

We’re Apple. We don’t wear suits. We don’t even own suits. - mickeyben
http://daringfireball.net/linked/2010/07/19/vogelstein-apple-att

======
jrockway
I don't normally like Apple, but I like their attitude here. Why should they
wear certain clothes to a meeting with AT&T? Who cares what AT&T thinks of
Apple!? If AT&T passes on Apple, Verizon or Sprint or T-Mobile would pick them
up in a heartbeat. The only reason AT&T is still in business is because of
Apple. Fuck wearing a suit!

I'm shocked to hear that AT&T is not showering Apple's execs with expensive
champagne and corporate jets every chance they get!

~~~
culled
" The only reason AT&T is still in business is because of Apple. "

That's a little over the top. Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile are all still in
business without the iPhone and AT&T was a very large carrier before they had
the iPhone. AT&T would probably be doing worse than they are now without the
iPhone but I seriously doubt they'd be going out of business. I'd go so far as
to say that AT&T's reputation would be somewhat better without the iPhone
since it seems like most of their network problems were caused because of the
demands that the iPhone created.

------
chwahoo
It does seem that concessions were made. For example, the Facetime app is
currently wifi-only. Also, I believe movie rental is wifi-only. Those are
understandable restrictions for now, but this article rings a bit hollow in
light of them -- It would seem that AT&T won a few of those battles.

~~~
jws
Or more likely, the probability of a negative user experience is too high on
AT&T's network.

To use a non-#attfail example: The little microwave ISP I use in a rural area
gives me 10mbps, but they don't have enough backhaul to support that kind of
bit rate in a sustained manner. If I start to watch a YouTube video at a
better-than-awful bit encoding the first 10 seconds or so are great, then the
routers notice my connection being a pig and fair-queueing or whatever
mechanism they are using lowers my allowed bit rate to unwatchable levels.

I have a negative impression of YouTube watching because of my ISP. It is only
because I have had experiences on other ISPs first that I don't associate this
with YouTube or my browser.

Apple knows better than to let Facetime get a reputation as choppy,
unreliable, or generally flakey, which it would on AT&T's network.

~~~
jarek
FTA, implied to be more of less AT&T's argument: "It didn’t make sense to
build phones and offer features that carriers couldn’t support." Message: AT&T
expects to solve user experience problems by removing or restricting features,
and this is a bad thing.

Your post: "[T]he probability of a negative user experience is too high on
AT&T's network ... Apple knows better than to let Facetime get a [bad]
reputation[.]" Message: Apple solves user experience problems by restricting
features, and this is a good thing.

~~~
Poiesis
_Message: AT &T expects to solve user experience problems by removing or
restricting features, and this is a bad thing._

This is of course in contrast to Apple's usual product design approach, which
is to solve user experience problems by removing or restricting features?

~~~
jarek
The double standard is exactly what I meant when juxtaposing the two quotes.

------
pinstriped_dude
Why is the DaringFireball article here? and why does it have a 100 votes? The
guy has just quoted the Wired article without adding anything on his own?

~~~
tlrobinson
Because it highlights the most interesting points of a much longer article?

I'm no Daring Fireball fanboy (the 1st derivative of an Apple fanboy?) but
there is sometimes value in aggregation and summarization.

~~~
wallflower
> sometimes value in aggregation

What do you think of <http://kottke.org> ?

------
alanstorm
Not that I don't ♥ The Gruber™, but the link should probably be pointing at
the original article, as all John is doing here is quoting from the Wired
piece.

~~~
jesseendahl
I made an HN submission to the original article 2 hours before this link to
Gruber showed up here. The original article was on the front page of HN (and
still is: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1529931>), but for some reason
this submission has twice the points. Guesses:

* Catchier headline.

* Short attention spans mean excerpts are more highly valued on HN (despite lack of context, such as bugs in the original baseband, as pointed out by cligner below).

~~~
jasonlotito
Several reasons for this.

1\. DF sneezes and get's hits. 2\. Linkbait headline. 3\. Shorter post means
people are back here faster and will remember to upvote. Wired article is
longer, much better, and by the time you are done, you forget to upvote.

------
warfangle
I do believe apple has given some opaque concessions. Note that this is
anecdotal; I have not scientifically tested this.

I have the nexus one, running on att 3g - the same similar card I used to use
in my iPhone 3g. A co-worker just got the iPhone 4.

We both picked up the FCC bandwidth test app.

Testing each phone in succession - not simultaneously - in the same spot,
hands free, flat on the desk.

My N1 consistently benchmarked at 2-2.5 mbps down and 1mbps up with a 200ms
ping.

His iPhone consistently benchmarked at 1-1.5 mbps down, .2-.4 mbps up, and a
2000ms ping.

Either there truly are antenna issues unrelated to the hand-holding-bars-
dropped issue, or the I/O processor cannot handle high speeds, or Apple is
throttling bandwidth usage based on geolocation. I don't know which it is
Another coworker tested his bandwidth in Vancouver and got over 10mbps.

These tests were performed in Soho. Your miles may vary...

~~~
Terretta
Tell him to reset network settings. If not fixed dial 611 to reprovision.
Known issue with activation not setting right for iPhone 4 restored from
iPhone 3, and some new iPhone 4 with glitch in activation.

I get 3 Mbps / 1.5 Mbps in SoHo and the Village.

~~~
warfangle
If the activation didn't set right, wouldn't he not be able to even get on the
3G network? The phone works fine - just, in tests, the network is quite a bit
slower than other phones.

Activation would seem to be a binary, not gradient, issue..

~~~
Terretta
No, it's not binary. I saw this happen to several people, including me.

In my friend's case, for example, his data speeds were incredibly low, and he
was unable to log onto the 3G Microcell base stations.

I suspect AT&T has custom settings on their end for particular classes of
devices, and haven't matched those settings correctly. Could be as simple as
not matching the IMEI number, or could be enabling HSDPA/HSUPA, I don't know.

But for me, him, and a couple others, AT&T had to push a reset (phone screen
shows an unusual "Ok to power off" type message you only see if they push
settings and a reset), and afterwards, speeds shot through the roof.

------
herrherr
From [http://putthison.com/post/833571254/were-apple-we-dont-
wear-...](http://putthison.com/post/833571254/were-apple-we-dont-wear-suits-
we-dont-even):

“We’re Apple. We don’t wear suits. We don’t even own suits.” — Steve Jobs (or
a representative thereof, the citation is a little unclear), incredibly rich
establishment capitalist businessman, on fighting in 2010 the anti-
establishment battles of 1965. Because you know what the problem is? Suits.

------
RyanMcGreal
>we always said, ‘Fine, we’ll escalate it to Steve and see who wins.’ I think
history has demonstrated how that turned out.”

Really? As far as I understand, the AT&T data network still sucks.

~~~
jarek
And, more tellingly in combination with this, the Iphone is still AT&T
exclusive in the U.S., even though making a T-Mobile version would be
essentially trivial (different UMTS band) and Apple already has a history of
larger radio hardware customizations for carriers (no wifi in mainland China).

------
plusbryan
Jobs must not get invited to many weddings.

~~~
pgbovine
he was the photographer at ellison's, though:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Ellison>

~~~
werrett
And yet strangely enough, this doesn't refute the thrust plusbryan's comment
if you take it as a reflection on Job's suite owning status _or_ his general
character.

------
CaptainMcCrank
Original article reeks of linkbait.

Counterculture versus The Man. Flippant startup versus entrenched corporation.
Think different versus rethink possible.

And a bunch of hacker newsers get all excited about a quote about dressing
nice.

I love the irony of counterculture groupthink. "we are apple, we don't even
own suits." They should finish that with a "we are legion" reference.

------
megablast
I get the impression that Apple is not run by a bunch of MBAs, unlike a lot of
the big companies around the world.

~~~
hyperbovine
According to their bios (<http://www.apple.com/pr/bios/>), every senior exec
who isn't doing hardware of software has either an MBA or a JD. More
anecdotally, I know at least three people with MBAs working in middle
management there. Apple does a good job of maintaining a counterculture image
while remaining a pretty average place to work.

Of course, you could make the case that Apple is run by one person, and he
didn't even graduate college.

~~~
billmcneale
It's way below an average place to work: these past years, Apple hasn't made
it in the top 100 places to work a single time. Not a single time. In the Top
100.

[http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2010/fu...](http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2010/full_list/)

[http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2009/fu...](http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2009/full_list/)

[http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2008/fu...](http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2008/full_list/)

~~~
astrange
That's a strange list and I can't really see how I'd use it to choose
somewhere to work. Would you enjoy getting a CS degree and then working at
Men's Wearhouse rather than Apple?

~~~
joubert
You could come up with some cool inventory logistics algorithms.

Eh, Thinking about it again, I'd rather work at Apple

------
famousactress
I originally misread the quote as "We don't wear suits. We don't even wear
suits." I like my misread better. Seems more Apple, even.

~~~
blhack
You're not the only one. In fact, I went back and read it four or five times
because I thought I was missing something. It wasn't until I finished the
article that I realized I was wrong.

------
jarek
That must be why Slingplayer and Facetime are wifi-only.

------
joubert
A quick google reveals this: <http://www.cultofmac.com/steve-jobs-weras-a-
tie/1566>

~~~
mattparcher
Also, Steve wearing a tux at the 2010 Academy Awards:
[http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/03/08/steve-jobs-big-
night-...](http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/03/08/steve-jobs-big-night-at-the-
oscars/)

For what it’s worth, the dramatic quote is attributed to “one of Jobs’
deputies,” rather than Steve himself.

------
ams6110
If Apple are so concerned with user experience that they are unwilling to
throttle the iPhone to meet ATT's network limitations, then why did they
partner with ATT to begin with? ATT are pretty generally perceived as having
the worst wireless phone service in the USA, and that certainly dovetails with
my personal experience.

~~~
MarcusA
You have to remember what the carriers were like in 2006/2007 timeframe.
Cingular/AT&T was the open carrier at the time. You would use any GSM phone.
More importantly, they allowed you to use any feature on your phone. Conceding
to Apple control of the apps on your phone was a very radical idea at the
time. Typically carriers dictated what application would be on the phone. On
Verizon, you had to use their phones (there was some lipservice around this
time about allowing any _fully compatible_ phone on its network). In addition,
included features such as bluetooth PC syncing, which had zero impact on the
network, was disabled on my Nokia candybar. It was simply too much of a leap
for Verizon to allow a phone as open as the iPhone (2007 terms, remember) on
its network.

~~~
jonknee
T-Mobile USA was just as open, perhaps a bit more because you could use
European GSM tri-band phones.

------
statictype
Why did Apple decide to tie themselves to a single carrier instead of keeping
the phone unlocked? Is it because AT&T would subsidize the R&D cost that went
into making the iPhone?

And purely in hindsight, was that a good decision?

~~~
yardie
Unlike Google, Apple realized early on that they would need carrier support to
get into the market at all. You only get that by having exclusives. Normally
these only last a year. Why 5 years? I don't know but I've heard that ATT was
paying Apple part of the data subscriptions.

------
stefs
FACT: They have even fought about wardrobe: When an Apple representative
suggested to one of AT&T’s deputies that the AT&Ts CEO wear a turtleneck to
meet with Apples board of directors, he was told, “We’re AT&T. We don’t wear
turtlenecks. We don’t even own turtlenecks.”

------
sriram_sun
Ha ha ha! Nice! And in our company, only the suits get reimbursed for an
iPhone. iRony!

------
natch
It's not just Apple. It's Silicon Valley. Yet another reason to love living
here.

------
hackermom
"Fine, we'll escalate it to Steve and see who wins."

------
aaron111
Of course Gruber will quote the parts where AT&T is asking Apple to tweak the
iphone (trying to shift more blame on AT&T for their network) and now all the
parts about how Apple is extremely hard to work with or where the iphone's
baseband radio is incredibly buggy and is arguably one of the main reasons for
the constant dropped calls.

Gruber is nothing but a hack who's trying to glorify Apple in every way.

~~~
brown9-2
Actually I think these snippets reveal the gist of the original article pretty
well, and also highlight some pretty basic differences between AT&T and Apple:

1) AT&T wants to cripple features and sacrifice customer experience because it
won't invest in it's network fast enough

2) AT&T wants Steve Jobs to wear a suit to meet with it's board of directors.
Not only is this something that AT&T seemingly desires, but it needs to have a
deputy arrange and suggest the clothing choices of executives before they
meet.

So on one side: a company that sacrifices customer experience and makes inane
suggestions about clothing suggestions, because appearance matters.

On the other side: a company that releases some bugs in some of it's software.

You pick which is more indicative of an overall company culture. Perhaps Apple
seems hard to work with when you come from an aging bureaucracy and an old way
of doing business. I can understand how some people might find fighting for
the customer and for good products "hard to work with".

~~~
sprout
>AT&T wants to cripple features and sacrifice customer experience because it
won't invest in it's network fast enough

Alternately, AT&T makes mass-market products, and wants to insure a baseline
level of usability for everyone, while Apple makes products aimed at the top
10%, and wants the absolute best user experience possible without regard for
scalability.

Don't get me wrong, AT&T's network needs work, but I don't think that this
sort of design philosophy can necessarily work if all handsets are designed to
be 'selfish.' It only works if the expensive handsets/plans are allowed to do
that sort of thing.

