
Does Apple have a Scott Forstall problem? - olivercameron
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/09/29/does-apple-have-a-scott-forstall-problem
======
robomartin
Nah. I don't agree with the premise of this article. This was not one person's
decision. Many actors had to be involved in the decision making process. For
some reason Apple decided that kicking Google off the platform was worth the
abuse they'd have to endure with Maps.

Those who keep saying "Maps is great" need to leave an egocentric view and
realize that there are millions of users all around the world with different
experiences.

According to the apology letter they serve about 500 million searches in one
week. That means two billion searches per month. What does this mean in therms
of customer experience?

<http://www.mtonic.com/applemaps/>

According to this either 60% of the locations either incorrect or missing
altogether. I'll be generous and propose that Maps, world-wide, might have an
average of 5% incorrect or missing locations. I don't know if this is too low
or too high. It's just a number that I pulled out of my imagination in order
to get a sense of proportion.

If only 5% of the data is wrong and we have two billion searches per month,
that means 100 million bad searches per month. I'll let the reader guess as to
how many users that affects. It certainly is in the millions.

If data errors are larger than that the situation is far worst. Again, I'll
leave it up to the reader to guess as to how much user anger would trigger
Apple to post an apology letter on the front page of their site.

If you live here in California, and, in particular, the Bay Area, please
refrain from posting how "Maps is great and it is beautiful". You do not
represent the experience of the vast majority of users who had almost no
issues whatsoever with Google Maps.

Oh, yes, on the whole "Maps is beautiful" mantra. Who the f __* cares? 3D
view? Who the f __* cares? First make them dead accurate, then add eye candy
if it makes sense. Accuracy is far more important than bling when it comes to
maps. Nobody is going to want to use a beautiful map that takes you to the
wrong place. And 3D view. Really? Get it right first. Then play.

~~~
CamperBob2
_Those who keep saying "Maps is great" need to leave an egocentric view and
realize that there are millions of users all around the world with different
experiences._

I have a theory about these people -- they are the ones who never realized
that you _could_ search Maps for place names.

If you search for street addresses, both Maps implementations perform OK. But
the strength of Google's database is that you can type almost anything within
reason into the Maps search box and get where you want to go. For my first few
weeks of iPhone usage, whenever I wanted to find a nearby "Starbucks" or
"Barnes and Noble" or $name_of_local_restaurant, I'd do the search in Safari,
pick a likely result, and then click on the page's address link, assuming
there was one, in order to open it in Maps. Eventually I realized that I could
type the search string directly into Maps, and that made life a lot easier. If
that stopped working or became less effective on the iPhone that I use for
navigation in the car, I would scream bloody murder.

So my guess is that the people who aren't complaining about Apple's maps
application are either living in metro areas that were carefully vetted by the
data provider, searching for street addresses directly, or both.

~~~
voxmatt
I'm not trying to apologize for Apple's mess -- and it is a mess -- but your
theory doesn't hold for me.

Some places are genuinely fine: I'm in San Francisco and the maps really are
pretty damn good (in SF, I'll actually use the word good). Of course, this is
right in Apple's back yard, but the reports seem to indicate that most major
U.S. cities are in good shape (mind you, I'm talking about maps & places, not
flyover's 3D views, which are a whole different story). And, I legitimately
find the link to Yelp's reviews more useful than Google's place markings, but
Google's are more consistently available.

Not to say that this isn't a huge mess, but simply that there are places where
"Maps is good" ("Maps is great" is a bit much no matter where you are!).

~~~
ImprovedSilence
I don't have an iPhone, but isn't the new maps missing public transit data?
Does that mean it won't route me through subways, etc, or doesn't even show
bus stops and subway stations? And what about bike paths, Google has fantastic
labeling of bike routes. As a city dweller, it's good to know they are
"accurate", but, from what I've heard, they are missing many key components
that would actually help tons in a city. Not trolling here, just asking if
maps has that info, and to what degree. Cuz if that is missing from city data,
that to me is just as bad as inaccurate maps for a flyover state.

~~~
hc33
Depends on the location. Where I am both the old and new version lack this
kind of data.

~~~
jlgreco
Does the new version have it _anywhere_?

~~~
hatcravat
In a word, "no." There are 3rd-party add-ons available from the App Store, but
those only cover a subset of cities. Also, there don't seem to be routing
plugins that can find transit directions across multiple transit agencies the
way Google Maps can. So, for example, if you wanted to go from San Diego to
Los Angeles, Apple maps couldn't tell you which buses to take on each end of
the Amtrak ride.

------
pkamb
> _Inside Apple, tension has brewed for years over the [skeuomorphism] issue.
> Apple iOS SVP Scott Forstall is said to push for skeuomorphic design, while
> industrial designer Jony Ive and other Apple higher-ups are said to oppose
> the direction. "You could tell who did the product based on how much glitz
> was in the UI," says one source intimately familiar with Apple’s design
> process._

[http://www.fastcodesign.com/1670760/will-apples-tacky-
softwa...](http://www.fastcodesign.com/1670760/will-apples-tacky-software-
design-philosophy-cause-a-revolt)

~~~
nilsbunger
Very interesting. Of course, Steve Jobs was also in favor of skeuomorphic
design, so it's not like Forstall is the sole reason I "find my friends" in
stitched leather.

~~~
dastbe
That's not skeumorphism; it's a style choice. If I had to simulate ripping the
top piece of paper off the notepad in notes to clear it, then that would be
skeumorphic design.

~~~
shinratdr
Can we just make this the auto-reply comment whenever someone mentions
skeuomorphism on the internet? I couldn't be more sick of the concept, except
when I hear it constantly being used incorrectly.

Textures and styles aren't skeuomorphism, skeuomorphism is imitating real-
world objects to provide a sense of familiarity in execution. Not a notes app
that looks like a notepad, a notes app that FUNCTIONS like a notepad.

~~~
arrrg
I think you two are wrong. Skeumorphism is about ornamental design, about
design features that imitate something that was once necessary but is no more.

It’s consequently all about style, not about function (at least when it comes
to real-world objects). Wikipedia has examples like flame shaped lightbulbs,
artificial film grain or spoke patterns on hubcaps.

It seems that when it comes to software, skeumorphism can also refer to
functional adoptions of virtual interfaces to their real-world counterparts†,
but I think it would be misguided to exclude mere style here.

I mean, in the end this is a stupid semantic argument. Using leather textures
is what it is, whether it’s skeumorphism or just style, but you two certainly
do not have the facts on your side.

—

† It’s pretty clear why that is the case: it’s only possible to make
lightbulbs look like flames, not to make them work like flames. Software
provides more freedom and makes it possible to make something virtual work
like the real thing.

~~~
dastbe
If we're going by the wikipedia page, here's their definition they provide:

"skeuomorphism is when a product imitates design elements /functionally
necessary/ in the original product design, but that becomes ornamental in the
new product design."

So yes, it is about function.

And also, the three things you mention are directly related to the function of
the original objects. While these things are clearly used ornamentally in
modern devices, their existence/use was inherent in the design of the modern
devices' predecessors.

~~~
arrrg
What? You seem to be very confused. Just give it up. You are wrong.

~~~
dastbe
I think you misunderstood me. While it can be purely stylistic in the modern
interpretation, the element replicated must have some functional purpose in
the original. I do not think that you have to reimplement the functionality,
that was just the example I used.

Your examples are skeumorphic because they use functional aspects of the
original. "Find My Friends" is not skeumorphic because even if such a thing as
"Find My Friends" existed in a previous form, the leather has nothing to do
with its function.

If that sounds confusing to you, then I don't know what else to say. You're
wrong?

~~~
pkamb
Almost all aspects of a physical object are "functional", so this is a strange
distinction to make.

For example, the rich Corinthian leather of a desk calendar functions as an
arm rest and also functions as a binding mechanism for the calendar pages
within. The stitching of said leather functions to hold the piece together.

~~~
snowwrestler
The point is that you do not need rich Corinthian leather to make a desk
calendar; in fact the vast majority of desk calendars in the world do not have
any leather on them at all. Even on the real-world object, the choice to use
leather serves a decorative purpose--it is not a functional necessity. Yet
I've never heard someone call a leather desk calendar "skeuomorphic."

------
w1ntermute
Forstall has been called "Apple's chief asshole"[0] - he channels Steve Jobs's
approach of being a douchebag, but doesn't seem to have acquired the same
level of perfectionism as Jobs.

0:
[http://www.dailytech.com/Apples+chief+Ahole+Forstall+Keeps+S...](http://www.dailytech.com/Apples+chief+Ahole+Forstall+Keeps+Steve+Jobs+Executive+Legacy+Alive/article23003.htm)

~~~
batista
He also gives me that impression when I see him on Keynotes, one of a power
grabbing, back-stabbing kind of guy. Which could or could not be true, I'm
talking purely from a "face-reading" standpoint.

The exact opposite of that would be Bob Mansfield.

~~~
paulschreiber
Fosrtall is the kind of guy who would sell you a used car and hit on your
wife.

~~~
dman
And you know this how?

~~~
gonzo
because his SO would, um, "flirt with" Forestall for a used car.

------
outside1234
No, Apple has a "liberal arts problem" in that they don't seem to have the
hard core folks to do algorithms in the way that Google does. Apple has a lot
of smart people, but can you really see them building a self driving car with
tons of lasers spinning on it in order to have super accurate maps? I can't.
But that's what Google did.

Its also a "device centric problem": I'm always struck when talking with
someone from Apple about how device centric they are thinking (running
algorithms locally that should run in the cloud, etc.). The cloud is eating
the world and device centric thinking, while its done them well for a while,
is increasingly incorrect.

~~~
001sky
_No, Apple has a "liberal arts problem"_

\-- Seriously? This is "analysis"?

A "a self driving car with tons of lasers spinning on it"? Learn before you
speak. The noticeable problems are not subtle: clouds covering cities in the
UK, buildings not being named on College Campus, etc. Stadia 0.5km out of
place. They are obvious, silly, dealbreaker problems for Soccer Moms and
Sociology FFS. Algo's are not going to solve this cr@p, its Cartpgraphy
101...and in any event, Google has to _hand fit_ the data that they do have,
for a variety of reasons, to sat-nav visuals (including incosistent basemaps).

~~~
pbharrin
Totally agree. I know, from many sources that a lot of human labor goes into
making the Google data so good. They used to give out cookies to employees who
would filter search results as porn/not porn. Algos can only get you so far.

------
stevenleeg
Since when has Siri been "an embarrassment for Apple?"

~~~
tlogan
Does it work for you? I stil have to meet a single person which actually can
ask Siri something and Siri understands it and gives reasonable answer... I
was under impression that it did not work because I'm ESL speaker: but it also
does not work for people who speak english very well.

Aha and there is class action lawsuit:
[http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/06/12/class-action-lawsuit-
file...](http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/06/12/class-action-lawsuit-filed-
against-apples-siri-technology/)

Here is the quote:

    
    
       Ryan asked Siri, “What is a class action?”
    
       Siri told her, “I found this meeting.”

~~~
mikeryan
Siri works fabulously for me. Here's how I use it, these use cases work
consistently.

1\. Call my wife at her office. 2\. Text My Wife - I'll be home in 15 minutes.
3\. Set a timer for 15 minutes. 4\. Where's the closest Mc Donalds.

Obviously I'm not looking for a magic speaking encyclopedia of knowledge, that
being said my primary use case for Siri is in the car, and for 90% of what I
need to do it works fine.

BTW I just asked Siri "What is a class action" and it asked me if I wanted to
search the web for "What is a class action" and it found the definition. I'll
give it this though, whether automated or manually Siri's been pretty
consistently tuned to get better and better as its gone along which was likely
to happen as it got a larger and larger dataset to work with.

~~~
mikeash
Yep, works nicely for me too. Definitely a net positive in functionality on
the phone, even if it's limited and not entirely reliable. Text messaging can
be MUCH faster with it, especially if my hands are busy.

It's no AI and you'll have trouble if you treat it as such, but if you think
of it as list of occasionally useful things that it can do, then it's pretty
handy.

------
contextfree
It sounds more like they have a services/big data problem, + maybe a Windows
XP-like "good enough" problem (leading to new features and changes being
viewed more skeptically)

------
X-Istence
I don't understand why someone needs to be fired just because they had one or
two bad products. Why would you throw away the rest of the knowledge that this
person has? Demote them, put them on new projects, place them where they are
stronger and have them work on another project, but outright removing someone
seems like it is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

~~~
weaksauce
The reason from Jobs:

[http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-05-07/tech/30043798...](http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-05-07/tech/30043798_1_janitor-
steve-jobs-excuse)

Makes sense to some extent at a company like apple. Maybe you get two chances
but if you don't have the foresight to see how important maps are to people
you might not be the best fit for the job.

------
dantiberian
Does Fortune have an interest in creating pageview's by making this Scott
Forstall's problem?

------
eaurouge
Why people don't seem to get this is beyond me. Releasing Siri and Maps early
were purely strategic decisions. Clearly both Siri and Maps can be improved
more rapidly if some of the development is crowdsourced. Apple would believe
(and rightly so) that the brand has enough excess credibility/goodwill with
the public to ride this out.

Google has done this repeatedly with products like GOOG-411, a data collection
exercise that was promptly shut down once it had served its purpose. Apple is
taking a risk here because Maps is not some 'free' offering like GOOG-411, but
they've done the math and will come out ahead when the dust settles.

~~~
eurleif
GOOG-411 worked well, in my experience; and it also let you make free calls. I
think it was probably a PR win for Google.

------
Bud
Who at Fortune deserves to be fired for its recent long string of incredibly
idiotic articles about Apple, which have been panned here and elsewhere, then?

I think the new Maps _app_ is fantastic; the _data_ accuracy leaves a bit to
be desired, but I notice that those doing the most high-profile complaining
point to errors in rural England, rural Ontario, etc. Here in the Bay Area,
the data is working fine for me as well.

It is not shocking to me that a map database that is a few months old is less
mature than one like Google's, which is the product of a decade's effort, and
also the product of 5 years' worth of improvements riding the back of iOS
users' crowd-sourced data. Now Apple has that data coming into its database,
instead of flying out the door to Google's.

Maps is likely to improve, and fast.

In any case, blaming Forstall is idiotic and talking about firing him is
Fortune-level idiotic. He made great things at NeXT, Mac OS X is great, Siri
is great, and Maps is a work in progress that shows great promise.

Have you tried reloading map data and zooming in and out on maps in Google
Maps vs. Apple Maps in an area with EDGE or otherwise bad internet coverage?
Apple's app wins hands-down versus reloading non-vector map tiles.

~~~
st0p
Newsflash: A lot of people live in rural England, rural Ontario and Rural
Holland. Besides, it can't find places like central station in Amsterdam
(hardly rural). I don't care whether it's the app or the data, I don't care
that it's working great in the bay area. What I do care about is that I had a
perfectly working mapping solution, and now I have a second class thing that's
just not working. I don't know about you, but IMHO having wrong directions is
even worse than having no directions.

~~~
tlogan
Working great in Bay Area? Who told you that?

I was under impression that this all similar to "antena gate" (kinda not big
deal), but iOS maps are really really bad even in Bay Area.

EDIT: Here is an example: Search for "428 University Ave, Palo Alto": you will
end up in Los Gatos.

~~~
awolf
Ah, I see that too. Clearly problematic since there doesn't seem to be a way
_at all_ to load up the intended 428 University Ave address. No good.

Still though, "really really bad" makes me think you have experienced many
other issues. I'm genuinely curious about how Maps performs in the places it
is "supposed" to be at least passable. Got any other examples?

Meta: please don't edit your comments to respond to sub-comments. It makes the
flow of the conversation very difficult to follow and makes my previous
comment seem irrelevant and out of place.

~~~
spinchange
Both David Pogue and Anil Dash have written about getting driving directions
that takes them to the wrong location in places like New York city.

I'm just one user, but if a navigation app takes you the right address in the
wrong location in a place like the Bay area or NYC, that's a "really bad"
problem.

------
martythemaniak
Well, I guess the knives are coming out. These kinds of distractions won't
help Apple with a pack of hungry companies wanting to take it down.

------
ChuckMcM
I've got a question on the maps fiasco, is it possible that Google never
shared any usage data with Apple and somehow Apple thought nobody really used
the App all that much? Seems like the click/search stream in maps is a
tremendous asset for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it
comes with a unique undisguisable identifier with each request. Where you go
an when you go there, both part of the query when you use maps. Its an
advertiser's wet dream I would think.

Perhaps Scott realized that and decided to take it back from Google? I don't
know. I do know it is pointless to try to second guess the executive staff of
a company like Apple (or Google, or Groupon, or Zynga, Etc) even though it is
fun.

------
programminggeek
I think you'd have to be a fool to think Apple didn't see this coming, but in
reality it a big deal for Apple, but not an earth shattering one. To truly
improve things like Siri and Maps, you need real world data, user feedback,
etc.

I'm sure they are keenly aware of the shortfalls of their own software, as
much as they are of the hardware they make. That's the whole point of QA. What
pushing out products early does is let you start getting feedback on the known
unknowns - problems you'd expect to have but didn't know exactly where they
might be, and the unknown unknowns - problems you didn't see coming at all.

------
rhizome
I thought this sounded familiar:

[http://nerdtwilight.wordpress.com/2009/06/25/apples-steve-
jo...](http://nerdtwilight.wordpress.com/2009/06/25/apples-steve-jobs-
problem/)

------
Fjslfj
Actually, it's an Eddy Cue problem.

~~~
czr80
Can you elaborate on why you say that?

~~~
Fjslfj
Almost all of the gripes people have with Apple Internet services and software
involve Cue's products, not Forstall's. But because Cue doesn't have any
interest in the top job, and because of his seniority, he ducks blame every
time.

------
nachteilig
As much as I dislike Forstall--particularly the way he presents--I don't think
we can lay this all at his feet. You can bet that even Steve had a hand in
this decision.

------
stretchwithme
I have a TomTom. And the first error I see in their data is 200 feet from my
house.

Gargade in, garbage out.

------
dvhh
The whole flow was amazing. 1\. Acquire external talent 2\. Fire google 3\.
Tell the press that the new map gonna be amazing 4\. Apologize for the whole
mess 5\. Sell 3rd party map on the app store 6\. Profit

------
fleitz
Another way to look at the accumulation of power during Jobs absence is other
members of the executive team stepping up to the plate while another is
absent...

------
denzil_correa
Forstall seems to be a "copy" of Jobs. I am not sure if it's a good thing.

------
pbharrin
YES!

