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Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

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Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#301

Post by mbesto »

dev_tty01 wrote: post #293
mbesto wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You decide. I did. Steve Jobs is survivorship bias at its finest. I've met and interviewed plenty of "detail orientated" bosses and not all of them create trillion dollar entities. > Maybe he was just a jerk, or perhaps he was giving an object lesson. 1. There is no legitimate reason to make a server rack a different color. 2. Making people work until 3am isn't a lesson. It ignores all studies that suggest that dep…

Well, moving an icon a few pixels is also a purely aesthetic choice, just like changing the color of your house, the thickness of a header bar on a web page, the color of your office walls, or the color of a server rack. As with all aesthetic choices, there is someone who will think there is "no legitimate reason" to make those changes. There is someone else who will disagree. And yes, many detail oriented bosses are…

> moving an icon a few pixels is also a purely aesthetic choice

It's not. Aesthetics are actually a design principle: "Beautiful products/objects are perceived as easier to use and more valuable than ugly ones. Even if it is not true!" Since no one is actively looking at server racks there is no opportunity for the color to even play a factor.

> And yes, many detail oriented bosses are not successful, but Jobs actually did create a trillion dollar entity so I think this is more than just a survivorship bias.

Huh? You literally just defined survivorship bias. If only one party (Jobs) survives a large party ("many detailed oriented bosses"), then that's a survivor, and you're bias to thinking that would led that party to success is because of the same characteristics as the others that didn't.

[0] - https://uxdesign.cc/design-principle-aesthetics-af926f8f86fe

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#302

Post by rib3ye »

tomcam wrote: post #300
rib3ye wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Too confusing for a first-time computer user or a small child. Having two small kids myself, I agree one button would be better for learning.

Except it gives rise to double-click, triple-click, shift-click, command-click, option-click, etc.

Double-click was always easy to teach, to my knowledge there isn’t a triple-click. There wasn’t command-click until OSX.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#303

Post by tomcam »

rib3ye wrote: post #302
tomcam wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except it gives rise to double-click, triple-click, shift-click, command-click, option-click, etc.

Double-click was always easy to teach, to my knowledge there isn’t a triple-click. There wasn’t command-click until OSX.

OS X has been around for 21 years. Many readers of hacker news aren’t that old yet.

Triple click is only a thing on iOS, apparently. Thank you for the correction: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204390

Double click is easy to teach but it’s sure as hell not discoverable. Whereas second and middle button advocates have, to me, semi convincingly claimed that they could also be taught through consistent application. In other words, not better but not worse.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#304

Post by 1123581321 »

Tijdreiziger wrote: post #197
jimt1234 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a friend interview at "Big Nameless Corp" a few years ago. He said when he saw that the engineers interviewing him all had Windows laptops, he knew immediately it wasn't an engineer-friendly culture. I always thought that was funny.

I don’t really see how that’s relevant given that WSL exists.

WSL is a business checkmark used to keep engineers quiet. It's not a pleasant surrounding ecosystem and the implementation isn't as high fidelity is the real thing.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#305

Post by hot_gril »

cma wrote: post #270
hot_gril wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe not cause of TikTok directly but because subtitled videos in general are an easier format on a phone compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups (including the cookies agreement) on every site. Web browsing is much easier on a PC, but that's the minority use case.

> compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups Queue the four minute youtube ad.

Yeah there's that too. I think TikTok simply has fewer ads.

One of my friends described tech platforms as following a cycle where they're popular while they're loss-leading, but eventually they try to reel in profits that are actually proportional to their valuation, and everyone switches to the next thing. This implies that later investors are duped into holding the bag for something that's not worth the investment. Idk if he's right, but given the tendency for tech to ride bubbles, he could be.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#306

Post by reverend_gonzo »

programmer_dude wrote: post #154
dboreham wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explains why there are no production Java applications...

FTFY... Explains why there are no high performance production Java applications...

Given there are hft firms built on Java…

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#307

Post by shanusmagnus »

solardev wrote: post #198
shanusmagnus wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked at a place like that before. A lot of people were grumpy that they were not progressing. Some of them were probably right; some were probably wrong. But it was clear to me that having a concrete thing to aim for (a new title) mattered. A lot. I take it that wasn't the case at Palantir. Since I'm convinced that all humans are status-seeking, I'm curious how Palantir satisfied that urge, if not w/ title differ…

Is it bad to discourage status-seeking behavior, such that the people are just that way... look elsewhere?

I don't believe in good or bad wrt stuff like this. You're welcome to try to discourage it, but success would depend crucially on how many people really are not "that way." I don't think I'd take that bet, personally, but it's possible I've lived in a strange sub-world and have met unusual people.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#308

Post by switchbak »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #172
switchbak wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Swing was built in a year Checks out. I'm still bitter towards Swing though. But impressive what they could put out in a year. That said, I'm absolutely NOT a fan of the JWZ sleeping bag under your desk/get it done whatever the cost mindset that was everywhere in the 90's.

Bitter towards Swing?

Yes. Swing was not good, we had better idioms before and after.

Re: Ask HN: Was anyone working at Apple during Steve Jobs' return in 1997?

#309

Post by abudabi123 »

dehrmann wrote: post #292
MaintenanceMode wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somewhere in Steve logic somethings are black, somethings are silver, that's just the way it is.

Now my iPhone is gray and my charger is white. What happened?!

With SJ gone Apple returned to the organization without taste driven by The Economist orthodoxy.
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