Apple Hires Top Netflix Engineer as Part of Effort to Build Technical Support Team for Apple TV+

[MacRumors]

Apple recently snatched a top engineer from Netflix as Apple works to build out a technical team to support Apple TV+ and the company's other services, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The new hire, Ruslan Meshenberg, helped build Netflix's platform and participated in key initiatives to create a faster and more consistent service for viewers. He ran the infrastructure guaranteeing Netflix shows and movies played reliably.

Meshenberg has joined Apple's internet-services organization just this week, with his LinkedIn profile listing him as an Engineering Leader.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Meshenberg is joining Apple at a time when Apple is shifting its approach to cloud services, relying more often on third-party providers to save money.

Michael Abbott, a former Twitter engineer, has been responsible for Apple's internet-services operations and he has been adding engineers to Apple's technical team. Apple has not run into any particular major issues with Apple TV+ or its other new services, but hires like Meshenberg will ensure that things continue to run smoothly as Apple scales up with new customers and new content offerings.

Article Link: Apple Hires Top Netflix Engineer as Part of Effort to Build Technical Support Team for Apple TV+

 

[thevofl]

Good! I hope he can improve the interface; it's god awful horrible.

 

[farewelwilliams]

Should probably fix Apple TV+ on macOS as each time I attempt to watch a show, it just stops playing immediately. Likely something to do with using an eGPU.

 

[konqerror]

Good! I hope he can improve the interface; it's god awful horrible.

Because that totally falls in the field of infrastructure engineering.

 

[guzhogi]

Would be interesting to have something interactive like Black Mirror's Bandersnatch

 

[jv2]

Maybe they'll be able to fix the issue with the box going to sleep and not working until you pull the plug, wait, then plug it in again... not impressive.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

Netflix's infrastructure is for a large part open source. Anyone working in the HA industry is familiar with their work.

 

[Allpaul]

Maybe they'll be able to fix the issue with the box going to sleep and not working until you pull the plug, wait, then plug it in again... not impressive.

I was having this problem, then I realized they changed it so only the Menu and Home buttons can wake an Apple TV. It used to work with any of the buttons. Not sure why they changed it, but I got used to it.

 

[mi7chy]

Don't mention Twitter since it's poop. Viewing Tweets in mobile browser is always throttled so you have to constantly refresh and there's no straightforward way to report fraud abuse. Twitter is even below Facebook.

 

[Sodium Chloride]

Isn’t this a hypocrisy ?

Apple Gains Footing in Court Feud With Former iPhone Chip Architect

A former Apple executive who worked on the chips that power iPhones and iPads has had a request to toss a breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by the...

www.macrumors.com

 

[BWhaler]

Great move. The latency on the Apple TV is just bad. Worse than everything except Amazon.

Apple needs to get better at software is they want to win at services.

 

[icanhazapple]

Would be great to see some viewership metrics for Apple TV+. What is an acceptable return on investment for the number of viewers they are looking for vs. the cost to produce the show? Or is this a sunk cost that Apple is willing to take on?

ps - Would much rather that cost go into chassis engineering design for user replaceable memory and hard drives in laptops.

 

[entropys]

Would be great to see some viewership metrics for Apple TV+. What is an acceptable return on investment for the number of viewers they are looking for vs. the cost to produce the show? Or is this a sunk cost that Apple is willing to take on?

ps - Would much rather that cost go into chassis engineering design for user replaceable memory and hard drives in laptops.

Well, in my survey consisting of one family, it was watched heavily for the first two weeks, which was how long it took to work through FAM, then subsequent visits have drifted further and further apart. There is only so many times you can drop in on the same deserted landscape. Barren it is.

Free is the right price.

 

[Justanotherfanboy]

Not sure how people are still confusing “AppleTV”, the settop box w/ “AppleTV+”, the streaming service.

These comments make my head hurt... I assure you, nobody is unplugging their streaming service, because it went to sleep- that’s not possible. The topic here is the streaming service... which is NOT a piece of hardware that can be unplugged.

 

[allapple]

Good! I hope he can improve the interface; it's god awful horrible.

Don't bet on it! Cook era interfaces are the proof! If this guy is so good, don't you think they should have hired him before they rolled out whatever it is they think is TV??
[automerge]1580332157[/automerge]

Great move. The latency on the Apple TV is just bad. Worse than everything except Amazon.

Apple needs to get better at software is they want to win at services.

Never going to happen.........and the money from the lemmings keeps pouring in......

 

[flaubert]

I heard a fascinating discussion on the BSD Now (bsdnow.tv) podcast about how Netflix partnered with Internet providers like Comcast to cache highly popular shows at locations throughout the country, so that when you fire up a show like "Breaking Bad" it's actually streaming from a local Comcast hub, not Netflix itself. I wonder if that is what this new hire would be bringing to Apple?

 

[allapple]

Not sure how people are still confusing “AppleTV”, the settop box w/ “AppleTV+”, the streaming service.

These comments make my head hurt... I assure you, nobody is unplugging their streaming service, because it went to sleep- that’s not possible. The topic here is the streaming service... which is NOT a piece of hardware that can be unplugged.

Watch me! Both are unplugged!! .....and mine is FREE with my wonderful new Imac/mojave.

 

[TracesOfArsenic]

Because that totally falls in the field of infrastructure engineering.

Irrefutable point but the best infrastructure in the world won't fix a crappy software UX!

 

[mdriftmeyer]

Isn’t this a hypocrisy ?

Apple Gains Footing in Court Feud With Former iPhone Chip Architect

A former Apple executive who worked on the chips that power iPhones and iPads has had a request to toss a breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by the...

www.macrumors.com

No. They're installing IT Data Center Infrastructure, not leveraging propriety IP Patented features owned by Netflix.

 

[ColBatGuano]

I heard a fascinating discussion on the BSD Now (bsdnow.tv) podcast about how Netflix partnered with Internet providers like Comcast to cache highly popular shows at locations throughout the country, so that when you fire up a show like "Breaking Bad" it's actually streaming from a local Comcast hub, not Netflix itself. I wonder if that is what this new hire would be bringing to Apple?

Apple have been partnering with Akamai for decades now for caching content so working with other companies for content delivery is nothing new for them.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Not sure how people are still confusing “AppleTV”, the settop box w/ “AppleTV+”, the streaming service.

These comments make my head hurt... I assure you, nobody is unplugging their streaming service, because it went to sleep- that’s not possible. The topic here is the streaming service... which is NOT a piece of hardware that can be unplugged.

the confusion is, at least on AppleTV console, there is an app called AppleTV ; the service. There is no distinction with AppleTV+ ... THIS is what those of use with the console are experiencing. Sure I get the pronto to “try” newservice but it’s does NOT specifics AppleTV+ and thus in VERY hesitant in clicking that notification as I’m not ready to engage my 7Day trail (no new hardware) just yet.

 

[incoherent_1]

Good. I’ve tried watching ATV+ from three separate locations Using two different accounts and had maybe a 20% success rate with watching a show without bugs. Usually the audio will desync, artifacts will show up, etc. Or it just flat out won’t play (when any of their competitors works fine).

They clearly need to invest significantly in their infrastructure. The fact that they didn’t do so already should have several employees being shown the door; I have at least one relative who has already sworn off ATV+ because of the bugs.

 

[PickUrPoison]

Isn’t this a hypocrisy ?

Apple Gains Footing in Court Feud With Former iPhone Chip Architect

A former Apple executive who worked on the chips that power iPhones and iPads has had a request to toss a breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by the...

www.macrumors.com

Why would it be? Employees get new jobs all the time. You can’t expect the guy to work at Netflix for the rest of life.

 

[itsmilo]

It’s just weird how they throw their own subscription based shows into the mix with all the other regular stuff you have to pay for. Makes it hard to find anything TV+ fast

 

[kis]

Poaching from the competition, huh? I thought Apple was extremely innovative.