Apple's Reorganization Goes Deeper Than Just Who's In Charge

[NaCl]

Be interesting to see how far this approach takes them. Now Steve's gone, Apple is now one grand experiment.. Who's to say what bits of Steve's approach should be kept and what needs changing. I think one thing that's certain is that trying to second-guess what "Steve would have done" is a major mistake for the people left at Apple... Try to learn from what he did; his approach to things, but ultimately Tim Cook has to run it his way and be praised or damned for it. I applaud the grand moves even if i don't necessarily agree with the decisions because sitting back and resting on the success they've had in the past will lead to failure....They have to continue to move forward, innovate, and yes, make mistakes... Tim has to be prepared to drive the company into the ground if need be, just to get that one last perfect device out the door, to say "we did it, we built perfection"... I always felt that was what Steve was prepared to do and in IMHO the reason Apple is such a successful company now. As long as that's the driving force behind Tim's thinking then i think he's being true to the spirit of Steve and Apple and i applaud him for it. Time will tell i suppose.
Just by 2p worth...

Oh, and one last (random) thing... RELEASE A BLOODY APPLE TV APP STORE ALREADY!!!
lol

I don't think Tim is qualified to run Apple as CEO. How many pattnets and inventions has Tim been involve in? Steve Jobs has been named as an inventor on a total of 300+ Apple patents. Of those, Steve Jobs appears as the lead inventor 33 times.

What does Tim have to offer?

 

[TsMkLg068426]

Who is in charge of iTunes 11? They really should change the site for iTunes 11 from saying coming soon in October.

 

[swingerofbirch]

Bring back Serlet!

I'm excited about all of it except for Bertrand Serlet not being back on the team. Mac OS X is still a good OS (minus the quality control going downhill and bugs I've noted many times in these forums), but it needs a level hand to guide it. And now the person who was in charge of it will have his attention divided, and given that iOS products make so much more money than Mac OS X, I'd imagine his attention won't be equally divided. I wonder if Apple is trying to woo Serlet back. I would like to think they are.

 

[nick_elt]

Yup, one more person who sees technology as fashion.
I'm so bored... put sparkly lights on it to entertain me.
Pathetic.

I have my phone on me 24/7 why can't I get bored after 5 years if it has hardly changed. What's so pathetic about having different needs to the guy next to me I dont want a larger screen to entertain me but so I can do more, same with widgets so it saves time, same with th we android keyboards. I'm no sheep I don't see it as a fashion and I need to have an iphone to look cool. I use macs because osx is the best out there and iphones used to be the same. Technology moves fast but apple(ios) isn't. Why do you think there's been all this shake up at apple. What's funny is you talk about sparkly lights but you all wet yourself when those sparkly lights from philips came out that you could control from your iphone.

 

[Namjins]

I'm not sure what this means.

Also, are people really confident in Cue? Isn't iMessage his fault? Myself and many other people I know have problems with that all the time: messages saying they've been delivered when they haven't been, messages taking 20 minutes to be delivered, or just not coming through at all. My friend who uses iCloud email tells me that's also unreliable for him, although I'm not aware of problems myself (but then how do you know when you have't received an email?).

Love iMessage. It has saved me $30 a month since it came out.

 

[Rogifan]

I don't think Tim is qualified to run Apple as CEO. How many pattnets and inventions has Tim been involve in? Steve Jobs has been named as an inventor on a total of 300+ Apple patents. Of those, Steve Jobs appears as the lead inventor 33 times.

What does Tim have to offer?

Bob Mansfield doesn't have his name on an Apple patent. Are you going to tell me he has nothing to offer Apple? Most of the patents Steve is listed on are design patents. If his name was listed first it was probably more due to ego than anything else. Look at their design patents today and the inventors are listed alphabetically.

 

[monty77]

I don't think Tim is qualified to run Apple as CEO. How many pattnets and inventions has Tim been involve in? Steve Jobs has been named as an inventor on a total of 300+ Apple patents. Of those, Steve Jobs appears as the lead inventor 33 times.

What does Tim have to offer?

I think Tim is a great CEO, just perhaps not the perfect CEO for Apple - it's value is in it's brand and what it stands for. e.g. innovation, no-expense-spared quality etc..

I am however quite glad he's resisted the urge to enter a price war with the other manufacturers, he obviously understands that Apple have to differentiate themselves on price to keep the premium aura alive - even if it results in thousands of people bitching that the new iPad Mini is too expensive for what it is - these people aren't the customers he wants anyway.

His management style is numbers driven and risk averse. Shareholders should love him, for a while at least until growth starts to slide as their creativity is blunted as a result.

M

 

[maniaco007]

Very big mistake

Very big mistake. Grouping all the products together will keep the specialization that each leader had on it. Instead now it's becoming a service company. Completely backward.

 

[monty77]

Who is in charge of iTunes 11? They really should change the site for iTunes 11 from saying coming soon in October.

As long as it drops today/tomorrow it is factually correct

 

[melendezest]

I think this is a brilliant move by Tim Cook. It reminds me of the image of Jobs where he had the product lines split on the board: 2 pro, 2 consumer. Simple, clean, and efficient. I feel that he really is doing what Jobs would do, if not in exact moves but in spirit.

I believe Ive is the most important guy at Apple. I believe he'll be CEO next. I recall hearing something in the special features of the Lord of the Rings movies that reminds me of this: "culture is in the hardware". The costume designers infused cultural elements into every physical item each "race" had in the movie. This made the races distinct, and you could tell an item was built by a particular race without an individual being present.

I believe it is the same at Apple. The marrying of hardware and software under a single (cultural) vision is (arguably) a good thing. I cannot wait to see what they come up with now and whether or not I was right in this assumption.

In addition to streamlining, Tim is merely "replacing" Jobs's most important function he had within the company: Cultural Director. Until now, that hole had not been filled (he's really an Ops guy). For that role, Ive is the obvious choice.

 

[Namjins]

..he's becoming a bit smug unfortunately - I think the money/power/title is going to his head although to his credit at least he's not calling himself 'Sir' in the Apple promo materials

M

I was going to make a comment about the UK version possibly including a "Sir". Your location put an end to that.

 

[NaCl]

"You're sure" really means you have no idea, just like the rest of us. My guess is Scott was not well liked amongst the other executives (for whatever reason) and some of them may have given Cook an ultimatum - either Forstall goes or I go. Over the past 24 hours I've read that Ive, Mansfield, Cue and Schiller didn't get along with Forstall. I've read that some of the engineers were glad to see him go. Read Apple's press release (and even Cook's internal memo). There were no warm fuzzier for Forstall. In fact the company press release doesn't even thank Forstall for his work with the company. Clearly there is some bad blood there.

It's a CEO job to give the final word. Period. Who had the final say to remove google maps?

 

[Allenbf]

I don't think Tim is qualified to run Apple as CEO. How many pattnets and inventions has Tim been involve in? Steve Jobs has been named as an inventor on a total of 300+ Apple patents. Of those, Steve Jobs appears as the lead inventor 33 times.

What does Tim have to offer?

He was handpicked by Steve to run the company

 

[conzales]

A product should only be released when it's more or less finished (I agree that's debatable, but time-driven release is absurd). I always wondered why a Beta version of Siri saw the day of light. If I remember well Jobs was still around when that happened.

Because for SIRI to work correct, a lot of 'real world usage' data has to be put into the development like with any other speech driven software. I think a big part of SIRI not working correct is because people don't use it the way it was intended; as a digital assistant. People are goofing around with it too much. That has to be the reason why all the 'easter eggs' have been taken out. We are al long time away from using speech driven technology; pressing a few buttons on a keyboard or screen are often quicker then waiting for voice commands to be processed. And BTW, SIRI is a.. slow! Unfortunately commands have to be remotely processed because of the 'learning' part. A huge mistake. Basic functions should be implemented locally on the device. Data about the processing itself should be sent when the device is not in use.

 

[monty77]

..thinking of the book again I read in between the lines that the Jony / Steve relationship was sometimes one of Ive showing Jobs 10 things he thought were cool and Jobs picking 2 that were OK and they refined them together to make something amazing. Who's there to play Jobs now?

I keep thinking back to the new iMac, I just cannot get over how pointless a design it really is. I cannot believe SJ would have allowed it into the wild until the whole thing could be made that thin, no just the edges with the awkwardly fat centre that'll sit out just as far as the old one does when wall mounted but look worse at the same time.

 

[oliversl]

Chill out Tim!

 

[Namjins]

Classic is where it's at...Look at System 7. A Very simple and powerfully designed interface that wasn't built to be a bunch of "eye-candy"

Utility always trumps aesthetics in my opinion.

Barkeep, I'll have what he's drinking! There is no comparison, and thinking System 7 is superior to current offerings in any way is ridiculous.

----------

no way, apple puck mouse was worse... ever

.

I still played some pretty good Warcraft II games with it.

 

[drewyboy]

Ok gang, here we go. Yeah, iOS5&6 along w/ 10.7 & 10.8 have not been "up to par" with a lot of wiz bang features. But if you look at it, it's hands down been a transitional period. With what you ask?? It's been a merging of many features. Why? Because of the main thing... iCloud. iCloud has been the driving force btwn the last two OSX & iOS releases. 10.7 & iOS5 were the beginning, pretty frustrating and what I thought it was being sold as... sure enough with 10.8 & iOS6 a lot of that has finally been realized. Understanding this is why the two need to be under 1 guy, it's no longer separate... they are tied at the hip.

I'm hoping that there will be some more bold moves in each now that the "hip" foundation has been set and has had time to dry and can be built upon. As far as stream lining... I can't speak on if long term it will be helpful simply because I hadn't been in senior management in a company that sits on 100+ billion dollars and that has the culture that apple does... remember than NO company has the same culture that apple does.

Time will tell and I hope for the best.
P.S. We have NO idea what Steve would have done/allowed. We'll never know. So quick frick'n saying it. YOU DON'T KNOW!

 

[extradryny]

Optical Drive is old tech. I completely agree with what Phil said about that, reducing as much mechanical functions as possible is the best thing to do. Mechanical things fail.

When an optical drive fails, the consumer (or Apple) can choose to fix it.

When there is no optical drive at all, the consumer is simply S.O.L. for the entire life of the product.

How the heck is the latter scenario - in which the consumer receives more features and choices - worse for the consumer?

 

[wrightc23]

He was handpicked by Steve to run the company

He's probably the ideal person to be running the market leader, richest and best known tech company on the planet. The nature of Apple has changed, it's no longer the outsider trying to create markets. It's precisely why Tim Cook has been having an ever increasing influence even prior to Steve Job's death. Apple has already changed as far as I'm concerned, it's about maintaining their position in often fragmenting markets, being reactive rather than innovative to see off competitors.

 

[Yr Blues]

..thinking of the book again I read in between the lines that the Jony / Steve relationship was sometimes one of Ive showing Jobs 10 things he thought were cool and Jobs picking 2 that were OK and they refined them together to make something amazing. Who's there to play Jobs now?

I keep thinking back to the new iMac, I just cannot get over how pointless a design it really is. I cannot believe SJ would have allowed it into the wild until the whole thing could be made that thin, no just the edges with the awkwardly fat centre that'll sit out just as far as the old one does when wall mounted but look worse at the same time.

I think that Ive and Cook should be co-CEO

Cook knows how to manage and is an expert at production

I also don't like it when company heads try to force apologies from people under them, although Cook did apologize himself for maps

And the new iMac is pointless and butt-ugly

 

[Rogifan]

..thinking of the book again I read in between the lines that the Jony / Steve relationship was sometimes one of Ive showing Jobs 10 things he thought were cool and Jobs picking 2 that were OK and they refined them together to make something amazing. Who's there to play Jobs now?

I keep thinking back to the new iMac, I just cannot get over how pointless a design it really is. I cannot believe SJ would have allowed it into the wild until the whole thing could be made that thin, no just the edges with the awkwardly fat centre that'll sit out just as far as the old one does when wall mounted but look worse at the same time.

Have you actually seen one in person? Until you do how can you really comment? Pictures are deceiving. And this whole ' Steve would never...' line is getting soooooo old.

 

[WardC]

Sometimes I wonder whether "Jobsian" philosophy was a good or bad thing for Apple -- Apple has turned into a consumer-catering business. I miss the time when Apple dominated in niche markets like digital design, desktop publishing, and education. It was a great source of Apple pride, and a great source of pride to say "I own a Macintosh" -- I feel that no longer.

The company has changed....it's become a consumer toy company. Apple is ignoring their Pro market and deserting them, centering their focus on iPhones, iPods, iPads, and small, thin laptops and consumer machines.

The Mac Pro has been ignored. XServe has been dropped. Apple no longer makes printers...Apple cutback and discontinued their high-end 17" laptop offerings...Apple no longer offers enterprise network solutions, they have burned bridges with Adobe (once a strong partner), and most design firms have now moved to PC-based solutions in lieu of Apple.

Many more reasons, many more...I don't like the direction Apple is headed...I don't like their leadership, I don't like their current vision -- Apple is becoming a consumer electronics company and no longer a creative solutions leader -- the consumer public can see through the BS and the tide is already starting to turn....the hype is over.

I just don't take pride in being a Mac user anymore, I don't think the company is the same...it's become so artificial, so focused on dollar figures and cheap labor, on overpricing their intel machines and Chinese-made electronics...it's almost like all of these keynotes are a "phony front" to the public to build up hype over iPhone ## or iOS ## so people will drool to ditch their 3-month old device to lay down their 6-month's salary to buy a new gizmo so they can "look cool" -- the phoniness of it all is hysterical!

Oh, and one more thing...an intel box is not a Macintosh. You can never convince me that a CISC computer is a Mac, even if Apple is calling it one.

 

[Mactendo]

Tim, give me back Forstall. Just stop him from skeuomorphing everything and let him stay at Apple. He will grow up, just like Jobs did. He should be the one to lead Apple in the end. Because he's the crazy one. The misfit. The rebel. The troublemaker. The round peg in the square hole.
Don't ruin Apple, Tim.

 

[melendezest]

But please keep it in GarageBand for iOS, where it's actually awesome.

Agreed to the max.

Personally, I've had enough of the "S" word. I love most of the eye candy like page turning and such.

Perhaps the solution is to add a way to turn them off or tweak them, for those who don't like it (Tinkertool-style).