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Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

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Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ive got way more credit than he deserved. And he had to run all his ideas by Jobs. Once Jobs was gone we got to see Ive's true colors (it was garish pastels and a butterfly keyboard). https://jonyiveredesignsthings.tumblr.com/

He has designed 4 consumer prodocts that a good portion of humanity use every day. By every measure he is the most successful product creator in the history of humanity, no single other product comes close to impact and quality. (Believe it or not the Dorritos Locos Taco is likely the closest 5th place product) The arrogance on hacker news is insane, or the self agrandizement and misunderstanding of how rare that is.…

Big difference is comparing to sports is millions of people can see with their own eyes the performance of a player in arena. All motivated media can't create a narrative of brilliance when bad performance is there to see.

In case Jony Ive or others like him, we simply do not know how many dozens or hundreds of very talented engineers and designers worked relentlessly under him so he can do beautiful presentations in British English.

Another person comes to my mind is Marissa Meyers. "Brilliant Executive" known for keeping Google Home page clean that's visited by billion people. But we all know how great she was when ended up at Yahoo.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#332
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you underestimate what he does. It seems simple and obvious in hindsight, but if it were so easy, others would not be so far behind. A difficult thing done well looks easy. Reminds me of when Toyota disrupted auto manufacturing. Under Tim Cook, Apple has pretty much exclusive access to certain parts and suppliers. Apple buys up all the silicon. Competitors can’t compete at the same quality without paying a pr…

I’m not underestimating what he does, I’m asking what does he actually do to make it happen beyond setting priorities and holding subordinates accountable? I’m not questioning that he does many things well and right and even genius, I just want to know what those are! I’m sure Isaacson will cover it well in his bio!

I would earnestly suggest reading Apple In China:

https://www.amazon.com/Apple-China-Capture-Greatest-Company/...

It both captures Tim's genius and the genius of the person much geniuser than him: Xi Jinping.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bought a newer iPhone. My older one had the button to go to the home screen, the newer one replaced that with swipe up. After a year, the swipe up is still a nuisance. It often doesn't work, and I have to swipe up several times.

Do you use a case? My guess would be that when you swipe up, you're not quite starting low enough, perhaps unconsciously, because of the case being in the way. See if a case with a thinner front or smaller bezels helps. Using your index finger also works better than the thumb. If that doesn't help, there are some settings you can try: 1. Go to Settings > Accessibility > Touch > AssistiveTouch and turn on AssistiveTou…

I had no idea. Thanks for the tips!

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#334
post #172
post #9

Cook seems to be dragged for some of his decisions ( like China ), but he was the right CEO for the time. Ternus in turn seems to be the right CEO for this phase of Apple. I'm excited to see what Ternus does in the role! It's a homecoming of sorts having a product person and there has already been chatter he'll be more like Jobs in the role. If they can maintain their hardware lead and tighten up the software a bit,…

I think Tim Apple [sic] has made 3 major errors, 2 of which got corrected: 1. The mid-to-late 2010s Cult of Thinness as the last gasp of Johnny Ive was terrible for the Macbook range. Butterly keyboard, 12" Macbook, no Macbook Air, Touch bar... ugh. I personally believe Johnny Ive got gently shown the door over all that so was corrected; 2. The Apple Watch didn't know what it was at launch. Remember the $10,000 Apple…

Aerenhart’s biggest task was combining the online store with the physical. That was my understanding of why she was hired. Before that there were many walls between the two retail arms of online and physical.

Ive was the one behind the 15k watches. He wanted the in store experience to be like a jewelry store. They also brought in his friend that had been doing hi end watches and bands to help with the watch design. Beonce got an 18kt gold link band along with her watch. You can only imagine Ive’s glee at the watches being on the cover of Vogue.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#335
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple makes computers there's quite a bit loaded in your term of "computer" that doesn't really work. if a watch or headphones can eventually be called a computer, then a software-based car running on a battery can certainly fit under that definition.

Right, but clearly the tech & regulatory environment was such that the use of a general purpose computer beyond the infotainment screens wasn’t going to add enough value. If self-driving had worked, and a fully vertically integrated tech stack could have controlled your “mobile experience” end-to-end, maybe a different story. “Siri, take me to pick up Grandma from her flight. Let me know when she lands and send her a…

I feel like your original comment was phrased as "Apple wouldn't build this", when in reality I think (we might mostly agree) is that they would build it ideally, but it might be too early or it might not be a good strategic business to be in.

Outside of the premium brand/build quality, I think Tesla was actually a successful proof of concept of what they could have done or could do. Computer/software-powered, battery-charged, integrated hardware/software, principled product tradeoffs, new retail model, advances in charging technology. Big parallels to the first iPhone. You even heard the same complaints from consumers when the first iphone came out ("I want my buttons/physical controls back", "The battery/range dies too quickly"). Apple may not want to be in the car business, but I think Tesla showed that cars could just be computers now

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#336
post #172
post #9

Cook seems to be dragged for some of his decisions ( like China ), but he was the right CEO for the time. Ternus in turn seems to be the right CEO for this phase of Apple. I'm excited to see what Ternus does in the role! It's a homecoming of sorts having a product person and there has already been chatter he'll be more like Jobs in the role. If they can maintain their hardware lead and tighten up the software a bit,…

I think Tim Apple [sic] has made 3 major errors, 2 of which got corrected: 1. The mid-to-late 2010s Cult of Thinness as the last gasp of Johnny Ive was terrible for the Macbook range. Butterly keyboard, 12" Macbook, no Macbook Air, Touch bar... ugh. I personally believe Johnny Ive got gently shown the door over all that so was corrected; 2. The Apple Watch didn't know what it was at launch. Remember the $10,000 Apple…

1. Flat UI is the other side of Johnny Ive’s legacy—arguably an error as well, never corrected.

3. Agreed that Siri stagnated, was already surpassed by Alexa a decade ago, and even moreso by LLMs today. However, some advantages of Apple Silicon have panned out for AI—e.g., using unified memory to run ML models, instead of requiring dedicated VRAM for a separate GPU.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#337
post #9

Cook seems to be dragged for some of his decisions ( like China ), but he was the right CEO for the time. Ternus in turn seems to be the right CEO for this phase of Apple. I'm excited to see what Ternus does in the role! It's a homecoming of sorts having a product person and there has already been chatter he'll be more like Jobs in the role. If they can maintain their hardware lead and tighten up the software a bit,…

What big hardware bets are people expecting him to take?

Medical and health. Cook has said multiple times that he thinks that Apple’s greatest legacy will be “health.”

The biggest hurdle in the health hardware game is regulatory. If they can make a noninvasive blood sugar monitor and get it approved they will both print money and help a ton of people.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#338
post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't speak for aworks, but most of the people I've spoken to on it, like my mother, say it's better than the private insurance they had before.

For general medical coverage, it was better for my Mom and now it seems better for me. Some things are not covered with traditional Medicare e.g. dental and vision.

Dental and vision aren't covered by private medical insurance either, and private dental insurance typically has max annual payouts low enough (like $1k/1.5k) to make it basically a scam unless you know you'll actually get use out of it.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#339
post #129
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And dont forget the scissor keyboard and the fucking touchbar

Fight me but I miss the touchbar, it was customizable to be super useful with better touch tool

Even without BTT, I liked the touchbar (especially on the Macbook “Esc” which restored the escape key). It was nice having keys that actually said what they did. Maybe someday, keycaps with an LCD-generated display will be feasible (or maybe e-paper for power consumption needs)
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