10-19-2008, 05:18 AM
> Gee, Steve Jobs is such a lousy CEO, running Apple into the ground...
Yeah, because the iPhone is, of course, the triumphant and perfect pinnacle of all creation.
Sir, please put down the kool aid, hold out your hands and slowly step away from the reality distortion field.
...
In addition to his health problems, there've been a whole lot of stupid screwups lately at Apple. Who takes responsibility?
A few things just off the top of my head and in no particular order...
The ENTIRE (ongoing) Mobile-Me fiasco.
The epidemic of motherboard failures in the iBooks and original MacBooks.
The epidemic of video-failures in the iBooks.
The discoloration in MacBook plastics and the months of Apple refusing to acknowledge the problem.
Extraordinarily high manufacturing defects in the aluminum iMacs -- especially in the 20-inch iMacs. Bad speakers, bad RAM slots, defective power supplies that shut off the computer at odd intervals. (As an aside: People tolerate the silliest things. I just had a long conversation with switcher-client trying to get him to take his iMac in to the AppleStore. He had convinced himself that his iMac shut itself off every hour or two as a neat Mac-only power-saving feature.)
Defective keyboards in the MacBooks.
Making the innards of the Intel iMacs a cluttered, overheating mess. Making the innards of the new Intel iMacs a cluttered overheating and nearly inaccessible mess.
Repairing permissions in Leopard. FUBAR.
Removing hierarchical folders from the Dock and implementing the transparent menu bar against almost universally negative feedback from developers... and the kludges that Apple put in place to "fix" them in 10.5.2.
The fragile glass in the first generation of iPhones. The high SIM-slot failure rate in both iPhones. The lack of SMS (a basic cell phone feature these days) in iPhones. The promise of instant calendar-synchronization and instant push email in iPhones, followed by the censoring of all mention of it from the web site when people figured out there was really a 15-minute to 1 hour delay... when it (rarely) works. The confusing licensing of the iPhone developer kit, the over-cautious NDA, refusing to sell any product with any overlapping or similar features with any Apple (or Apple-partner) software.
...
...And yeah, dropping FireWire from the consumer Macs was awe-inspringly dumb because FireWire brings easy pro-quality video and audio to the masses AND because FireWire on Macs is reliable and fast and offers target mode AND because the ease of using and troubleshooting Macs that all of that engendered were the last big distinguishing features of Macs.
What makes it so royally dumb is that now anyone can run the Mac OS on a PC. Without FireWire, nothing of any real importance distinguishes consumer Macs from other PC's anymore. It's just shiny screens and buffed aluminum and Steve Jobs standing on a stage telling you how great they are.
...And what happens when Steve's not there any more? Will shiny screens and buffed aluminum be enough?
Yeah, because the iPhone is, of course, the triumphant and perfect pinnacle of all creation.
Sir, please put down the kool aid, hold out your hands and slowly step away from the reality distortion field.
...
In addition to his health problems, there've been a whole lot of stupid screwups lately at Apple. Who takes responsibility?
A few things just off the top of my head and in no particular order...
The ENTIRE (ongoing) Mobile-Me fiasco.
The epidemic of motherboard failures in the iBooks and original MacBooks.
The epidemic of video-failures in the iBooks.
The discoloration in MacBook plastics and the months of Apple refusing to acknowledge the problem.
Extraordinarily high manufacturing defects in the aluminum iMacs -- especially in the 20-inch iMacs. Bad speakers, bad RAM slots, defective power supplies that shut off the computer at odd intervals. (As an aside: People tolerate the silliest things. I just had a long conversation with switcher-client trying to get him to take his iMac in to the AppleStore. He had convinced himself that his iMac shut itself off every hour or two as a neat Mac-only power-saving feature.)
Defective keyboards in the MacBooks.
Making the innards of the Intel iMacs a cluttered, overheating mess. Making the innards of the new Intel iMacs a cluttered overheating and nearly inaccessible mess.
Repairing permissions in Leopard. FUBAR.
Removing hierarchical folders from the Dock and implementing the transparent menu bar against almost universally negative feedback from developers... and the kludges that Apple put in place to "fix" them in 10.5.2.
The fragile glass in the first generation of iPhones. The high SIM-slot failure rate in both iPhones. The lack of SMS (a basic cell phone feature these days) in iPhones. The promise of instant calendar-synchronization and instant push email in iPhones, followed by the censoring of all mention of it from the web site when people figured out there was really a 15-minute to 1 hour delay... when it (rarely) works. The confusing licensing of the iPhone developer kit, the over-cautious NDA, refusing to sell any product with any overlapping or similar features with any Apple (or Apple-partner) software.
...
...And yeah, dropping FireWire from the consumer Macs was awe-inspringly dumb because FireWire brings easy pro-quality video and audio to the masses AND because FireWire on Macs is reliable and fast and offers target mode AND because the ease of using and troubleshooting Macs that all of that engendered were the last big distinguishing features of Macs.
What makes it so royally dumb is that now anyone can run the Mac OS on a PC. Without FireWire, nothing of any real importance distinguishes consumer Macs from other PC's anymore. It's just shiny screens and buffed aluminum and Steve Jobs standing on a stage telling you how great they are.
...And what happens when Steve's not there any more? Will shiny screens and buffed aluminum be enough?