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The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

fastcompany.com

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Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#281

Post by KptMarchewa »

jen20 wrote: post #103
KptMarchewa wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually like that I can connect everything - keyboard, mouse, two monitors, headphones, power, ethernet via one thunderbolt cable. What I'd hate is the fact that I'd have to unplug everything and take this dock with me if I wanted to connect in the conference room.

You can still do that with the newer MacBook Pro with extra ports.

I did this, and I had to use all of the ports, except for card slot.

Every time I had to connect or disconnect 6 cables, now I have to connect only one.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#282

Post by jen20 »

KptMarchewa wrote: post #281
jen20 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still do that with the newer MacBook Pro with extra ports.

I did this, and I had to use all of the ports, except for card slot. Every time I had to connect or disconnect 6 cables, now I have to connect only one.

What? I have a 2016 MacBook Pro (Touch Bar, maxed out), 2019 MacBook Pro (16” Intel, maxed out) and a 2021 MacBook Pro (16” M1 Max, maxed out). All can connect with the same single cable to my 2 x 5K displays, ATEM + DSLR webcam, audio interface and gigabit ethernet without any issue. The difference is the M1 can ALSO connect more easily to projectors, and have the protection of MagSafe when away from the desk. The keyboard is hands down the most comfortable on the 2016 (butterfly) though, so I tend to use that away from my desk.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#283

Post by makeitdouble »

refurb wrote: post #247
makeitdouble wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot of nuance as usual. Firing you over provably true statements or things you said strictly as a private individual can have harsher consequences for the company (you can be let go but they'd need to pay a pretty heavy severance) I am not a lawyer, but I'd expect you'd need to be revealing company secrets, or have a public speaking position in the first place (e.g. you work for PR) and your declarations ma…

Use the example in the article. You basically write a letter to your fellow employees saying (I’ll paraphrase) “im outta here because the talents and ideas that made this place successful are gone”. Can you do that in Europe and face no consequences?

The exact phrasing:

> "He was fond of a line from the Persian poet Rumi, who said, “When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.” Playing off that line, Chaudhri wrote, “Sadly, rivers dry out, and when they do, you look for a new one."

No, an employer wouldn't be in a great position firing an employee about a reflexion on a poem, that was used to explain his motivation drying out. To be clear, the employer would face the consequences.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#284

Post by the_af »

nomel wrote: post #277
the_af wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If quantifying "best" is so difficult, then maybe Ive should have worded his words of consolation better, maybe? Otherwise it's just an empty platitude.

Someone like Ive, and anyone within his professional circle, would necessarily be intimately familiar with the concept of “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, just as best is. Any one designers design is the best for that designer. Best, by anyones definition, doesn’t always make the cut.

I obviously disagree. And it's not like Ive has never made a mistake in his decisions or appreciations. His words are not holy.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#285

Post by the_af »

bradknowles wrote: post #269
the_af wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that was Ive's meaning, that humans sometimes choose a worse idea than the best one, then it's both a truism and an empty platitude...

In Re: Betamax vs. VHS, what does "best" mean?

Excellent point. I don't know, maybe there was no clear-cut "best" in that case. Refreshing my memory about that formats war by reading Wikipedia, it wasn't obvious Betamax was "better" (it didn't check many of the boxes consumers wanted, like cheaper, longer running time, faster; instead, it checked boxes video professionals wanted, so it can be argued Beta was not "the best" for consumers!).

That said, in this case Ive seems to be arguing even in cases where the "best" can be identified and has a known meaning, it won't make the cut. By definition of "best", this means something "worse" will be chosen instead. Seems like a flawed process to me!

PS: if you ask me, I think Ive wasn't careful with his words, and instead he meant "even extremely good products sometimes don't make the cut, because they are competing with something even better here at Apple". But he said "best", an unfortunate word which made his statement... wrong. Someone so careful about design should also be careful about words, because words are also design.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#286

Post by the_af »

sumedh wrote: post #278
the_af wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it was too expensive, then it wasn't the best. Whichever way you put it, it's either a flawed process or a weird turn of phrase by Ive.

No its not a flawed process nor a weird phrase. Have you ever heard of "Good/Cheap/Fast — pick two"?

Yes I have, where is "best" in that triplet?

An unqualified "best" means it's the best. It was an unfortunate turn of phrase by Ive, a person known to make mistakes, as pointed out several times here on HN.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#287

Post by nomel »

the_af wrote: post #284
nomel wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone like Ive, and anyone within his professional circle, would necessarily be intimately familiar with the concept of “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”, just as best is. Any one designers design is the best for that designer. Best, by anyones definition, doesn’t always make the cut.

I obviously disagree. And it's not like Ive has never made a mistake in his decisions or appreciations. His words are not holy.

The context here is product design. Does this mean that you think there's one perfect form of a product that everyone would agree is the best, from the bean counters, to the fabricators, to the users?

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#288

Post by the_af »

nomel wrote: post #287
the_af wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I obviously disagree. And it's not like Ive has never made a mistake in his decisions or appreciations. His words are not holy.

The context here is product design. Does this mean that you think there's one perfect form of a product that everyone would agree is the best, from the bean counters, to the fabricators, to the users?

Well, if there isn't, Ive shouldn't have used the word "best"! It sends the wrong message. Designers should be careful with their words.

(As an aside, in my opinion -- and many others on HN, as I've read through the years -- Ive sometimes made the worst choice between two design decisions, so he definitely sometimes cut the best in favor of the less good).

(Also, judging by the reactions to my top-level comment, others agree with me!)

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#289

Post by nomel »

the_af wrote: post #288
nomel wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The context here is product design. Does this mean that you think there's one perfect form of a product that everyone would agree is the best, from the bean counters, to the fabricators, to the users?

Well, if there isn't, Ive shouldn't have used the word "best"! It sends the wrong message. Designers should be careful with their words. (As an aside, in my opinion -- and many others on HN, as I've read through the years -- Ive sometimes made the worst choice between two design decisions, so he definitely sometimes cut the best in favor of the less good). (Also, judging by the reactions to my top-level comment, othe…

I think you're coming from a context that isn't design, so there's a language mismatch here. In design, and basically everything not dictated by maths/optimization, the precise definition of "best" is that it's subjective. From the dictionary: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/best

> 1. excelling all others

> 2. offering or producing the greatest advantage, utility, or satisfaction

Different models of products exist because "best" is subjective. The phone that is best for me is not best for you, but both are precisely, by definition, best for each of us. You seem to be thinking that the word "best" means some absolute global maximum, which is not the definition of the word. That maximum is made from weights in some huge vector space, with those weights being different depending on the perspective of each of us. There is no "correct" perspective that can allow this global maximum, that you seem to be searching for, to exist.

You're making the assumption that he, a celebrated consumer product designer, was not aware of the subjective, multivariate, nature of "best", when used in the context of consumer product design. I don't think that's an appropriate assumption, for any professional designer.

Re: The dissolution of Apple’s legacy design team

#290

Post by the_af »

nomel wrote: post #289
the_af wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if there isn't, Ive shouldn't have used the word "best"! It sends the wrong message. Designers should be careful with their words. (As an aside, in my opinion -- and many others on HN, as I've read through the years -- Ive sometimes made the worst choice between two design decisions, so he definitely sometimes cut the best in favor of the less good). (Also, judging by the reactions to my top-level comment, othe…

I think you're coming from a context that isn't design, so there's a language mismatch here. In design, and basically everything not dictated by maths/optimization, the precise definition of "best" is that it's subjective. From the dictionary: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/best > 1. excelling all others > 2. offering or producing the greatest advantage, utility, or satisfaction Different models of produc…

Both definitions 1 & 2 are universal and not exclusive to design, and furthermore, prove my point.

I stand by my opinion: Ive was either careless about words, or pointing out a flaw in Apple's process.

Please, don't try to convince me I don't understand product design or what "best" means. At this point, this intellectual match trying to save Ive from his own words is not productive.

Let's agree to disagree.

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