The moment I realized the LED was mimicking breathing (I first experienced it with a white iMac) was the moment I realized just how far Apple goes to make computers for humans. Truly personal computers. This is the kind of stuff that gets people lining up for new Apple products, not some silly brand whoring or desire to be hip and fashionable.
Admittedly, they made the LED way too bright on the earlier MBPs, such that it would distract you if you were trying to sleep in a dark room. The newer MBPs have gotten the brightness just right, however.
Also, none of this ignores the fact that Apple routinely privileges superficial aesthetics over ergonomics, utility, etc. (Magic Mouse, hard edges on MBP, glossy displays), but that rarely stops the whole package from being the best on the market.
To be fair, on top of that, they're also really good at marketing. But their marketing is only effective because it has a sincerity--they're genuinely proud of the products they make. I bet you can tell when someone is trying to fake that.
Yeah, this definitely is an important component of their success. The authenticity of their marketing message, thanks to that pride, resonates with people who are being fed bullshit everywhere else.
Regardless of how you feel about him, it's impossible not to be at least a little captivated by a Steve Jobs keynote. The joy of watching someone stand up and just be proud of how honestly hard his company works – it's refreshing.
Back in the 1990s, Apple's products were junk, but the marketing was still excellent.
I think when engineering types hear the word "marketing", they immediately take it as dismissive. But Apple is an example of a company who owes their skin to phenomenal marketing over the long term.
Apple's marketing in the mid-to-late 90's was poor to nonexistent, frankly, while on a technical level Macs weren't any worse than PC's (both crashed a lot and came with fairly comparable hardware, but the Mac OS 7/8/9 UI was very arguably better than the Windows 95/98 UI). Apple's user loyalty was fantastic (and fanatic) in the mid-to-late 90's, but the company itself didn't do anywhere near the kind of promotion they did once Jobs returned.
Yes, Mac OS 9 had technical disadvantages compared to Windows NT and Windows 2000, and Apple had a second-system effect of legendary proportions with Copland. 90's Apple wasn't that great at technology. But they were abysmal at marketing, while Microsoft were fantastic at it.
Yeah, Apple's 90's marketing was ass. But I loved every last Mac I owned during that decade.
Apple had overall high product quality but their focus was lacking and they weren't terribly ballsy. They had a distinct feeling of running on the fumes of the Mac's initial success. But it was (and is) a sufficiently great product that those fumes informed an OS that, from a user perspective, remained the best. Mac OS got long in the tooth, but I'd still take it over Win95/98/NT any day.
I don't know about you, but the things I do not miss are putting spaces in extension names to reorder them (at boot time, they were loaded alphabetically and there were often conflicts, if the order was "incorrect"), manually setting up, how much RAM can a specific app use, or rebooting with virtual memory on/off, depending on which app I wanted to run. I still remember, that reading websites with table-layouts on the only somewhat standards-compliant browser (IE for Mac) was exercise in frustration.
Both windows (95/98) and macs had their share of shortcomings, you just had to pick, which set you can tolerate.
Windows had the same problem, except instead of having conflicts between extensions (which everyone understood were extensions to the operating system), installing applications could cause conflicts. Personally, I never reordered extension names to avoid conflicts.
agree with philwelch. Apple's reputation for good marketing is a very recent phenomenon. As someone who has followed apple for a long time, in the 90's I recall them being mocked for their crappy marketing.
Making great things can be very risky. Most companies are setup to avoid risky behavior at all costs because exposing yourself to risk can be very destructive. The few truly great things squeeze out of a typical company are all because of accident more than by design.
Apple has managed to figure out how to be risky in their behavior without being destructive. They've learned that you can actually jump out of plane if you have a parachute.
Making great things is marketing. The first (and perhaps most important) part of marketing is understanding the, you know, market, and what products would be appropriate for it.
The pervasive Marketing==Advertising mindset is a little short-sighted.
That’s silly. If anything that implies “understanding of the market” is “marketing” then “marketing” has become an all-purpose synonym for “running a business”. At that point, it has no reason to exist as a separate word. I contend that “marketing” does not in popular practice have such a broad definition.
Yes, absolutely. Marketing is part of everything. It's not a separate department or effort, it's a facet of every effort of a company. It's something that everyone, from product design to development should keep in mind.
I'm just running with the definition given to me by my marketing professor at my university's business school :)
Look at 37Signals. I contend that everything they do is marketing, even if it's not writing commercials or buying ads.
There's more evidence of their attention to detail if you look closely. Most companies, if needing an indicator light, would simply drill a hole in the case where the light is to go. Now have a look at the MB sleep light. It shines through a few rows of ultra small laser made holes, meaning when the light is off, the surface of the case is almost completely unbroken
Ive talks about this. The point is that an indicator should be invisible when there isn't anything to indicate. Otherwise, it's just another tiny distraction.
He's right, and it's a cool feature. But the fact that it's sitting right next to the useless (from a user's point of view) black blob of the IR sensor kinda spoils the effect.
That interview for sure shows passion and obsession for details. It gives an impression that Ive is one of the greatest industrial designers of our time partly because his obsession and understanding of manufacturing processes. He knows the limitations and possibilities of his tools.
"The newer MBPs have gotten the brightness just right, however."
That's because the sleep LED adjusts to the ambient brightness. Try this: watch that LED in a dark room, then turn on the lights, keeping your eye on it. You'll notice it gets quite a bit brighter in reaction to the light.
[...] the moment I realized just how far Apple goes to make computers for humans. Truly personal computers.
Jobs has been talking about anthropomorphic technology for quite a bit [1]. I've always liked to imagine Jobs had some influence on WALL-E's EVE. It was a Pixar movie, after all...
You've got the right idea but the wrong influence.
Jobs doesn't do the actual industrial design - he knows what he likes, and he has a great eye for it (or so I hear) but the man behind Apple's design aesthetic is Jonathan Ive. And he did design Eve.
Amusing if true: the glass cube outside the Manhattan Apple Store was designed by Steve Jobs himself, and the lease stipulates that it is his personal property and he has the right to remove it at the end of the lease: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/05/12/05/jobs_wants_32_...
(If I ever had the balls to ask Steve Jobs a completely inane question, I would ask what the hell it was with him and cubes.)
Spheres are more symmetrical than cubes though. Cubes are symmetrical about a high but still finite number of planes--spheres are symmetrical about an infinite number of planes. But I guess it's harder to get a sphere to sit still on your desk, or to fit computer guts into it.
I can't think of a more worthy successor. Brilliant, if true.
The power multiplier that Jobs brings to the company comes from two things: his uncompromising sense of good taste and his idealism for the role of technology in our lives.
The things that Jonathan Ive builds are reflections of his own deep commitment to those values. He gets it.
Interesting, I had definitely not heard that. The name that I thought was passed around regularly was Tim Cook.
I'd have to think that letting the design guy worry about design would probably be the better route, rather than clouding with all of the other business decisions and realities in a major way
If they want to keep the template Jobs has established, they need a person who can drive products (both tech/design sides) and say no in a manner that leaves little doubt.
The exciting part is that there are so many _potential_ worthy successors even when Jobs leaves. The same can't be said of many companies with rockstar CEOs.
Steve Jobs's eye for talent is just as keen as his eye for design. It's an absolutely critical skill and has been an essential component of Apple's success. It's also a skill that too often goes unappreciated. Unlike most rockstar CEOs, he doesn't surround himself with people he can dominate and control.
Indeed, the story of Jony Ive reflects this: toiling in relative obscurity before Jobs' return, Steve immediately recognizes his talent and promotes him aggressively.
The first time I saw that LED I thought of an SF story I read where an intelligent computer had a "smile light". I was like "Cool, it's like the computer is snoring."
Admittedly, they made the LED way too bright on the earlier MBPs, such that it would distract you if you were trying to sleep in a dark room. The newer MBPs have gotten the brightness just right, however.
Also, none of this ignores the fact that Apple routinely privileges superficial aesthetics over ergonomics, utility, etc. (Magic Mouse, hard edges on MBP, glossy displays), but that rarely stops the whole package from being the best on the market.