Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple • Hacker News Board

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#111

Post by thret » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:24 PM UTC

zach wrote: post #98

AllenKids wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, Cars 2 is the low point in Pixar's streak but overall still able to capture an audience not to mention tons of toys sold. I understand Lasseter's point and given his fixation over the concept I'll just accept the fact it is a big deal to him personally just as I accept Jobs' enthusiasm about getting Beatles in the iTMS.

I think that's a very apt comparison. It's hard to overestimate how deeply personal Cars and Cars 2 are to John, but it's also hard to overstate how tricky they were to pull off. Sure, you can criticize Cars 2 for having a story that didn't hit the bullseye. Totally fair, by Pixar's own "story, story, story" standards. But don't think the Pixar Brain Trust didn't do so first (as mentioned in the article, things had i…

The Cars storyline was offensive to begin with. People who compete professionally in ANYTHING demand the best performance from their peers. Anything less is disrespectful. Having someone throw a race out of sentimentality, and making that seem somehow honorable is despicable. And then they make the winner of the race out to be some kind of arsehole because he gave it his best? It doesn't make any sense.

The plot is the same as Lucky You and it physically made me sick.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#112

Post by n3m6 » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:27 PM UTC

chrislomax wrote: post #91

nobody31415 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could take everything you just said and apply it to Sony in 1980. Then their founder, Akio Morita, retired with poor health and they diversified into lots of sensible business decisions about owning studios Then some little computer company in California moved in on their territory and began making beautiful, simple, well made upmarket products.

Might I just add, I am not your typical fan boy for Apple. Quite the opposite actually. I am a Microsoft geek at heart, learnt basic when I was 13 and loved them since. They can do minimal wrong in my eyes (except for windows ME). I appreciate Apple in a completely different way, I think how they have created their following in nothing short of amazing. The spot a market potential and they make it work, really well.…

I read somewhere that Jobs' decision to make a phone came after their bungled relationship with Motorola on integrating their Rokr phones with iTunes. So I think it had a lot to do with iTunes. I'll have to find that link though.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#113

Post by danilocampos » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:33 PM UTC

AllenKids wrote: post #90

danilocampos wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Say what you will about the original iBook, 14 year old me would have killed anyone you asked to have a Tangerine model. Loved that design so much. And it had Airport, which was science fiction shit at the time.

It was certainly playful and fun and seriously one of a kind in the laptop category to this day. But, Ive kinda let his design overwhelm the product and the design was a lot less timeless comparing to his similarly themed first gen iMac. I consider it an evolution of the pretty ugly eMate (though of course much better), and it was created at a time Ive still was maturing as an industrial designer working closely with…

That's a fair point. Later designs grew ever more timeless. The only giveaway that the first all-white iBook is an older model is its dimensions, since it didn't have a widescreen display.

I would offer one counter, though – the portable computer was long seen as a super serious affair. It was a thing for suits. The iBook was a bold declaration. It said "Fuck that, guys, portable computers are for everyone. Look how fun that's going to be!" The design positioned it as a friendly tool for kids, for students, for mom and dad. It was, in its way, egalitarian in a sense that no portable had previously been.

Over the top? I guess, in hindsight, yes. But it reconfigured expectations, so in that way, the design did its job.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#114

Post by nobody31415 » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:34 PM UTC

krobertson wrote: post #110

nobody31415 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It cuts both ways. There are designers who build things that can't be made - and especially things that can't be mass produced cheaply and easily. But there are also people with 20years of manufacturing experience who don't what that we can do more things cheaply and easily with 5-axis CNC mills and hot-wire cutters than you can with a casting.

Sure it cuts both ways. I was just reacting to the picture of a CNC behind him. If that is his design studio, it is awesome he has real equipment for making the stuff he designs rather than some art deco chairs from some snooty designer.

If you have a CNC mill or a 3D printer in the office you can certainly turn around prototype designs quickly!

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#115

Post by jhamburger » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:40 PM UTC

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #77

siglesias wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jobs has never taken credit for a design, has he? People who are uninformed just assume it's Jobs, and that perhaps is what Ive is referring to. He probably meant "it hurts when [Jobs] gets credit..." If you look at the Objectified interview, along with nearly every promotional video that Apple puts out, it's very clear that Ive is the design guy.

No one even knows who Ive is. Ask 10 random people not on hackernews and I bet you will get 11 blank stares. There is implied credit being given, and Jobs knows this. He doesn't bother to correct it, document publicly who designs things, or let Ive speak to the press and take credit himself. All of these are tantamount to taking credit. If credit comes your way and you do not deflect it or recognize the true author,…

Has anyone here ever had their name on a press release for a product launch? Dude gets a 8-figure salary and unlimited autonomy without the risk and management overhead of starting his own firm. There are tradeoffs in life.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#116

Post by forensic » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 8:45 PM UTC

aantix wrote: post #78

technoslut wrote: post #7

Interestingly enough, there is a quote from the Jobs book, from Ive, that was tweeted by Bianca Bosker, who works at the Huffington Post: https://twitter.com/bbosker/status/127357233632788480 "Jony Ive:'I pay maniacal attention to where an idea comes from...so it hurts when [Jobs] takes credit for one of my designs'" As much as Jobs considered Ive a 'spiritual partner' there was still a power play that existed betwee…

Personally, I think it'd be a much more intellectually honest viewpoint if Apple started showing off this creative process instead of the word "magic" being tossed around so loosely. It's not magic; it's hard working designers iterating, researching, collaborating, and then iterating more to make a great product. And it's damn hard work. Lift the curtain Apple and give Ive (and the others) their due.

The entire point of the design process is to produce magic. Why would you want to destroy that?

It's one thing to give insider looks like Valve does with developer commentaries. It's quite another to give up on providing and selling magic. Magic is the goal of technology.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#117

Post by azulum » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 9:17 PM UTC

ellyagg wrote: post #97

azulum wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

chuck norris looked at this analogy…and it just stared back. EDIT: there are a lot of interesting people on HN, but there are a lot of humorless people too. enjoy your spectrum disorder.

It's not that, it's just that we as a community are keenly afraid of HN's comments section turning into reddit's. Reddit's threads are often clever and sometimes hilarious, but that crap has choked off most everything else. That's not what this forum is about. If we don't remain hyper-vigilant, it will creep in while we aren't looking. Comments that consist solely of a joke will almost always be voted down here.

that's nice and all that you responded. any idea how i delete my account as this obviously is not the place for me.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#118

Post by azulum » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 9:24 PM UTC

burke wrote: post #85

azulum wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

chuck norris looked at this analogy…and it just stared back. EDIT: there are a lot of interesting people on HN, but there are a lot of humorless people too. enjoy your spectrum disorder.

"Everyone that doesn't agree with my sense of humour is handicapped!"

exactly.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#119

Post by MatthewPhillips » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 9:25 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #93

MatthewPhillips wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all make that judgment individually. We all have different aspirations. You can't hold someone back because theyre too good at their job. You can let them stay where they are, if that's what they want. Otherwise you have to eventually make the tough decision to either promote your talent, or let them go.

On the contrary, I think it's a management innovation that tech companies have figured out how to keep good technical people in their areas of core competency by giving them the things they would really want out of a promotion, whether that be compensation, autonomy, etc. The article notes that Ive is worth $128 million and has tremendous autonomy within the company. I.e. he gets compensated extremely well and has a…

I want to preface this by saying that I'm not implying there is any problem with the Ive/Apple situation, I'm merely arguing against the idea that you can stop an ambitious person from climbing as far as they want to climb.

You can never compensate a person what they would make if you actually promoted them. I.e., you can't pay your CEO less than or equal to your Chief Engineer. If I'm wrong on this feel free to speak up and/or down vote me.

I think you're making some assumptions here that are not necessarily correct, 1) that by being CEO you don't get to do the fun stuff, we only have to look at Apple's own former CEO to know that's not the case, and 2) that a person at this level is going to reflect on the choice and not think they would be good at the higher position. I'm no John Ive, but even my little ego has never allowed me to think I won't be equally good at some higher position than my current one.

Re: Steve Jobs left designer Jony Ive more power than anyone at Apple

#120

Post by ryanklee » Fri, Oct 21, 2011, 9:41 PM UTC

Jayasimhan wrote: post #83

technoslut wrote: post #7

Interestingly enough, there is a quote from the Jobs book, from Ive, that was tweeted by Bianca Bosker, who works at the Huffington Post: https://twitter.com/bbosker/status/127357233632788480 "Jony Ive:'I pay maniacal attention to where an idea comes from...so it hurts when [Jobs] takes credit for one of my designs'" As much as Jobs considered Ive a 'spiritual partner' there was still a power play that existed betwee…

" [Jobs] " in the quote was added by the person who quote's Ive. He might have meant anyone.. These injected words change the meaning of a sentence.

What you are looking at is part of a standard, accepted and necessary editing practice whereby pronouns such as "he", "she" and "it" are replaced with their antecedent pronouns; in this case "he" was replaced with "Jobs". There's nothing suspicious about it.