the future, full stop.
https://stratechery.com/2019/jony-ive-leaves-apple-ives-legacy-the-post-ive-apple/
I even enjoyed Dieter Bohn's take on what this means for the new era of design at Apple
https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/28/18870887/apple-jony-ive-design-genius-committee
Also, there was next to nothing wrong with iOS 6’s visual design. My iPhone 4 still runs it because I refused to cripple and uglify it with iOS 7. Every time I use it, I see how beautiful it is compared to today’s ugly iOS. Low contrast UI elements, flat Corel Draw-style oversimplified clipart icons, and borderless text as buttons isn’t the future. It’s a massive detour from the beauty, intuitiveness, and readability that put Apple on top with iOS and iPhone. We have pocket-sized print-level resolution displays with fantastic color capabilities, and the current over-simplistic UI skin barely takes advantage of this.
By the way, that’s all it is: a skin. The only actual GUI change was the control center; everything else is the same UI elements, reskinned as harder to look at (and lacking any visual cues as to what the control is). Dark mode might help, marginally, but it too looks like a clumsy shift to mere tone/color opposites, not a mode made with curated design choices.
Gruber is becoming more of a pearl clutcher ever since he joined Marco Arment's Techie Echo Chamber of Doom, Worry, and Concern (tm).