Tim Cook Calls Apple Maps Launch His 'First Really Big Mistake' as CEO

[HuskerNKS]

The first of a very, very, very long series. Glad he’s about to go, shame it took so long to get rid of him.

Except they didn't get rid of him. He is moving into an Executive Chairman role. One of the responsibilities of that role is advisor to the CEO. Tim will still be very involved in the direction of Apple.

Excited to see Tim continue to troll MacRumors users for years to come!

 

[citysnaps]

Please don't use faux-comic insult names for people. Or type "Micro$oft". It doesn't help your argument. It's the sort of thing that a certain world leader does; and it just reflects poorly on the speaker.

Yes... and is very childish. And says a lot about those who use such language. 'Liquid ass" is another one. I prefer engaging in tech conversations with adults.

 

[HadrianQ]

Don’t think for a second we forgot about that Gulf of Mexico debacle and Tim Cook;

 

[I7guy]

Don’t think for a second we forgot about that Gulf of Mexico debacle and Tim Cook;

Who is “we” and what “debacle”?

 

[germanbeer007]

really? because he fired Scott Forstall.

you know, Scott Forstall who literally has a background in AI and you fired him right before the AI revolution and now you're behind with Siri.
that was Tim's biggest mistake.

 

[germanbeer007]

Why? I still haven’t forgave him for his mess with Apple Maps, I refuse to use it because of it and it’s bad from what I hear

Scott Forstall has an AI background. He would have pushed hard into AI the moment ChatGPT was getting popular. He would have fixed Siri by now. Apple would have been one of the frontier model providers.

And maybe use it instead of "hearing" it from others. Others are just chirping it's bad because they heard it's bad too which is probably baseless.

 

[MacBH928]

I wish they'd bring Forstall back. Apple software quality declined after Forstall left IMO.

your opinion?

you could literally measure how much worse it is now. FCP, iMovie, are just some examples of main stream apps and mac killer apps. who cares about them today? The Apple Suite got dumbed down and went subscription.tahoe windows look ludicrous .

 

[HuskerNKS]

really? because he fired Scott Forstall.

you know, Scott Forstall who literally has a background in AI and you fired him right before the AI revolution and now you're behind with Siri.
that was Tim's biggest mistake.

Right before? Dude left Apple in 2012...

 

[QuantumPulse]

I will miss Tim. 

 

[cjducasse]

Ok, maps sucked, but who uses it anyway. can we talk about the state of the iOS keyboard. Autocorrect absolutely sucks now and the iPad keyboard takes up 80% of the screne when filling out online forms.

 

[baryon]

Ok, maps sucked, but who uses it anyway. can we talk about the state of the iOS keyboard. Autocorrect absolutely sucks now and the iPad keyboard takes up 80% of the screne when filling out online forms.

Yes! To the user, Apple maps is not a problem because they can just continue to use Google Maps. It's only a problem for Apple.

Whereas the keyboard. Holy hell. At this point I resort to not answering messages on my iPhone, and I just wait until I get home so I can type things out on a keyboard. The horizontal iPad keyboard makes the iPad unusable. Autocorrect can't figure out what I wanted to spell if a single letter is off, and suggests that I probably meant something totally different made up of a totally different number of words. How can this happen? It systematically fails to correct simple, tiny, obvious typos, and insists on correcting words that are already correct. How hard is it to write:

if(word is in the dictionary){
// do absolutely nothing
}

And it's like Apple just stopped localizing their keyboard. While Swiftkey and Gboard support every language on Earth, Apple keyboard only has a handful of languages, and many of them don't support swiping and lack multi language support. It's been like this for a decade, why can't they fix this?

In the age of AI, how hard would it be to just figure out what I'm trying to type using AI? CharGPT can 100% correct my spelling no matter what language I type in and how weird my typos are. Why can't they use AI to do this?

 

[hagar]

Best maps app in the planet? Apple Maps still falls really short in so many cases.

Speed limits in the EU are wrong 80% of the time. It’s just embarrassing.

And road works and car accidents go largely unnoticed. I guess they don’t interface well with government API’s. And the community to report these things is largely non existent.

 

[Taq'aix]

Sorry to disappoint you Tim you have made a lot of mistakes hopefully your replacement has a vision to innovate

Hopefully not a Vision Pro.

 

[ChiAppleGuy]

Before the maps fiasco, I would say Tim's first "F"up was with the retail stores. When Ron Johnson left, Tim hired John Browett from Tesco UK. Basically the retail devision went from GOLD standard customer service to K-Mart declining retail. 1/2 staff was let go or left. Normal staffing of 4-5 specialists on the floor was wound down to 1-2. Changes with repairs and how they were handled also were inplemented. The stores were left in such a state that customers started to comment that Apple Retail was no better than their worst Best Buy experience. Browett only lasted 6 months before getting axed. Glad there was feedback surveys that showed the dramatic decline.

 

[germanbeer007]

Right before? Dude left Apple in 2012...

This was the big bang that setoff the AI revolution what are you talking about?

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/2999134.2999257

 

[HuskerNKS]

This was the big bang that setoff the AI revolution what are you talking about?

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/2999134.2999257

You referenced ChatGPT which was released in 2022, 10 years after. It's not like the decision to fire him was some shortsighted AI miss. That's my only point.

 

[SBlue1]

Apple Maps is still useless if you search for local businesses here in Europe. I just use it for navigation when I drive a car. When I search for restaurants and shops, when I need navigation for my bike or my Vespa scooter, I need to switch to Google Maps.

 

[I7guy]

Apple Maps is still useless if you search for local businesses here in Europe. I just use it for navigation when I drive a car. When I search for restaurants and shops, when I need navigation for my bike or my Vespa scooter, I need to switch to Google Maps.

I went though Switzerland and France with Apple Maps. Not sure of what is the issue.

 

[ThailandToo]

Jobs recommended Cook to be the next CEO.

Not the whole story. It was meant to be a few years until Forstall was ready to take the reins. This is why Forstall was setup with the Maps and fired, he was in line for the job Cook wanted to retain as greed always wins.

 

[ThailandToo]

You are certainly welcome to your opinion, but outside of MR, Tim Cook is regarded as one of the best tech CEOs.

At making money for shareholders, he is the best CEO! At not understanding the products, employees, customers, developers and other stakeholders, he is the worst of CEOs. He’s really good at turning a product company into one run like a financial institution that worries only about shareholders.

 

[I7guy]

At making money for shareholders, he is the best CEO! At not understanding the products, employees, customers, developers and other stakeholders, he is the worst of CEOs. He’s really good at turning a product company into one run like a financial institution that worries only about shareholders.

He’s still lauded as one of the best tech CEOs. Whatever that means to everyone personally.

 

[germanbeer007]

You referenced ChatGPT which was released in 2022, 10 years after. It's not like the decision to fire him was some shortsighted AI miss. That's my only point.

I said "has a background in AI and you fired him right before the AI revolution". AI revolution began with that paper which Scott Forstall would have seen that clearly.

He obviously would have pushed hard (like Google did) when ChatGPT was gaining traction too.

 

[JimmyHook]

Apple Maps legitimately does smoke Google Maps in most areas I travel. I don’t care how many feet away from the next stop I am, Google. Apple’s distance to turns is much more intuitive. Also, the graphics are better.

 

[User 6502]

Except they didn't get rid of him. He is moving into an Executive Chairman role. One of the responsibilities of that role is advisor to the CEO. Tim will still be very involved in the direction of Apple.

Excited to see Tim continue to troll MacRumors users for years to come!

It’s clearly a garden leave. The usual way of ushering out high level exec. They park them in a role without relevance or power for some time until whatever insider knowledge they have becomes irrelevant. They did something similar with Ive.

 

[HuskerNKS]

It’s clearly a garden leave. The usual way of ushering out high level exec. They park them in a role without relevance or power for some time until whatever insider knowledge they have becomes irrelevant. They did something similar with Ive.

Maybe, but the current Executive Chairman has been in place since 2011 working on things like major investments, acquisitions, and leadership succession. Executive Chairman roles are key to hold day to day operational leaders accountable. If you know and work in that world, you know.