Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#311

Post by mr_toad » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:06 PM UTC

amelius wrote: post #304

Hammershaft wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How will AI change this situation? I don't catch your drift.

Briefly, with an example: instead of going through menus looking for the option you need, you can just tell the AI (with a voice command) what you want to do. At that point it does not matter who has the nicest menus. Advanced users are already seeing this. You don't need HandBrake anymore. You can just use ffmpeg directly and ChatGPT will tell you the command line arguments.

> you can just tell the AI (with a voice command) what you want to do

Hard no. Not happening.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#312

Post by ndriscoll » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:08 PM UTC

edoceo wrote: post #106

staplers wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I very much doubt the execs understand how much they're damaging the brand for that little bit of extra revenue. Our entire societal system is based on increasing revenue (due to inflation). Until we measure, define, and value experience in nominal terms through data, most leaders won't care because it will remain an estimate against hard data.

Consumers need actual choice too. Choosing between ad-infested music and no-music is crap. The option of music, sans PM-bloat doesn't exist. Sub music with the thing you like. Freaking heck, I've gotta dismiss ads on my BANKING APP just to deposit a check.

It does exist. I ripped my CD collection ~20 years ago. VLC and Finamp both work great as players depending on whether you want to just load up files in a directory, or have a more advanced media server (jellyfin) that can do stuff like transcode FLAC to opus on the fly for mobile clients.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#313

Post by quantum_state » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:08 PM UTC

Crossing the red line has consequences … though not immediately…

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#314

Post by WoodenChair » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:09 PM UTC

techscruggs wrote: post #310

Remember that Steve Jobs appointed his COO Tim Cook to take over Apple. Not Ives or Cue or Federighi. I've always seen this as an acknowledgment that without Jobs the company would not be able to innovate in the same way. Having acknowledged that, Apple shifted to the value extraction phase of its business lifecycle. It sucks. It like when your favorite band starts selling out, but as publicly traded company, I am no…

> Not Ives or Cue or Federighi.

It’s “Ive” and Federighi wasn’t a candidate in 2011.

Also, how you think someone is going to work out and how they actually work out is still worth commenting on. Not every CEO would have extracted value in the same way. You can prioritize extracting value by making customers super happy so they buy more. That’s what the article is about.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#315

Post by lvl155 » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:12 PM UTC

I’ve been an Apple fan for as long as I can remember. I didn’t worship Jobs but he had complete control of Apple when he returned and molded the company in his vision. The company lacks that vision. Vision Pro is an example of that failure. Luckily for them iPhone and Mac will continue to dominate. They are here for another decade plus and once the AI bubble passes and we settle on clear winners, Apple will pounce on that opportunity. Am I heartbroken that they’re not the trailblazers? Outsiders? Hipsters? Yes. The brand has gone from Ferrari to Toyota. That’s quite literally the most perfect analogy.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#316

Post by sidcool » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:12 PM UTC

Interesting read. But I avoid deifying Jobs. I won't be surprised if he went ahead with Ads for revenue. Who wouldn't! If he were around the iPhone would not be dramatically different than what it's now.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#317

Post by kamma4434 » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:12 PM UTC

gwd wrote: post #75

> From that point on, Steve would go on to spend lavishly on things that improved the experience, and he would reject—often brutally—any idea that diluted or harmed the experience. ...I’ll go out on a limb and say that uninvited advertising is not normally equated with a better customer experience. YES!!! SOO much of the Apple user experience has degraded due to this. I can't listen to my own music that I bought on t…

Like fitness where they want you to activate Fitness+. This means the one they are shipping is trash? Plus, thank you, I know where the App store is in case I need it

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#318

Post by mapontosevenths » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:14 PM UTC

waste_monk wrote: post #282

sugarpimpdorsey wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you have things like the Charlie Brown Halloween Special People made fun of me for continuing to hoard physical media all these years. I predicted this hellscape might come one day. Man I love being right.

I appreciate the attempt, but have never seen the point personally. That is, many physical media collectors do it to have nice box sets to display, or in an attempt to have off-line copies of media, but I have never met anyone who goes to the effort of ensuring long-term readability - which is understandable, it is a huge hassle. Unless you are copying the content to new physical media every so often it will eventual…

Outside of manufacturing defects you can expect HTL blu-rays to last for more than a hundred years when stored properly. Some estimates are as high as 300 years. Don't buy the cheap ones or store them outdoors and you'll be fine.

Some archival grade disc's are estimated to last 700 years or more and dont cost THAT much more.

DVD's and CDR'S used organic dies that broke down quickly. Blu-rays mostly use inorganic dies that last forever. Cheap LTH disc's being the exception.

MOST manufacturers like Verbatimm do not even produce the organic die LTH disc's anymore as people stopped buying them. There are still some floating around for sale, so avoid them.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#319

Post by CuriouslyC » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:17 PM UTC

Gud wrote: post #274

lukan wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bit deeper into the scene, there are no ads anymore. And the biggest problem for most people in the west, is rather just using torrents without a VPN will get you lawyers letters quite quickly. But Joe average can use youtube downloader without danger.

I’ve torrented for decades, never received such a letter.

They only send them to ISPs in major markets such as the US, and some providers just redirect them to /dev/null, but a lot of providers that are larger will terminate your service for repeated violatioins.

Re: Apple is crossing a Steve Jobs red line

#320

Post by JimDabell » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 2:18 PM UTC

metabagel wrote: post #36

I ran a reverse image search on the image of Steve Jobs, and couldn't come up with anything, so it does appear that it might be AI generated, which I don't approve of.

This is something that really grates with me, but it’s made so much worse with the AI-generated image of him. If you want to say that you don’t think Apple should do that, then fine. But stop using Jobs to fight your battles, and especially don’t generate images of him with that attention-seeking YouTube thumbnail face.

> It’s WWDC week. Every time this rolls around, I see people saying the same sort of thing. “Steve Jobs wouldn’t have done this”.

> Firstly, Jobs wasn’t perfect. He got a lot of things right and a lot of things wrong. His opinion wasn’t the end of the argument when he was alive, and it’s certainly not now that he’s been dead 14 years.

> But more importantly: Stop putting your opinion in a dead man’s mouth to give it more credibility. It’s ghoulish. Let your opinion stand on its own two feet.

— https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44246274