
Steve Jobs would probably very upset with what Apple has become - Yhippa
http://qz.com/822818/steve-jobs-would-probably-very-upset-with-what-apple-aapl-has-become/
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AdmiralAsshat
I'm not convinced that constant, continuous innovation is really necessary all
the time. I mean, we're talking about an industry where the two most popular
code editors still used today were written in 1976. Does every new Macbook
need to be a "revolution" in design?

I imagine most people are okay with the idea of "last year's model but
thinner/lighter/faster/stronger", up to a point. People hold on to their six
year-old Macbook Pros and their 10 year-old Thinkpads because they're
reliable. It seems to me that the bigger backlash is against Apple's attempted
"innovation" which felt gimmicky and unnecessary.

~~~
SocratesV
Late 2008 Aluminum 13'' Macbook here. Going to upgrade.

Can't really understand all the fuss. It's Apple. Making this polemic
decisions has been their bread & butter for a long time, always dropping
standards that have peaked for new ones. Causes a pain in the short term, yes,
but it's certainly not something new.

~~~
Yetanfou
Well, the thing is they're getting 'better' and 'better' at dropping
standards. They drop things which still see a lot of use, for which there are
no viable alternatives which perform at least as well as the current standard.
It is almost as if they're trying for some form of abstract 'perfection' as
defined by the dictum that 'Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing
left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away'. While nice in
theory, in practice people buy computers to perform mundane tasks with
'imperfect' hardware with odd interfaces like HDMI, SD or analogue audio. This
might go against the purist's dream of a perfect world but it is the one we're
living in, warts and all. If you want to buy a computer as a personal
statement you may be willing to live with the restrictions such 'perfection'
brings with it, but those who want to upload their photos are left out in the
cold. Yes, they can use an adapter or some sort of dongle but surely that is
even less 'perfect'?

~~~
grzm
You bring up some interesting points. I think we all agree we want to be able
to make progress on connectors. The question is how we do so.

\- Before something is widely adopted, how do we decide which connectors to
use on future products?

\- How do we transition from one to another?

Some thoughts that came to mind when reading your comment: What did people do
before computers had HDMI ports? SD slots? How about audio systems that have
1/4" plugs (not 3.5mm)?

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snowwrestler
Why? Because a bunch of reporters are shitting on a new Apple product they
haven't even tried yet? I'd imagine he was pretty familiar with that
phenomenon.

Remember "then don't hold it that way?" And they gave bumpers to iPhone 4
customers for a few months to shut up the press. BTW the iPhone 4 sold very
well, with very high consumer scores, for 2 more years _after_ the bumper
program ended.

Steve Jobs was a guy who spent most of the time between 2001 and 2007
releasing incremental updates to existing products. I have to wonder how many
of those keynotes this writer has seen. Most would be incredibly boring and
pointless to view today. "Wow, 802.11g has the speed of 802.11a, but uses the
backward-compatible 2.4 GHz band." This was like a 5 minute section in
multiple keynotes.

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heisenbit
"While Jobs was explaining why he thought old tech giants had fallen from
grace, he probably wasn’t thinking about Apple at that time. "

I doubt that. Just read Ed Catmull's "Creativity Inc." (highly recommended)
and all his thoughts that went into making Pixar (Steve's other company)
sustainable and returning a fallen Disney animation around. The question what
went wrong elsewhere is central to that. Also there are the early years of
Apple where Apple fell from grace. Steve was acutely aware of the fragility of
his businesses and wanted to protect them.

Steve knew about the critical importance of culture. The spaceship follows his
earlier work on the Pixar building. Enabling people to come together and build
something great, insanely great.

Apples products tended to deliver value seen from the customer perspective.
Proper waterproof phones is a step forward that does not look great, is hard
to do, is hard to charge for but delivers value every single day. The
"insanely great" perceivable customer value was missing in the presentation of
the last macs for a lot of reasons (memory, keyboard, cable integration with
iPhone out of the box, mag-safe, extension cord, higher price etc.).

~~~
SocratesV
For me knowing that soon, once peripherals makers and also cable makers catch-
up, I'll be able to use just one type of cable to connect to anything (and I'm
assuming cable makers will stop doing sub-par ones and just stick to
Thunderbolt 3 capable), is probably a huge win. No more USB/HDMI/MagSafe mix
(with the different ports on the peripheral side to increase complexity).

After that, wireless.

~~~
erichocean
> _I 'll be able to use just one type of cable to connect to anything_

If you're talking about USB 3, sorry to burst your bubble, but you won't.
There are a lot of different varieties of USB 3 cables.

You're thinking of "connector", and yes, the USB 3 connector is now used for
wildly different things. Cables are different _even though they have the same
connector_.

~~~
SocratesV
Please read my comment again, I did say:

> I'm assuming cable makers will stop doing sub-par ones and just stick to
> Thunderbolt 3 capable

~~~
erichocean
> _I 'm assuming cable makers will stop doing sub-par ones and just stick to
> Thunderbolt 3 capable_

Thunderbolt 3 cables are expensive (just like regular Thunderbolt cables), and
there's no chance that cable makers drop cheaper cables. None, zip, zero.

Furthermore, _all it takes is one manufacturer_ making the non-Thunderbolt 3
cables to make things as I described…and remember, using the "wrong" cable can
hurt your machine.

The situation with USB-C isn't good and it's very likely that many machines
will be damaged as a result of not using unique connectors for unique
capabilities/requirements on the cables themselves.

~~~
SocratesV
What's the market share for USB-C compared with USB-A/B?

Would hope that as it passes USB-A/B, it becomes as cheap as, or at least
close to.

Also people will start to name & shame bad cable manufacturers, both when they
are the ones not reading the cable specs (in which case it will alert people
to do so) or when the cable specs do not match the actual cable capabilities
(in which case the cable manufacturer is liable).

The other thing is as mobile phones/tablets change, you'll also get cables
bundled with the device, which will probably be of a decent quality at least
(they don't need to be Thunderbolt 3, just not fool the devices by violating
USB-C specs).

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Juliate
Or he probably wouldn't. We don't know. And either way, it does not matter.
Either way, it won't/wouldn't change anything. As all things do, Apple
evolves.

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drinchev
If Steve Jobs was still Apple's CEO, the only thing that is certain is that he
would keep the Skeuromorpihsm UI.

For anything else there is no proof.

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perlpimp
Its either they are asleep at the helm or are furiously working on something
else, like VR, not too focusing product renewal of current product lineup...
It is an essence of a magic trick. You follow left hand while right one is
about to surprise you, isn't it? I hope they are working on something
extraordinary.

~~~
no_wave
They haven't done anything remotely extraordinary since Steve J left. I don't
know why people are so charitable towards Apple when everything indicates it's
a company that's no longer what it was.

To quote someone, "revenue is a lagging indicator in the technology business".

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omarforgotpwd
Yeah I'm sure Jobs would be so upset to see that Apple is one of the most
valuable companies in the world. I'm sure he would think the fact that Apple
now makes a computer you can wear on your wrist is "meh" and the new MacBook
Pro should have kept the functions keys.

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busterarm
I'd hate to have to live up to the spectre of Steve Jobs.

Maybe we shouldn't care about satisfying the dead. They're not around to care
anymore. This post is the equivalent level of discourse as saying he's turning
in his grave.

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aikah
When it comes to the Macbook Pro, something like the Razor Blade laptop
keyboard would have been much much better than getting rid the upper row.

[https://i.ytimg.com/vi/0talSSC5ToI/hqdefault.jpg](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/0talSSC5ToI/hqdefault.jpg)

Imagine the screen on the right of the size of an iphone. I would have opened
a much larger set of possibilities. Want to test and develop iphone apps ?
want to use this for video or music production ? or want the num pad back ?
The num pad is redundant yet useful, and replaced by a screen the surface is
big enough to offer interesting possibilities for pro users.

