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Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

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Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#81

Post by plorkyeran »

verelo wrote: post #43
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Cook's been great for massively scaling Apple (and its stock price) up, but the art, vision, and soul of the company is gone. It's just a stock price maximizing lawnmower now, just like every other corporate stock price maximizing lawnmower. If that's what shareholders want, fine, I guess. But I'd be bored just manufacturing the same boring rectangles every year. I think Steve would have been, too.

You forget, the camera gets better every year! I've had an iphone for 15 years. I mean, it's fine...i just wish there was incentive for durability and sustainability v's replace it every 12-24 months. I guess sustainability concerns at Apple ends at ensuring their stock price is sustainable.

I'm on my fourth iPhone in 13 years and have never replaced a phone because of anything related to physical damage. I'd still be on my third but T-Mobile offered such a large trade-in value for my 2020 SE that upgrading was the same price as replacing the battery.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#82

Post by 827a »

rhubarbtree wrote: post #22
827a wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ternus is the leading candidate; VP of Hardware Engineering. He was very likely more directly responsible than Cook for all the things you liked about Cook's Apple. My fear for Apple right now is how most decisions they make appear to incentivize them toward becoming a perpetual middle-man in all aspects of your interactions with their products. They don't manufacture much of anything anymore; its on-contract. They d…

Wait, Apple Pay Google for search?

No, but Apple is likely to be paying Google for access to Gemini in the upcoming Siri revamp, and relies on Google's technology for the default safari search experience, which is what I was referencing.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#83

Post by throw_m239339 »

tptacek wrote: post #34
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Cook's been great for massively scaling Apple (and its stock price) up, but the art, vision, and soul of the company is gone. It's just a stock price maximizing lawnmower now, just like every other corporate stock price maximizing lawnmower. If that's what shareholders want, fine, I guess. But I'd be bored just manufacturing the same boring rectangles every year. I think Steve would have been, too.

I couldn't disagree more. Some of the worst Apple computers I've owned date to the Jobs era. All of the best have been from the Cook era. Apple Silicon has been an enormous success. (My first Apple was a TiBook, for what it's worth.)

Well Jobs obviously took risks, way more than Cook ever did. But Yes, Silicon was absolutely the right move, incredible performance leap, at an accessible price (but one could argue it's more of a failure from Intel). Now from a "culture re-definition" perspective, nothing is going to top what Apple did in the 80's and what they did again in the 2000's with the iPhone.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#84

Post by someperson »

plorkyeran wrote: post #81
verelo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forget, the camera gets better every year! I've had an iphone for 15 years. I mean, it's fine...i just wish there was incentive for durability and sustainability v's replace it every 12-24 months. I guess sustainability concerns at Apple ends at ensuring their stock price is sustainable.

I'm on my fourth iPhone in 13 years and have never replaced a phone because of anything related to physical damage. I'd still be on my third but T-Mobile offered such a large trade-in value for my 2020 SE that upgrading was the same price as replacing the battery.

So you replaced your perfectly functional phone because they made the battery (a consumable) too expensive to replace?

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#85

Post by someperson »

Gigachad wrote: post #73
verelo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forget, the camera gets better every year! I've had an iphone for 15 years. I mean, it's fine...i just wish there was incentive for durability and sustainability v's replace it every 12-24 months. I guess sustainability concerns at Apple ends at ensuring their stock price is sustainable.

In the real world I don't know anyone replacing their phone every 24 months. Usually people keep a phone for 3-4 years and then it gets given to kids/someone else for another few years usage. I doubt any significant number of people are chucking their 1 year old iphone in a draw to sit unused after they get the next one.

With easier to replace batteries and 3.5mm headphone jacks, I'd wager the secondary market service life would be 2-3 times longer.

Not to mention the e-waste from non-repairable battery-based devices like air-pods.

Corporation make planned obsolescence decisions that happen to benefit themselves, then can dress it up as "water resistance".

Wouldn't be so bad but Apple's anti-consumer decisions are unfortunately imitated.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#86

Post by ardit33 »

tptacek wrote: post #34
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Cook's been great for massively scaling Apple (and its stock price) up, but the art, vision, and soul of the company is gone. It's just a stock price maximizing lawnmower now, just like every other corporate stock price maximizing lawnmower. If that's what shareholders want, fine, I guess. But I'd be bored just manufacturing the same boring rectangles every year. I think Steve would have been, too.

I couldn't disagree more. Some of the worst Apple computers I've owned date to the Jobs era. All of the best have been from the Cook era. Apple Silicon has been an enormous success. (My first Apple was a TiBook, for what it's worth.)

Apple Silicon was started by/during the Steve Jobs era in 2010. You seeing the rewards now (well starting in 2019), because it takes so long to produce a chip.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#87

Post by javman »

tptacek wrote: post #46
grumblingdev wrote: post #21

Yes!!! Such great news. Apple has really gone to shit. I am confronted by Apple performance and bug pain every hour of my life. I always think: how can someone think this is acceptable? Steve Jobs wouldn’t. Everything is such trash I could go on for hours. I realized a long time ago that if the person at the top doesn’t care then no one will. It seems hard to believe but it makes sense when you consider individual in…

Steve Jobs shipped a cordless mouse with a charger port on the bottom, the infamous hockey puck mouse, and a laptop that visibly discolored in the shape of handprints where your wrist rests. iTunes happened under Jobs watch and was unwound in the Cook era.

I'm a huge critic of the mouse with the charger port on bottom, but that was the 2nd gen magic mouse released in 2015. Is there another mouse that had charger port on bottom?

The 1st gen from 2009 used AA batteries.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#88

Post by majormajor »

someperson wrote: post #84
plorkyeran wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm on my fourth iPhone in 13 years and have never replaced a phone because of anything related to physical damage. I'd still be on my third but T-Mobile offered such a large trade-in value for my 2020 SE that upgrading was the same price as replacing the battery.

So you replaced your perfectly functional phone because they made the battery (a consumable) too expensive to replace?

The issue with batteries on older iPhones isn't even replacing the battery. Apple will do it for like $80 bucks or so out of warranty. That's WAY cheaper than a new phone.

But every new OS version manages to use more CPU and GPU and burn down that battery faster even if it's brand new, since the older chips have to work harder to run them than they had to work to run the older OSes.

I replaced my battery which was showing around 83% of original capacity last year, in a 3-4 year old phone. I was skeptical of the 83% reported number. Nope. The new battery didn't last much longer, nowhere close to how long it lasted on the OS it shipped with.

(This software-cpu-bloat is not unique to Apple. My Pixel, after 4 years or so, was practically unusable just from the amount of background shit the CPU was doing, compared to when it was new.)

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#89

Post by dyauspitr »

bnchrch wrote: post #2

If you check my comments Im a routine critic of Apple. Specifically its mis-management of Siri. But, in my mind, Tim Cook is also responsible for the only exceptional qualities of Apple. Namely its production of the M series chips and the Vision Pro (yes really). They better have someone outstanding in mind as a replacement. Otherwise I could easily see the successor mildly improve Siri/AI functions, while continuing…

I think it should be Sabih. Having worked with him he has a great head on his shoulders.

Re: Report: Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'

#90

Post by majormajor »

gyomu wrote: post #71
ludwik wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this sounds like an ideal setup, doesn't it? Tim is fantastic at execution, but he does need a shot of big-picture vision every now and then. Tim as CEO with Steve as Chairman, steering the broader direction, feels like it could have been a perfect pairing. The issue with how things actually turned out is that Tim ended up on his own - all execution, no vision.

How many people can name the chairman of the board at Apple today off the top of their head (Arthur Levinson)? And how much does Arthur Levinson steer the broader direction of the company? That's just not what the role is about. Steve was so effective precisely because he was able to get deeply involved in the day to day details in ways no other CEO has (whether on product matters, or personnel matters). That's not w…

> How many people can name the chairman of the board at Apple today off the top of their head (Arthur Levinson)? And how much does Arthur Levinson steer the broader direction of the company? That's just not what the role is about.

Jobs in that role would likely take a much more occasionally-active role w.r.t. future product direction since that was kind of his bread-and-butter and the company was his long-time passion project. Not because that's the regular purpose of that role, but because that's what he'd probably want to keep doing.

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