Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Ex-Apple employee says company a 'failure'

Realizm · 09-14-2003, 07:24 AM

I don't really see the company as a complete failure. Lots of software is still bloated as he said, but this is not entirely the fault of Apple. Many software developers seem to make a lot of their strong applications bloated. Apple has pretty much had to follow what the developers made (most of the software seems to get ported to Mac, right? Take Office, for example.)

Microsft makes their OS and Office as bloated as they like. If Apple wants to keep any kind of decent office apps they had to take what bloated stuff MS gave them.

While UI has stayed basically the same over the last decade, it is finally taking a turn with OS X, at least on Apple's side. It actually opened up to developers with *nix experience and leaves room for more ideas to get out in the mainstream.

It is hard to make extreme innovations in UI design because you have to have something that will be accepted by the users. Can users really handle such drastic changes, even though they are improvements?

If it was anything like in Pirates of Silicon Valley, then maybe they can't. The corporate people thought the UI at Palo Alto was just plain nuts, didn't they?

Have to take some smaller steps in order to gain acceptance by the community as a whole. There isn't a lot of room for Apple to just force something on the community either, like MS could with their so incredibly large user base.

Apple continues to make innovations on the hardware side, as far as I can tell. Take the iPod. While originally limited to the Mac side, it has now moved to support both Windows and Mac, think I also heard people getting it to work on Linux. A very very small compact music player holding lots of songs, or doubling as a storage device. The iMac(s) all in their own way have provided an opening in hardware innovation by catering to the senses of its users (Some of them, not everybody wants to find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow). Smaller hardware with bigger bang. Software that can really kick it with the big guys. It's an improvement if you ask me. Hardly a failure

I don't have very good grammar skills and I probably spoke a lot of rubbish, but the above is what I think anyway.

09-14-2003, 07:24 AM	#4 (permalink)
Realizm Insane Location: A fuzzy cloud.	I don't really see the company as a complete failure. Lots of software is still bloated as he said, but this is not entirely the fault of Apple. Many software developers seem to make a lot of their strong applications bloated. Apple has pretty much had to follow what the developers made (most of the software seems to get ported to Mac, right? Take Office, for example.) Microsft makes their OS and Office as bloated as they like. If Apple wants to keep any kind of decent office apps they had to take what bloated stuff MS gave them. While UI has stayed basically the same over the last decade, it is finally taking a turn with OS X, at least on Apple's side. It actually opened up to developers with *nix experience and leaves room for more ideas to get out in the mainstream. It is hard to make extreme innovations in UI design because you have to have something that will be accepted by the users. Can users really handle such drastic changes, even though they are improvements? If it was anything like in Pirates of Silicon Valley, then maybe they can't. The corporate people thought the UI at Palo Alto was just plain nuts, didn't they? Have to take some smaller steps in order to gain acceptance by the community as a whole. There isn't a lot of room for Apple to just force something on the community either, like MS could with their so incredibly large user base. Apple continues to make innovations on the hardware side, as far as I can tell. Take the iPod. While originally limited to the Mac side, it has now moved to support both Windows and Mac, think I also heard people getting it to work on Linux. A very very small compact music player holding lots of songs, or doubling as a storage device. The iMac(s) all in their own way have provided an opening in hardware innovation by catering to the senses of its users (Some of them, not everybody wants to find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow). Smaller hardware with bigger bang. Software that can really kick it with the big guys. It's an improvement if you ask me. Hardly a failure I don't have very good grammar skills and I probably spoke a lot of rubbish, but the above is what I think anyway.