He oversaw Siri and Maps, two products which over-promised and under-delivered, and six months ago he cashed out 95% of his Apple stock. I think it was evident he lost the power struggle and it killed his enthusiasm. His heart just wasn't in it anymore.
That's interesting, do you have a source for the stock cash-out?
Scott Forstall leaves Apple
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Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#82Everybody here talks about Ive being opposed to skeuomorphism , does anybody have any examples of what the UI would look like under the leadership of his design principles? I can't even imagine it.
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#83Everyone's mentioning Maps/Siri, but my most recent disappointment with an Apple product is the UI, performance and structure of Game Center for iOS.
I've never been inclined to use it before the recent release of Letterpress which necessitates its use and it a steaming pile of you-know-what.
It's so jarring going from the lovely minimalism of the Letterpress game into parts of Game Center to manage match/friend requests.
It's the sort of experience that's had me worried about Apple, and this is (tentatively) good news, as I gather he was heading up the part of Apple responsible for such products.
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#84Scott Forstall is already rich thanks to Apple, but he lost a lot of money by being fired. 75,000 RSUs vesting in 2013, 100,000 RSUs to vest in 2014, and 75,000 in 2016. That's a lot of dough ($151M at today's share price).
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#85Interesting that Eddie Cue remains the company fixer, taking on the quirky Siri and the flakey Maps app just as he was once given a completely fucked up MobileMe. This is good news. Even better news is Browett's ouster. The business with his cutting operational corners in retail was a very, very bad omen. If they'd left him in, he might have poisoned a very important well for the company. Hopefully his replacement is…
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Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#86I feel very sorry for Apple. Scott was a major catalyst that made things happen at the company.
His functions are being taken over by people who make good things happen at the company.
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#87People's reactions to this announcement are overly focused on Forstall's assumed support for heavy skeumorphism (and their excitement at his departure as lead proponent). I think his record as head of iOS since its inception is a much more salient issue. Forstall led development of the fastest-growing, most popular computing platform of the past decade or so with, to be sure, a few notable screw-ups, but mostly incre…
The thing about Forstall's achievements is he did them all under the shadow of Steve Jobs.
Is it that he had to take a more active role now, and not just be a Jobs man?
Is it that Jobs could bring talented people together and keep them there and Tim Cook is failing to do that?
I'm almost certain it's neither of those, but they serve to illustrate the point: when people think of iOS, Scott Forstall is not even close to the first person they think of giving credit to.
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#88Here are the major changes announced:
1. Jony Ive's role is expanded from Industrial Design to Industrial Design AND Human Interface. In other words, Ive is the new Design chief for hardware and software. This is huge.
2. Scott Forstall is out (after an interim advising role to Tim Cook). iOS goes to Craig Federighi who already oversees Mac OS. So, now iOS and Mac OS are overseen by the same person.
3. Eddy Cue's role is expanded (he previously was in charge of iTunes, App Store, iBookStore, iCloud). He now also oversees Siri and Maps.
4. Bob Mansfield will lead a new group called Technologies (wireless and semiconductor).
5. John Browett of retail is out.
Overall, I view this move as extremely positive.
Tim Cook just elevated his most reliable and capable SVPs to assume more leadership role.
John Ive, Eddy Cue, Mansfield and Federighi have all proven to be pretty spectacular. Ive with industrial design, Cue with iTunes/AppStore/iCloud, Mansfield with hardware and Federighi with Mac OS.
Further, Tim Cook gets rid of his problem SVPs - namely Browett who didn't match the culture of Apple... and Scott Forstall (who advanced iOS in huge ways) but reportedly had problems with getting along with other SVPs and also who disappointed users with iOS6/Maps (and also in my opinion poorly designed and implemented Apple apps... appstore reviews for Apple apps have gone significantly down the last year or two).
Cook will probably give Forstall a good severance package with an agreement that Forstall doesn't go to a mobile OS competitor.
I'm actually more optimistic on Apple with this bold management shakeup. Tim Cook is showing the moves of a bold leader... and it's exactly what Apple needs.
Re: Scott Forstall leaves Apple
#89Interesting that Jony will be overseeing UI. I expect a more minimalistic polish to upcoming interfaces. In other words, this is the beginning of the end for the skeuomorphism trend at Apple.
You're the second person that mentioned skeuomorphism. Could you please explain what it is and why it's a big todo? Most of my cursory google searches don't provide any particularly insightful definition of what it is. The blogs/rants usually just dive into why it's good or bad.
Skeuomorphism has been interpreted two ways - as decorative elements (leather stitching), and in functionality that attempts to emulate a real world object (page flipping in an e-book).
The former is just a matter of aesthetic preference. Where skeuomorphism gets dangerous is in the latter case.
A perfect example is the horrible address book in OS X. It looks like a book, and therefore the user expects it to function like a book. Yet, it doesn't. It's this area of interaction design that has run afoul at Apple.