John Gruber Shares Scathing Commentary About Apple's Departing Software Design Chief

[Mac Fly (film)]

Which episode was that, specifically?

Louie Mantia episode. You can skip like the first hour at least. John rambles about crap before getting to why people are wanting to listen. Somewhere between like 60 minutes to 90 minutes in to get to actual content.

 

[woolypants]

I agree about not focusing too much on vilifying people who have left Apple, and I don't dwell on any of that, but Dye's departure does raise the question about how the chain of command works at Apple, when people who one would think are in a position to override bad decisions often don't. Bad decisions by people like Dye seem to be given a pass, in consideration of their better decisions. That odd chain of command at Apple, for all we know, still remains odd, despite Dye's departure, which may put at risk the opportunities that his departure might otherwise bring, which might result in Apple squandering a lot of those opportunities.

Apple's a huge organisation. How it clearly works is that there are individual business units run almost like independent organisations, with people who control them in that way. These people have huge power, because they need it.

So, when Liquid Glass was put forward as the UI/UX for all Apple devices, the output most certainly was not questioned by people like Tim Cook. There was trust and belief in people like Dye. He's the UI/UX guy. If Cook didn't believe in him then he shouldn't be in that role.

Imagine it this way: Ford want to include a super-duper engine in the top-end range of their new car. They commission a department to create it. When the engine arrives, the C-suite don't look into every minutiae of the engine. They trust that the department that designed the engine knew what they were doing. It would be an insult to not only that department but also themselves to suggest otherwise. They made the decision to ask the department to make the engine, after all, so if they say the engine is crap then they're damning themselves as much as the department.

Apple is like this. Every aspect is spun out to an autonomous unit. It has to be. And I think this structure is doing them a disservice. It's the inverse of the Jobs era, where Jobs was likely to weigh influence on anything he gazed at. But this is also what happens when you have people in charge who aren't artists. And, to be fair, that's most companies. Jobs was rare. Ive leaving was unfortunate. What's left is what we call Apple today. Even back in the pre-Jobs days there was more artistry and craft at Apple, I suspect, even if they did keep making mistake after mistake. But, you know, that's the way it is.