Quick internet search would show you he’s much younger than Cook. Looks like he graduated high school in 1993, so 49 or 50 years old.
Not sure why you are bringing AI into this. Had you actually read Gruber's piece, as I did last night, you'd know that he's talking about design-related talent that has exited the company the last few years (mostly following Ive to LoveFrom it sounds like).
I keep my boxes because Apple is one of those rare companies where years old product still fetch a decent used price when sold. And continues to be used. Our 2013 imac will soon be resold (probably about $200-$500), and I have the box for it. With an SSD and memory upgrades, it still works great. Will be getting a mini or studio soon.
Unfortunately Apple is in the same trap with iOS that Microsoft is in with Windows. It’s too popular to fundamentally change.
Indeed. The refrain during the Jobs era was that the UI should be intuitive--if you have to teach someone how to do something, you got it wrong.
Yeah the old settings app was nice. Also the "About this Mac" box is now vertical, like a freakin' phone.
Surly what you’re describing is aesthetic before functionality? That is primary reason why it’s been controversial .
On the other hand, the original iPhone ads were literally teaching people how to use the damn thing 🤣
Because actual paying customers don’t seem to have minded the apparently terrible user experiences Apple has been putting out.
If there is one person who does not care about design at Apple it is Tim Cook. He has single-handedly killed design at Apple with the endless reusing of chassis designs to save on tooling costs. So much so it got to the point that there was nothing left for Jony Ive to do but to leave Apple. This is going to bite Apple hard in the a**. With Apple so far behind in AI, the new Ive/Altman partnership leaves Apple ripe for disruption. Not surprisingly, dozens of Apple’s design team have left to join Ive in the years since and he continues to attract them.
In a statement shared with Bloomberg on Wednesday, Apple confirmed that its software design chief Alan Dye will be leaving. Apple said Dye will be succeeded by Stephen Lemay, who has been a software designer at the company since 1999.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that Dye will lead a new creative studio within the company's AR/VR division Reality Labs.
On his blog Daring Fireball, longtime Apple commentator John Gruber has since reacted to the news with some scathing commentary about Dye.
Foremost, Gruber said Dye does not care about design.
"If you care about design, there's nowhere to go but down after leaving Apple," said Gruber, in a lengthy post citing conversations with Apple employees. "What people overlooked is the obvious: Alan Dye doesn't actually care about design."
Gruber said that everyone he spoke to inside and outside of Apple was "happy" — if not downright "giddy" — to learn that Lemay is replacing Dye.
"Lemay is well-liked personally and deeply respected talent-wise," he said.
"He has always set an extraordinarily high bar for excellence and embodies Apple's culture of collaboration and creativity," Apple CEO Tim Cook said of Lemay, in his statement to Bloomberg that confirmed Dye is leaving the company.
Dye was promoted to Vice President of Human Interface Design at Apple in 2015, at the same time as Jony Ive became Chief Design Officer at the company. Gruber said this was a "big mistake," as Dye had no background in user interface design.
Lemay, on the other hand, is described as being a "career" interface designer with a particular "attention to detail and craftsmanship."
The move from Dye to Lemay could be the best thing to happen to Apple's human interface design "in the entire stretch since Steve Jobs's passing and Scott Forstall's ouster," according to Gruber. At the very least, he expects the move to "stop the bleeding" at Apple, both in terms of quality of work and talent retention.
Dye is expected to begin his role at Meta at the end of December.
Gruber's full post on Daring Fireball: "Bad Dye Job"
Article Link: John Gruber Shares Scathing Commentary About Apple's Departing Software Design Chief
Actually no. Good human-computer interface design is NOT subjective. It is an objective academic discipline (in which Dye apparently had no training). This at least somewhat explains Apple's abysmal designs the past many years (with Ive being the primary cause).
