
Steve Jobs Presents His Ideas For A New Apple Campus - sahillavingia
http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/07/steve-jobs-cupertino/
======
thingie
I work in a small office park located quite similarly on a grassy field locked
entirely by some freeways and other large roads, though the buildings here are
cheap and ugly, but even if they weren't, it'd still totally suck. It's
isolated, not a part of the city, essentially, it's just a large parking lot
(most of which is below the ground, but that doesn't really change anything).

It's quite disappointing. Maybe it's a marvel of architecture, but indeed it's
a failure of urbanism (which, I believe, is much more important). It's 2011
and we're still building things while thinking in predefined square lots
separated by roads? Such a shame.

~~~
jamespitts
I worked at a place in Santa Monica called the Water Garden and it did seem
isolated. And seeing cities like NYC and Taipei and even downtown Ann Arbor, I
realize the benefits of new urbanism. However, I wonder if there is a new
model emerging here in next generation corporate work centers.

Buildings will get so large that they are act as their own cities, creating
space that can be returned to ecological use. Such buildings would be so large
as to need their own rail systems.

But the problem is living spaces being separate from working spaces. I do hope
that buildings like this get closely integrated into mass transportation. Not
every couple work at the same place with their kids at the corporate school.
If public transportation is not very intelligently integrated, the desolation
of the parking lots that this beautiful building replaces will continue in the
social dimension. From the presentation it seems as if this will be addressed
by buses.

~~~
ajross
Not to laugh too much, because I agree with you, but...

You do realize that what you're positing (giant work buildings, close
together, with all needed facilities nearby and lots of intra- and extra-
transit access to nearby housing) is what most of us call an "urban downtown
area", right?

You don't need to invent this. People already figured it out.

~~~
jamespitts
Y, I do! That companies seeking an isolated, concentrated workforce somehow
vibes with new urbanism is a big stretch. Worse, I am biased by the aesthetic
and technical qualities of this building concept, and it overwhelms practical
considerations. This is exactly how so many planners bought into modernist
architecture.

------
kabdib
A bit of Silly Valley lore: Go graph "Company builds a new campus" against
"Company stock falls like a rock."

Atari, 1983.

Apple, 1991.

Sun (both times, I forget the years).

SGI, 1990s.

Various other companies (I forget which, it's been a while). It's like the
hubris builds up to the point where the company is in a natural position to
say, "Hey, we need a new campus," and the Gods decide that a little
humiliation is in order as well . . .

~~~
YooLi
What about all the other companies that built new campuses and their stock
didn't fall?

~~~
Apple-Guy
Exactly. Google's new campus:
<http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_18081606?nclick_check=1>

------
guelo
I don't know, I worked in a campus with a huge courtyard in the middle, though
smaller than this, and it was mostly wasted unused space. I think it actually
makes different parts of the company feel more isolated from each other
because the other side of the building is so far way, the middle almost feels
like an intimidating wilderness that you stay away from. If instead you have
multiple smaller buildings connected by meandering paths it gives a campus a
friendlier feeling.

~~~
sjwright
I suspect the middle courtyard will have a lot of features not shown in the
design, including meandering pathways, benches and lawns for laptop jockeys,
full wifi coverage, and maybe even an outdoor cafe (or two, or three).

It's the job of a landscape architect to create an environment that is both
inviting for those walking outside, and serene for those looking out the
window. Somehow I doubt they'll screw it up. (Even if they did, it's
comparatively cheap to fix compared to bad architecture.)

With so many employees, I suspect it will be very well utilised, particularly
on warm sunny days.

~~~
checker
It reminds me of the Pentagon, which has the same sort of stuff along with
food vendors. It was pretty busy at lunch time and seemed to be a popular
place to have a walk and talk meeting.

~~~
camiller
And the worlds most dangerous hot dog stand. (torn down in 2006 IIRC)

~~~
protomyth
link for hot dog stand <http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=1049>

------
jacoblyles
Apple style - one monolithic building designed down to the square foot.

Google style - a motley assortment of buildings spread out over a large
campus, some of which are better than others.

~~~
Tichy
Has Apple found a way to make the sun shine from the North? Otherwise I think
there will be rooms that are better than others in the round spaceship, too.

~~~
jbrennan
Maybe there's "One more thing…" about it, and the whole thing _rotates_.

You know, I wouldn't be entirely surprised, either.

~~~
troymc
Or maybe some giant half-silvered mirrors north of the building, facing south,
which only come out of their underground silos around noon +/- 4 hours.

------
bgarbiak
The project looks like a literal approach to the walled garden idea.

~~~
billybob
Your comment wins for entertainment value. :)

------
Steko
Just for perspective:

Proposed Appleplex: 1.4 mil sq ft (?), 12-13k employees

Pentagon: 6.5 mil sq ft (3.7 mil for offices), 26k employees

Empire State Building: 2.8 mil sq ft, 21k (?) employees

~~~
hugh3
Now I'm curious -- what's in the other 2.8 million square feet of the
Pentagon?

~~~
icey
Hallways, conference rooms, shops (there is a small mall in the Pentagon),
more hallways, bunkers, monuments / military museums, and a bunch of other
general use areas.

~~~
brudgers
It's important to keep in mind that when the Pentagon was built, a computer
was a person who did calculations and documents were sent to the secretarial
pool to be typed; so the number and roles of its occupants were quite
different. The space has been re-purposed over the past 70 years.

~~~
icey
It's a very interesting building. You can tell that it was made with a focus
on people walking from place to place. I think there are tours open to the
public (but require a reservation). I'm pretty sure it's the only tour in the
U.S. that features a Marine walking backwards for over a mile. I think there
are over 15 miles of hallways in the Pentagon. There are 5 levels with 5 rings
each, so you can imagine that's a lot of places to walk.

One of the things that isn't so nice now is the anti-radiation film that got
placed on the windows after 9/11. The film is bright yellow, so everything
that sunlight touches has kind of a gross pee colored tinge to it.

------
thematt
I find it extremely interesting that they'll be using natural gas as their
primary energy source for the campus and using the electrical grid as their
backup. Is this really cost effective? Are many businesses doing this?

~~~
nettdata
Isn't the electrical grid down there a bit undersized, and in need of
improvement anyway? I'm in Vancouver, BC, so I don't know for sure, but I keep
seeing news stories about rolling blackouts fairly often.

If that's the case, then it seems to me that relying on something other than
the grid would be a smart move.

~~~
ghshephard
The last time we had rolling blackouts was 10 years ago, 2001. They occurred
on seven days. Enron played a role. See:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis> for a reasonably
good accounting.

------
amirrustam
That council is so embarrassing.

~~~
whalesalad
Seriously the questions they asked were just ridiculous.

~~~
joelhaasnoot
I thought the same way. Not only the Wifi but also the question about safety.
Is it just me or is there a strict state/federal building code for that kinda
thing? And mentioning a cement plant? Apple isn't dumb if they hire top
architects that's something they'd have realized. They really acted like
clowns if you ask me...

~~~
d5tryr
The point is to have someone make a statement, on record, that they take
responsibility for the issue.

~~~
joelhaasnoot
Don't they have to either way?

------
aresant
Only Steve could glue me to the screen for 20 mins to watch a city council
meeting.

It's like listening to PT Barnum read the J Peterman catalog.

~~~
phillco
I laughed when he projected the estimated percent increase in trees. I hope
this filters into future presentations. "We're here to announce the iPhone 5,
but first...we've been really, really happy with the growth of our tree
population here at Apple."

~~~
sjwright
Lots of apricot trees... perhaps the odd McIntosh Apple? [1]

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McIntosh_%28apple%29>

~~~
latch
I grew up in Ontario, where McIntosh are king (and deliciously awesome!). I
was surprised, when I moved, that a lot of people didn't know that the
MacIntosh computer was actually named after this apple (trademark, or
something, prevented them from using "McIntosh")

~~~
rbanffy
"Macintosh" was also chosen because it's acronym-proof

~~~
tcdent
Still doesn't stop people from writing MAC instead of Mac; its an
abbreviation, not an acronym!

~~~
rbanffy
Things like these help separate the clueless from those you should pay
attention to. It's a Good Thing.

------
plainOldText
Watching this presentation makes me think of how important it is to stick to
your values across everything you are doing. The building Steve jobs presented
has some of the same design principles found in the recent apple products;
roundness, simplicity, clean neutral colors, environmental friendly, etc. I
think this gives apple great appeal.

~~~
Luyt
But he also calls it 'human scale', while in the pictures the building looks
huge: it's a kind of hollow frisbee, pentagon-style.

Maybe it's because I'm from a small country, we don't have skyscrapers here
;-)

~~~
shadowsun7
It's 4 stories high. Not a skyscraper, by any means. I'd bet the council would
be a little touchy if it were any higher than that.

~~~
checker
Yeah, people have houses that are 4 stories high. No big deal here, although
I'm not sure how big the houses are out in Cupertino.

------
Todd
I, too, found myself watching the proceedings for longer than I should have.
The design is elegant and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.
Ironically, the most amazing thing about the video is seeing a modern icon in
such a quotidian scenario.

------
sjwright
When I saw the photos, I figured that the building's circumference would be so
wide that curved glass would not just be unnecessary, but almost counter-
productive, as it's difficult to curve glass without imperfections that might
ruin its reflections.

Surely we'd be talking about small fractions of a degree per pane.

Can anyone estimate what the building circumference is, and therefore what
amount of curve would be called for?

~~~
redthrowaway
Just looking at the proposed plans and comparing to Google Maps, I'd give a
rough guestimate of 1100 ft for the building's diameter. So, that's about 3450
ft in circumference. That means a single degree of arc would cover about 960
ft. If each pane of glass were 10x48 and flat (as long as the building is
tall), then they would form a 7200-sided polygon, and the angle between them
would be 179.95 degrees, or a deflection of 0.05 degrees. So, while they claim
a curved window, you wouldn't notice if it was flat. Unless, of course, my
math is horribly misguided.

Edit: well somebody didn't like that. Anyway, I can't speak for the math, but
my source for the diameter guestimate: The building site shown at [1], and the
same site on Google maps [2]. Notice the scale in the bottom, showing 1000 ft.
The building plan appears slightly larger than that, so that's where I got my
estimate.

[1]
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtuz5OmOh_M&feature=playe...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtuz5OmOh_M&feature=player_embedded#t=293s)

[2]
[http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&...](http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&q=1+Infinite+Loop,+Cupertino,+Santa+Clara,+California+95014,+United+States&aq=&sll=49.891235,-97.15369&sspn=31.426188,79.013672&ie=UTF8&geocode=FcqjOQId1vm5-A&split=0&hq=&hnear=1+Infinite+Loop,+Cupertino,+California+95014,+United+States&ll=37.332972,-122.008882&spn=0.01887,0.038581&t=h&z=15)

~~~
erikpukinskis
How do you get a 7200 sided polygon from a 3450 ft circumference? That would
be 6 inch wide windows. Steve mentioned them having a process to create the
largest pieces of glass in the world... which look to be on the order of 10+
ft wide. That would mean at most 360 panes of glass, each turning a full
degree.

Maybe it's not easily perceptible, but how much do you wanna bet they mocked
it up and Steve was like "Yeah, you can tell the difference. It just doesn't
feel right."

~~~
redthrowaway
See, I knew the math was wrong... thanks for pointing that out.

------
barrkel
This isn't the first time he's presented to the council, I remember a previous
show he put on that was also on YouTube, over 5 years ago:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meVQqYNGzYA>

~~~
goatforce5
I've heard that he's been known to sit and watch council meetings when they've
been discussing issues relevant to Apple... Just to remind them to keep
Apple's interests in mind.

------
daimyoyo
I understand that Apple is a very important company to Cupertino, but I've
never need a city counsel so lovestruck at a meeting. They should just give
him a rubber stamp for whatever he wants to do.

~~~
pchristensen
I'm pretty sure any business offering to expand facilities, add thousands of
jobs, and increase tax base by a lot while staying inside city limits would
have the same kind of rapt attention.

~~~
matthavener
Yup, most cities have people on staff that simply beg companies to move to
their area. I'd be shock if Cupertino wasn't giving a few carrots to Apple..

~~~
pchristensen
Beg? Most {cities, counties, states} throw the bank at companies to get them
to move a couple miles.

Read the "economic development" stories on this blog
(<http://globalmidwest.typepad.com/global-midwest/>) if you're ever in the
mood to throw up in your mouth.

------
pjy04
They should have asked when the iPhone 5 is coming out

Plus: very sneaky for the council to ask for free wifi, ipads, more apple
stores, donations for schools in this presentation...

~~~
swombat
An architect friend of mine commented: "they always ask for free wifi".

He also said that it's amazing salesmanship on Steve Jobs' part to have
pitched this and basically given _nothing_ to the council. Most councils
manage to squeeze all sorts of concessions from even large multinationals
(e.g. banks in the UK). Steve gave them, basically, nothing - not even free
wifi.

If they'd been more savvy they could probably have had their free wifi and
Apple store - it's cheaper to Apple than relocating 10k employees to another
city and drawing all the plans again from scratch. Steve may be known for
holding grudges, but he's also a relatively rational businessman.

~~~
hugh3
_If they'd been more savvy they could probably have had their free wifi and
Apple store - it's cheaper to Apple than relocating 10k employees to another
city and drawing all the plans again from scratch. Steve may be known for
holding grudges, but he's also a relatively rational businessman._

Yes and no. You don't necessarily want to play chicken with Steve Jobs' ego.
Cupertino is lucky to have Apple -- Cupertino knows it, and Apple knows it. If
they start giving him a hard time getting his building approved then he's not
going to knock down Infinite Loop, but he could well start entertaining offers
from neighbouring cities which would no doubt fall over themselves to get the
second Appleplex.

~~~
panacea
Speaking of his ego. He must be _pissed_ that he couldn't get that small patch
of real estate in the lower left corner. The neighbours have made a powerful
enemy ;]

~~~
jarek
If you take a closer look at the area, you can see they'll actually houses
rather than office parks. They actually appear impressively dense by
California standards. It's a lot harder to buy people's houses than a
corporation's floors.

~~~
henryl
It's the Hamptons Apartment complex. I currently live here.

~~~
hugh3
Ooh, looking forward to your backyard becoming an enormous donut-shaped
construction site?

~~~
furyg3
Hopefully he owns his apartment, and is looking forward to the value of his
house tripling...

------
bluegene
Is it just me who shuddered every time when council leaders asked those
completely off-topic idiotic questions? Free wifi, really?

------
flyt
Really, really nice looking building and landscaping.

Why keep the IL1 campus, instead of just moving everybody into a slightly
larger mothership in 2015?

~~~
hammerdr
Sounds like they still need the space. 20% Increase with 13000 current
employees. IL1 will be needed to house everyone.

~~~
redthrowaway
They haven't built the new one yet; they could always make it bigger. Even
simply thickening it would likely add a ton of space.

~~~
elithrar
It would also darken the building and require more artificial light, which it
seems they're trying to avoid.

~~~
redthrowaway
They could always use skylight tubes [1]

Or, if they _really_ wanted to go green... [2]

[1] <http://www.solatube.com/commercial/index.php>

[2] <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zMAWztZ6TI>

------
barrkel
It reminds me somewhat of the Borland campus. That thing was Japanese
inspired, and shaped like a kind of jagged C, but similarly had a large
central courtyard, and due to its shape had lots of natural light in the
offices.

------
sambeau
What a lesser mind would come up with given a similar breif:

"Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), Cheltenham, United Kingdom"

<http://www.designbuild-network.com/projects/gchq/gchq1.html>

~~~
46Bit
Exactly what I thought when I saw it.

------
rmason
Not only will the new building become a tourist destination but it will be a
prime tool for recruiting.

~~~
Luyt
All the greenery and landscaping also made me wondering in what extent this
new campus will be accessible to the general public. Will you be able to just
go there and take a walk in Apple Park, or will there a big fence around it?

In the presentation you see casual people walking and playing about.

~~~
a-priori
I expected the council to demand that he make at least part of the campus open
to the public. You know, if they weren't being fangirls over Jobs.

------
thematt
I wonder how it is structured inside. 12,000 people still seems like a lot for
that building. Does anybody know how Apple employees are typically structured?
Is it offices for everybody? Open spaces with collaborative work spaces?

~~~
bstx
Typically every engineer has his own office, if space is tight some need to
double up until new offices become available.

------
bkudria
Well now you know what they've been hoarding that cash money for.

~~~
redthrowaway
I'm sure it won't cost 60BB. Although, it would be interesting to see what the
budget is.

------
Someone
Quite daring, to plan such a building. Who knows whether they will need the
space, four years from now? With multiple buildings, it is easier to make
corrections during construction or even afterwards.

Also, it will be a challenge to make that underground garage look as beautiful
as the building. That is what most visitors will initially see from the
building.

Finally, will this be a real click wheel or a modern version without moving
parts? :-)

~~~
Steko
"Who knows whether they will need the space, four years from now?"

I think Steve and Tim know they'll need it. I think the interesting thing is
not whether they'll need it, it's not like Apple is in any danger of
collapsing, but that it shows they don't anticipate needing more. This fits
with what we know about Apple wanting to stay lean and mean but it also makes
those plans concrete (lol?).

------
bretthopper
This isn't impressive to me. What would be impressive would be building a
skyscraper in downtown SF. Being environmentally friendly isn't building a
massive campus on a plot of suburban grassland. Apple likes to say they think
differently, but this isn't different. It's just slightly nicer than most
other headquarters in a suburban wasteland.

~~~
tptacek
In any other city I think this would be a more valid point. But San Francisco
is tiny. A lot of people really don't grok just how geographically small the
place is. An Apple move to downtown SF would be incredibly disruptive, would
generate epic amounts of traffic on already _extremely_ congested roads, would
doubtless increase pollution and energy expense, and price thousands of
families out of SF neighborhoods as wealthy Apple employees relocated.

I also think it's a bit unfair to judge the new Apple campus on a scale of
"worldwide innovations in green facilities". Apple has done what seems to be a
very good job of greening _up_ their existing Cupertino presence, and they are
probably going to end up spending a large amount of money on an effective
model for how to deploy a modern green-er corporate campus. I don't think we
need to ding them for not absolutely revolutionizing the integration of
corporate office space with environments.

This is a Cupertino City Council meeting, not a presentation at the UN.

~~~
bretthopper
It sounds like you're treating an Apple building downtown differently than any
other skyscraper. It's still just a big tower filled with people. Are you
saying that SF is literally bursting at the seams and that it can't support
another big office tower? What about the giant Transbay development plan? If
you're going to stuff 12,000+ people anywhere, it's better to do it in an
already dense area to take advantage of efficiencies.

Green Metropolis is an interesting read about big cities and sustainability:
[http://www.amazon.com/Green-Metropolis-Smaller-Driving-
Susta...](http://www.amazon.com/Green-Metropolis-Smaller-Driving-
Sustainability/dp/1594488827)

~~~
tptacek
Yes. That is what I am saying. That even if Apple could make the building
itself as green as conceivably possible, simply moving 12,000 people's
workplaces to the city of San Francisco would create additional problems and
be a net negative.

If you want to call that "bursting at the seams" that's fine, but Apple isn't
in a position to reengineer the whole dysfunctional city of San Francisco.

~~~
olefoo
> Apple isn't in a position to reengineer the whole dysfunctional city of San
> Francisco.

I'm imagining what San Francisco reengineered by Apple would be like.
Somewhere on the same continuum as Disneyworld and the Las Vegas strip, but
with rounded edges, lots of greenery and a social order similar to Singapore.

------
cleverjake
I recently went to 1 infinite loop for the first time, and was extremely
disappointed with the building. It was strikingly anti-apple in its aesthetic,
seeming more like it was something out of Office Space from most angles rather
than from the mind of Johnny Ives.

I am really glad to see how forward-thinking the concept looks.

~~~
grinich
The Infinite Loop campus was actually buit in 1993, before Steve returned and
Jony was made head of ID.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_Loop_(street)>

~~~
hugh3
Indeed, when Infinite Loop was built a Mac looked like this:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadra_700>

------
mahyarm
I'm surprised it's only 4 stories. I would of added 3 more stories and added
capacity for several more thousand employees. I can easily see them out
growing the space very quickly in the next 20 years and possibly building two
other circles in the empty spaces beside the circle.

~~~
mbateman
Didn't he explicitly say it was an aesthetic decision? He wants it "human
scale" or something like that.

~~~
mahyarm
Well it's either that, and having a high likelihood of spreading the company
around 30 crappy buildings all around Cupertino again, or using the large
fields as building spaces for new circles.

------
impendia
There are still orchards in Cupertino?!

Not for economic reasons. Modest houses on modest lots sell in the seven
figures there. Whoever owns the land could make huge money by selling to
developers, but presumably the city council has made it clear that they won't
approve a zoning change. Apparently, the people there already really want
there to still be orchards in Cupertino, if only as a memory of what was.

Sounds like Steve Jobs wowed the city council, but after paying some attention
to SV local politics, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the community rallied
against this.

~~~
goatforce5
He did point out a couple of times that they're the largest tax payer in
Cupertino and while they wanted to stay, they've go a couple of miles up the
road to the next city if they needed to. Also note the councillors asked when
they'd be breaking ground so they could start taxing them on it. Apple
wouldn't have to look hard to get big incentives to hop over the city
boundary, and they'll keep reminding the council that they have options.

I imagine a large percentage of Cupertino residents are Apple employees or
otherwise directly benefit from Apple being there. I'd think that the majority
of the community would be completely happy for the biggest local company to
spend a lot of money in their city, and to convert a big chunk of asphalt back
in to green space.

~~~
impendia
Possibly so. I should add that I'm not saying Cupertino _should_ prevent Apple
from building.

I lived in Menlo Park for a year before moving to SF, and was struck by how
anti-development the Menlo Park and Palo Alto governments (and ordinary
citizens) were. Perhaps Cupertino is different.

And, this proposal is pretty damn cool. Underground parking? That's fabulous.

~~~
cpeterso
Neither SF residents nor the city council are known for their pro-development
attitude. Beyond NIMBY is BANANA: _Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near
Anything_.

~~~
impendia
Well, fair enough, true.

My perspective is biased -- I live in the Dogpatch/Mission Bay neighborhood
where there are lots of new buildings, piles of dirt, and construction cranes.

------
teyc
In the "Man Who Fell to the Earth",
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Fell_to_Earth_(film...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Fell_to_Earth_\(film..).
the lead character is an extra terrestrial posing as a man, made a lot of
money by being a technologist selling amazing "inventions" from his planet,
and has a luxury apartment which turns out to be a spaceship, which is meant
to cart water back to his planet, which has run out due to its use in power
generation. Maybe Jobs is planning bring natural gas back to his planet?

------
paramaggarwal
Wow, such a beautiful campus.

~~~
Luyt
And all the ugly parking lots will be underground! What a huge gain. It almost
makes me want to work for Apple and move to Cupertino.

~~~
adpowers
Not all, if you look at the south part of the drawing there is still an above
ground parking structure :(

------
joeguilmette
if i didn't enjoy free time so much i'd love to work in this new building :)

------
noonespecial
I'd have a back up plan for a second nearby city so that once the town
councils bike-shedding begins, Steve can just shrug and say "Gee it would have
been nice to build it here but..."

~~~
simonw
He kind of did that with his mention of Mountain View.

------
cubicle67
for some reason it reminds me of a Panopticon.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon>

------
spitfire
Reminds me a bit of IBM's TJ Watson center in NY.

Very cool, very futuristic. That is a place I'd like to be. Importantly,
they've said they have a few thousand people at 1IL currently and they're
consolidating everyone together. That should benefit the communication and
innovation having everyone under one roof able to get together and chat.

In short, I love it. More companies should be so bold.

------
delackner
When I saw that aerial three-quarter image of the building, I started to
imagine crossing from one side of the campus to the other via that inner
garden. Somehow the burning man city layout popped into my head, along with
memories of crossing the vast open middle on foot (not recommended. Only
attempted a bicycle-free year once).

------
xxpor
What is the advantage to Apple to build in an incorporated city? I understand
the need for infrastructure, but what does a tech co like Apple need other
than electricity + water + gas? Wouldn't there be less regulation and taxes if
they moved to unincorporated territory?

------
hillbilly
Massive corporate office buildings seem so antiquated to me. Don't people work
remotely nowadays? Even when I am on-site I prefer to hold meetings over web
share and phone conferences. Meetings you have to walk to never start on time.
What a waste.

------
kmt
I bet that Jobs has had a dream about this building for a while. Finally, he
gets to do it.

------
minikomi
Wow.. reminds me of the kindergarten I used to work at (at a massive scale!)
[http://www.landezine.com/index.php/2009/07/fuji-
kindergarten...](http://www.landezine.com/index.php/2009/07/fuji-
kindergarten/)

------
Anti-Ratfish
To quote our IT manager "So its an actual walled garden?"

------
bfung
in the LA Times article about the same topic, Steve Wozniak also added his own
bits on the land purchased. Scroll down to the Comments section (it's via
facebook).

[http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/06/apple-
spa...](http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/06/apple-spaceship-
campus-site-special-to-steve-jobs-because-of-hp-connection.html)

------
spitfire
What other companies have built beautiful office spaces like this? I count IBM
and Epic systems. I hear sas has a great campus as well.

------
seriocomic
So what would be the new address? Does it mean giving up "1 Infinite Loop"?
Any guesses at a replacement?

------
tudorizer
Is it bigger than the Pentagon?

~~~
rflrob
It's close, depending on what you mean by size. Looking at the Pentagon
diagram on wikipedia and using the above estimates of 1100-1200 feet for the
Mothership, it's about comparable in diameter. I'm fairly sure the Pentagon
rings are thicker, though, so that probably contributes to it's ability to
house 26k (employees + support personnel) instead of Apple's 12-3k.

~~~
vaporstun
The Pentagon also has more height, with 4 stories above ground and at least 2
below. Don't know if Apple plans on having stories below ground, there was no
mention during the presentation, but not doing so would account for more of
the difference.

~~~
bonzoesc
Apple plans to hide parking underground instead of leaving vast expanses of
asphalt above ground like The Pentagon:
[http://www.bing.com/maps/?v=2&cp=qgbkxj8kbvq8&lvl=17...](http://www.bing.com/maps/?v=2&cp=qgbkxj8kbvq8&lvl=17&dir=0&sty=b&where1=Pentagon%20City%2C%20VA&q=pentagon&form=LMLTCC)

------
kadavy
He seems so tired. Get well Steve. Beautiful building!

------
quickpost
I wonder what the radius of that building will be.

------
trout
Does anyone else get a creepy Dubai vibe reading this? Some of the statements
like 'there will be no straight glass' beg the question - is it really worth
it?

~~~
jaysonelliot
You mean it "raises the question."

Begging the question means something completely different:
<http://begthequestion.info/>

------
lukestevens
Simply utopian.

