OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive • Hacker News Board

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#331

Post by no_wizard » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:44 PM UTC

izolate wrote: post #97

arusahni wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the same dude who brought us the butterfly keyboard, so I'm anticipating a form-beating-function failure (if they actually ship something).

It's also the same dude who brought us beloved products in Apple's lineup. It's almost a meme at this point to say that Jony Ive's genius needs a containing force like Steve Jobs. Perhaps Sam Altman can fill that role.

Jobs, for all his faults, understood where aesthetic, functionality and user experience intersected extremely well.

He got stuff wrong too, don’t get me wrong, but I have yet to see another CEO (heck any business person of note) with the same pattern of deep understanding of how those things intersected as well as he did

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#332

Post by vjvjvjvjghv » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:45 PM UTC

brulard wrote: post #278

bigyabai wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And many of those designs were made at Ive's behest, against the wishes of entire teams of engineers. I feel like we have his "courage" to blame for the Butterfly keyboard, terrible Mac thermals and the lack of ports on "Pro" computers.

I had the butterfly keyboard for 5 years yet I didn't have a single problem with it. And I'm a long time mechanical keyboards user. What is all the hate about?

I didn’t like the feel and mine failed after a year.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#333

Post by seatac76 » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:45 PM UTC

hexator wrote: post #90

seatac76 wrote: post #35

That is an insane amount to hire Johnny Ive. Just to signal to the market that OpenAI is getting into hardware, what on earth could they be building towards. They’ve been writing some big checks off late, these costs will have to be justified soon enough.

The obvious answer would be some sort of consumer AI assistant, like Siri but better.

I mean for this kind of money and pedigree the obvious answer to me is kill the smartphone level tech.

10 mins I spent watching that weird video in third person dialogue no less, they better deliver something great.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#334

Post by asadotzler » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

croes wrote: post #46

Handy-Man wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Meta is thriving with Meta Ray Bans, they have sold over 2M as of few months back. (Yes I know that number seems small compared to other devices, but for a new form factor, that seems like a great early success)

Where is they AR/VR part in the Ray Bans? It’s cameras, speakers, microphones but no display.

AR can surely be audio only. Or are you suggesting a blind person getting navigation instructions via cameras and speakers isn't augmenting their reality? If so, I violently disagree.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#335

Post by microtonal » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

brulard wrote: post #278

bigyabai wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And many of those designs were made at Ive's behest, against the wishes of entire teams of engineers. I feel like we have his "courage" to blame for the Butterfly keyboard, terrible Mac thermals and the lack of ports on "Pro" computers.

I had the butterfly keyboard for 5 years yet I didn't have a single problem with it. And I'm a long time mechanical keyboards user. What is all the hate about?

I had the first generation on a MacBook 12" and had no issues at all. Then I got the second generation on a MacBook Pro (I think this was still without the dust seals) and it was one big misery. A small speck of dust would make a key feel bad or get stuck. I was so happy when I could finally get rid of the stupid device. Never had issues with Apple Scissor switches thereafter.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#336

Post by Karrot_Kream » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #310

bobxmax wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I absolutely despise comments like these, and you only see them on HN. It's like saying great architects aren't great, it's the construction workers who should get the credit.

I agree somewhat, you can feel the tension on HN with respect to labor vs capital. Which is funny because the entire premise of YC is to infuse capital and get a huge leverage over bootstrappers.

It's a pretty common turn of phrase on "lefty" (Western, English, very online, progressive) parts of the internet. I've always found it silly because it takes some pretty interesting nuanced problems (how do you give credit to folks who executed Ive's vision, many who probably boldly innovated to create what they did? How do you realistically situate Ive's flaws given his aura?) and wrings the nuance out of it by polarizing the readers (you're either with labor or you're with capital, pick your side of the picket line!)

But then these days lefty and righty parts of the Western English-language internet are all polarized and beating on common enemies is part of their conversational language. I think for a while HN was small enough that it resisted this polarization but at its current size there's no escaping it.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#337

Post by PokemonNoGo » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

ko_pivot wrote: post #10

No question that Ive is a legend, but I do think the fall of Humane (also ex-Apple) and the challenges at Meta, Apple, and Google in terms of VR/AR adoption (Meta Ray Ban, Apple Vision, Google Glasses and the new thing) are instructive here. The $6.5B almost feels like the largest ever aquihire.

That's how I read the article and came to find your comments. AI bought a human.

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#338

Post by JKCalhoun » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

bdangubic wrote: post #305

JKCalhoun wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps buying him so Apple doesn't? (Just wild speculation — but one that would be on par for Corporate America over the past decade or two.)

I’ve heard stories of people paying $5B to get divorced, haven’t heard any paying $5B to their ex-husbands :)

Except that time Apple bought NeXT? :-)

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#339

Post by mlnj » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:47 PM UTC

dudus wrote: post #268

First Windsurf and now this. OpenAI is spending billions like there's nothing else to use this money for while being seemingly cash strapped for model training since they already signaled more investment rounds would be needed to remain competitive. They're trying to become too big to fail before they have a moat which won't work well.

What else are they going to do with all that money?

Raise billions and billions under the guise of AGI coming tomorrow and they just become a too big to fail company gobbling up any competition.

You don't hear anyone touting AGI anymore do we?

Re: OpenAI to buy AI startup from Jony Ive

#340

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 21, 2025, 6:47 PM UTC

bigyabai wrote: post #81

amelius wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No question that Ive is a legend Not sure why he deserves to be a legend, to be honest, but yes, he is a legend. He did a good job, but those small and minimalistic designs were only possible because of the efforts of entire teams of engineers, of which the public never heard anything.

And many of those designs were made at Ive's behest, against the wishes of entire teams of engineers. I feel like we have his "courage" to blame for the Butterfly keyboard, terrible Mac thermals and the lack of ports on "Pro" computers.

[deleted]