

This year, Mac apps are no longer eligible for the Apple Design awards - mortenjorck
http://developer.apple.com/wwdc/ada/

======
rauljara
I am really not liking the whole emphasize-iphoneOS-over everything-else
direction of apple recently. I like OSX a lot. I really hope they return to
giving it the attention it deserves soon.

~~~
CamperBob
_I am really not liking the whole emphasize-iphoneOS-over everything-else
direction of apple recently._

When they renamed the company from "Apple Computer" to "Apple", it should've
been obvious which way the wind was blowing.

They are not going to be selling Macs in ten years.

~~~
pyre
What are they going to do with their development platform then? I can see how
it makes sense for Apple to drop 'computers' and focus on 'devices,' but they
are currently restricting their development platform to Macs. Do you feel that
they will be able to create a competent development platform for Windows or
Linux? Or do you think that we will all be coding on iPhones/iPads in 10
years?

~~~
CamperBob
I can't see using a tablet as a coding platform, but who knows what kind of
wacky stuff will happen by the time they get around to retiring the Mac
platform.

As mentioned above, though, Windows-hosted development is the rule and not the
exception in other industries like game development, which are just as
technically demanding (if not far more so) than iPhone OS app development.

~~~
pyre
The problem is that Apple has never shown any sort of competency in developing
stable and/or usable Windows applications. They need their developer tools to
stay friendly during such a transition, too. They can't just expect
i{Phone,Pad} developers to walk barefoot over broken glass just for the
privilege of creating an application for the platform.

{edit} Either that or they are banking on being so entrenched by the time they
drop the Mac platform that developers will have no choice but to 'walk
barefoot over broken glass' to develop for their mobile platform.

~~~
orangecat
_They can't just expect i{Phone,Pad} developers to walk barefoot over broken
glass just for the privilege of creating an application for the platform._

Based on their recent policy changes that is exactly what they expect.

------
dotBen
They simply want Apple Design awards to be given to apps that they have _also_
approved.

I tell you, if Jobs could get away with running OSX as an App Store orientated
platform that can only run pre-approved apps, he would. :(

~~~
karipatila
Didn't he already say there would be no App Store for desktop apps? Some
developer emailed him about that and the reply was "nope".

~~~
drewcrawford
Good for him. In other news, Steve Jobs is often full of shit.

    
    
      There are some customers which we chose not to serve. 
      We don't know how to make a $500 computer that's not a
       piece of junk, and our DNA will not let us ship that.
       - 2008
    
      We didn't think we'd do well in the cellphone business...
      We chose to do the iPod instead of a PDA. - 2003
    
      There are no plans to make a tablet...It turns out people
      want keyboards. - 2003
    
      I'm not convinced people want to watch movies on a tiny
      little screen. - 2003

~~~
aeontech
Well, first of all, in 2008 there _was_ no way to make a $500 computer that
wasn't a piece of junk. Not with currently available technology. I'm sure if
they could build iPad 5 years earlier at the same price, they would have; the
technology wasn't there. Second of all, even Jobs is allowed to change his
mind. Calling someone full of shit because 7 years has passed, with technology
evolving correspondingly (do you remember the resolution of tiny screens in
2003? I do; cell phone screens were mostly something like 240x360 at most; he
was right, at that resolution, the market wanting to see movies in that
quality is worthless) is a bit harsh, no?

~~~
drewcrawford
I've thought about this for the last hour or so, and after thinking about it,
I think arguing about the hardware is a red herring.

Suppose the hardware wasn't there in 2008 (which I don't think is strictly
true, but OK). Are you really saying that Steve Jobs, with all his secret
meetings with Samsung and random manufacturers, isn't aware that it will be
available soon?

To put it another way, if the hardware is hard, wouldn't it have taken Apple
quite some time to build the stuff? Wouldn't they be working on the iPad, say,
two years out, when Jobs was making those statements about $500 tablets?

But I think even _that argument_ in a sense is a red herring. The real issue
is "can Jobs change his mind?" Of course he can. But he's notoriously cryptic
about what Apple's working on. It's not like he's out talking to industry
analysts and is making off-the-cuff comments about Apple's strategy. His
statements are calculated and controlled. In fact, I would argue that he is
more often "wrong" or "misleading" about new products than he is "accurate",
because lots (by percentage) of his forward-looking statements turn out to be
inaccurate, at least according to the plain meaning of them. To say that he is
changing his mind is to imply that he's really inept his job: figuring out
what to build.

But I think even _that's_ not the central issue. Let's say Jobs is just a
really whimsical guy, who doesn't know he's working on an iPad until it slaps
him in the face on launch day. So all of the quoted statements are just him
running his mouth and he really has no product vision years out.

Wouldn't that imply, then, that today Jobs has no idea whether he'll be making
a Mac app store or not? So his statement has no real information content?

tl;dr It doesn't matter whether the hardware is hard or what his intent is--to
mislead or if he simply doesn't know he's going to make a product. His track
record shows that claiming he's not going to do something is a good indicator
that he'll do it a few years later.

~~~
GHFigs
The real issue is that your thesis is flimsy and hinges on selective quoting
and ignorance of context. Here is but one example:

 _when Jobs was making those statements about $500 tablets?_

He wasn't. Here is the original transcript from which your first quote was
pulled. It is not about tablets, and only by implication is it even about the
idea of an "Apple netbook", the prevalent rumor of the day.

 _Toni Sacconaghi - Sanford Bernstein

And then you had also mentioned the price umbrella statement and you said
look, certainly to be successful on iPhone, we don’t want to create a price
umbrella. I think in response to another question, you also talked about
extraordinary feature functionality in terms of your Mac products. Do you have
the same philosophy around Mac as you do with iPhone, that you have to be
careful not to create an umbrella in each? So I guess the simple question is
should we continue to see more affordable price points across the Mac product
family and across iPhone going forward?

Steven P. Jobs

Well, I think what we want to do is deliver a lot, an increasing level of
value to these customers. There are some customers which we choose not to
serve. We don’t know how to make a $500 computer that’s not a piece of junk,
and our DNA will not let us ship that. But we can continue to deliver greater
and greater value to those customers that we choose to serve and there’s a lot
of them. And we’ve seen great success by focusing on certain segments of the
market and not trying to be everything to everybody. So I think you can expect
us to stick with that winning strategy and continuing to try to add more and
more value to those products in those customer bases we choose to serve. Does
that make sense to you?

Toni Sacconaghi - Sanford Bernstein

Yes, it does. I mean, I guess, if I could follow-up, you did in this case add
more value in terms of feature functionality with your notebook by actually
lowering the price, so you retained the features but lowered the price.
Certainly in terms of the new notebooks, you retained the price and added more
features.

Steven P. Jobs

Correct.

Toni Sacconaghi - Sanford Bernstein

Can we expect you to continue to attract more customers by doing both, both
adding more features at the same price and lowering price and retaining the
same features?

Steven P. Jobs

Well, we like to attract new customers but you will just have to wait and
see._

[http://seekingalpha.com/article/100980-apple-f4q08-qtr-
end-9...](http://seekingalpha.com/article/100980-apple-f4q08-qtr-
end-9-27-08-earnings-call-transcript?page=-1)

------
warwick
I can't help wondering if all the regular app reviewers have been pulled to
help with iPhone and iPad app reviews. The Apple Downloads section hasn't been
updated in weeks, and now this.

As a Mac developer, this feels like a major blow. Sure, I understand that the
iPhone OS stuff is the new shiny and the spotlight is going to be on it, but
lately it feels like Apple is just coasting on the Mac side. It makes me
seriously question if I'm writing apps for the right platform.

If it's time to reevaluate platforms, then it's time to take a look at all the
possibilities again, not just the ones made by Apple. The iPad looks great,
but then again, so does the web.

~~~
squidsoup
Given that you're a Cocoa developer, you may find Cappuccino interesting if
you decide to start targetting the web.

<http://cappuccino.org/>

------
koenbok
As a two time ADA winner, and having a new app almost ready for this years
wwdc we're pretty bummed out about this. As one developer put it, it feels
like the end of an era. We love the Mac desktop, but Apples current attitude
towards it is very bad for developer morale and will make us definitely think
twice on what platform we'll build our next project.

------
icodestuff
Seriously not cool. But it IS true, there haven't been a ton of groundbreaking
apps on the Mac this year, and I say that as a Mac developer. Still, they
could have given an award to best Mac companion app for an iPhone app, and/or
best developer tool (Accessorizer FTW).

Looks like the scientific computing poster session has been dropped this year
too.

------
pxlpshr
The second coming of jumping the shark.

I really don't like the deemphasis of OSX in favor of iPhone OS. The iPhone is
great for mobility because it strips computing down to the core, but it has a
LOOONNGG way to go before it can toe up with OSX or Windows when it comes to
productivity, IMO.

ps. I'm a mac fanboy at heart, but i try to remain objective about consumer
technology for the "masses". Outside of the tech ecosphere, the world is a
very different place.

[http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/01/windows-7-grow...](http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/01/windows-7-growing-
faster-than-vista-overtakes-mac-os.ars)

------
lzimm
sounds like the design awards are just becoming a beauty contest.

how many iPhone apps actually feel delightful to use and don't just look
pretty?

------
anujseth
The folks at panic must be pretty bummed about this, transmit 4 was a major
contender.

~~~
starkfist
Transmit 4 is awesome, but you can tell a platform is stagnating when one of
the coolest applications is an FTP client.

~~~
jrockway
Actually, you can tell it's awesome when your business is sustained by people
buying a $34 wrapper over a few perl scripts.

~~~
lallysingh
Actually it's a wrapper around a library they licensed for like $500. 15
licenses later and they've made their money back!

~~~
jrockway
Very interesting. I had no idea there was a market for libraries.

~~~
onewland
Last company I worked at did nothing but that. I think it's more common in the
MS/.NET world.

<http://accusoft.com/>

------
nailer
Perhaps they'd like to avoid awarding something to an OS X app that isn't
written using Objective C / Cocoa.

~~~
jarin
Somehow, I don't think an Adobe AIR app is going to beat something using fancy
Core Animation stuff.

~~~
mortenjorck
I wouldn't say it's impossible: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1295052>

But yes, highly improbable.

~~~
thwarted
Which may mean it is more deserving of an award.

------
habitue
Perhaps they are thinking of dumping their line of computers and going
completely portable electronics?

~~~
archgoon
And have people develop applications on windows computers? I don't think so.

~~~
CamperBob
If you think anyone at Apple gives a rat's behind what hardware platforms are
used to develop iPhone OS apps, I... respectfully disagree.

~~~
akadien
Well, they give a rat's ass about the kind of language developers use to
develop iPhone apps.

~~~
CamperBob
That is for a very different reason than anything being discussed here.

------
sheldonwt
Since there's no app store for OSX, why award people who are striving to
further the platform? Such broken logic.

~~~
ericd
Only if that's actually the logic they're following. I don't see any
indication that it it.

------
allwein
I'm actually wondering if this indicates the possibility of a small Mac-
focused developers conference in Apple's future. There was quite a bit of
grumbling last year at WWDC from Mac developers because of the heavy focus on
iPhone technologies.

I can understand a lessened focus given how popular iPhone and iPad are right
now, but the shunning of Mac apps completely from the ADAs makes me think
we'll see a Mac-only conference soon.

------
jsz0
Makes sense to me. There's just not much exciting innovative stuff happening
on the desktop these days. Good apps get marginally better all the time but is
that worthy of an award?

------
lovskogen
I'm hoping to see desktop apps with the same simplicity that is (forced) on
touch apps. Less everything.

------
drivingmenuts
So which iFart app will win?

