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Tim Cook is a "Bozo" - He has moved the focus away from computers and the companies core professional users and turned Apple into a fashionable health services

Tim Cook is a "Bozo" - He has moved the focus away from computers and the companies core professional users and turned Apple into a fashionable health services company. They will coast for a while on their dominant mobile market share but eventually the stagnation and lack of new products will catch up to them. He built a watch, which was a "me too" product and answered a question that no one asked. Jobs would never have done this because of the marginal increase in utility that smart watches provides users. He also wasted company time and resources on trying to build a car, which is completely outside Apple's skill sets (the supply chains and profit margins are radically different). It seemed like he was just trying to do something innovative instead of actually looking at the needs and demands of users inside the computing industry where apple should be focused. Its unfortunate that Jobs didn't see his lack of product development skills when he made him CEO - Jobs always talked about how product companies falter when marketing/sales/supply chain guys run the company and not product guys.

zimpenfish 10y ago
Your frequent reminded that people have said "They will coast for a while on their dominant mobile market share but eventually the stagnation and lack of new products will catch up to them" about Apple -every- -single- -year- since about 2007. And yet, they endure.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  I remember a different Apple around 1994 - 96, almost getting ready to close doors, if it hadn't been bought by NeXT (which is what actually happened).
  - yuhong 10y ago
    I was for a while thinking of the case where Apple bought NeXT, but Gil Amelio and later Ellen Hancock stayed as CEO. While PC margins was declining, I was thinking that Apple could mostly focus on the higher-end PC and workstation markets. I wonder how this would have compared to Tim Cook.
chapium 10y ago
The same could have been said about the ipod as well. It has little to do with computing and was marketed as a lifestyle product. Apple is notorious for being second to the market with its simplified vision of emerging tech.
- daxelrod 10y ago
  Agreed. I'm having trouble thinking of any product category where Apple was actually first to market.
  - xenadu02 10y ago
    > Agreed. I'm having trouble thinking of any product category where Apple was actually first to market The dirty little secret is that the first company to market with a new product category almost never succeeds. No one really knows what the market wants or what will make the whole thing come together and take off. Most of the time the discovery never even makes it to market because no one can figure out how to make a real product with it. Execution is as important as innovation. The iPod was transformative because it was paired with a music store. The iPhone was transformative because it was a pocket computer that happened to make phone calls and it broke the carrier's stranglehold on hardware and software. The Mac was the first widespread easy to use GUI. Yes, Xerox had the Alto. So what? They had no idea what to do with it and it was never terribly successful. When you take an ultra-reductionist approach you can dismiss anything. Dropbox wasn't the first one to sync files over a network. Oh Uber, it's just a fancy way to order a taxi. Airbnb: just a fancy version of classified ads. Instacart? I can pay anyone to go buy my groceries, rich people have been doing that for years. Stripe? We already have a million payment gateways!
- mwfunk 10y ago
  "Notorious" or "beloved"? What you're complaining about here is literally a huge part of why they're successful, and the reason so many people like their products. There are people who value "tech done first" over "tech done right", but those people are more known for their hot takes in tech blog comment sections than as a meaningful or lucrative target audience in the consumer electronics and computer industries.
LaSombra 10y ago
This image http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06-apple-magic-mouse-2-100622394-large.jpg http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06..., to me, simbolizes the recent Apple.
- samastur 10y ago
  Magic Mouse happened on Jobs' watch.
  - LaSombra 10y ago
    Well, it did, but the second iteration happened under Cook. The original one uses AA batteries while the second iteration, pictured above, uses an integrated battery that needs recharge using the Lightning cable. As you can see, there was no redesign to accommodate this new requirement besides slapping the charge port under the mouse, making it impossible to use while charging.
    - JustSomeNobody 10y ago
      It takes courage to make products that can't be used (fully) while they charge. Magic mouse, Macbook, now iPhone.
    - Bud 10y ago
      Which doesn't matter, at all, because the device charges in a few minutes. As everyone who actually uses one knows. BTW, there WAS a redesign...it's just that you don't like the redesign, which is different. Some of us like the fact that the Lightning port is hidden and not sticking out the side of the device in some ugly way. This is a vast improvement which saves all the waste and inconvenience of throw-away batteries.
      - JustSomeNobody 10y ago
        You're correct; it doesn't matter. Until it does. Edit: BTW, you'll eventually have to throw this mouse away because the battery is dead. And there are AA batteries that can be recharged and used many, many times.
robotresearcher 10y ago
> looking at the needs and demands of users inside the computing industry where apple should be focused. That approach would not have yielded the iPod, iPhone, or Music Store.
- 1_2__3 10y ago
  I would actually argue with on on the iPod. Back when they came out digital music players were still considered a kind of cutting-edge gadget, not something you'd expect a random punter to carry. It was in many ways the iPod's success that created that environment.
astrodust 10y ago
> He has moved the focus away from computers... The market moved away from computers, not Tim. PC sales are imploding, that whole market is a shell of what it used to be. A desktop computer is not an essential piece of kit any more, and even a laptop is a luxury. Many people survive almost exclusively on their phone or tablet, they have little to no need for an actual computer. IBM divested itself of desktop computers, HP's flirted with the idea for over a decade, and Dell had to undergo a huge restructuring just to survive. Every single PC manufacturer is getting pounded by dwindling sales. So yeah, he's a bozo.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

zimpenfish 10y ago

Your frequent reminded that people have said "They will coast for a while on their dominant mobile market share but eventually the stagnation and lack of new products will catch up to them" about Apple -every- -single- -year- since about 2007. And yet, they endure.

pjmlp 10y ago
I remember a different Apple around 1994 - 96, almost getting ready to close doors, if it hadn't been bought by NeXT (which is what actually happened).
- yuhong 10y ago
  I was for a while thinking of the case where Apple bought NeXT, but Gil Amelio and later Ellen Hancock stayed as CEO. While PC margins was declining, I was thinking that Apple could mostly focus on the higher-end PC and workstation markets. I wonder how this would have compared to Tim Cook.

chapium 10y ago

The same could have been said about the ipod as well. It has little to do with computing and was marketed as a lifestyle product. Apple is notorious for being second to the market with its simplified vision of emerging tech.

daxelrod 10y ago
Agreed. I'm having trouble thinking of any product category where Apple was actually first to market.
- xenadu02 10y ago
  > Agreed. I'm having trouble thinking of any product category where Apple was actually first to market The dirty little secret is that the first company to market with a new product category almost never succeeds. No one really knows what the market wants or what will make the whole thing come together and take off. Most of the time the discovery never even makes it to market because no one can figure out how to make a real product with it. Execution is as important as innovation. The iPod was transformative because it was paired with a music store. The iPhone was transformative because it was a pocket computer that happened to make phone calls and it broke the carrier's stranglehold on hardware and software. The Mac was the first widespread easy to use GUI. Yes, Xerox had the Alto. So what? They had no idea what to do with it and it was never terribly successful. When you take an ultra-reductionist approach you can dismiss anything. Dropbox wasn't the first one to sync files over a network. Oh Uber, it's just a fancy way to order a taxi. Airbnb: just a fancy version of classified ads. Instacart? I can pay anyone to go buy my groceries, rich people have been doing that for years. Stripe? We already have a million payment gateways!
mwfunk 10y ago
"Notorious" or "beloved"? What you're complaining about here is literally a huge part of why they're successful, and the reason so many people like their products. There are people who value "tech done first" over "tech done right", but those people are more known for their hot takes in tech blog comment sections than as a meaningful or lucrative target audience in the consumer electronics and computer industries.

LaSombra 10y ago

This image http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06-apple-magic-mouse-2-100622394-large.jpg http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06..., to me, simbolizes the recent Apple.

samastur 10y ago
Magic Mouse happened on Jobs' watch.
- LaSombra 10y ago
  Well, it did, but the second iteration happened under Cook. The original one uses AA batteries while the second iteration, pictured above, uses an integrated battery that needs recharge using the Lightning cable. As you can see, there was no redesign to accommodate this new requirement besides slapping the charge port under the mouse, making it impossible to use while charging.
  - JustSomeNobody 10y ago
    It takes courage to make products that can't be used (fully) while they charge. Magic mouse, Macbook, now iPhone.
  - Bud 10y ago
    Which doesn't matter, at all, because the device charges in a few minutes. As everyone who actually uses one knows. BTW, there WAS a redesign...it's just that you don't like the redesign, which is different. Some of us like the fact that the Lightning port is hidden and not sticking out the side of the device in some ugly way. This is a vast improvement which saves all the waste and inconvenience of throw-away batteries.
    - JustSomeNobody 10y ago
      You're correct; it doesn't matter. Until it does. Edit: BTW, you'll eventually have to throw this mouse away because the battery is dead. And there are AA batteries that can be recharged and used many, many times.

robotresearcher 10y ago

> looking at the needs and demands of users inside the computing industry where apple should be focused. That approach would not have yielded the iPod, iPhone, or Music Store.

1_2__3 10y ago
I would actually argue with on on the iPod. Back when they came out digital music players were still considered a kind of cutting-edge gadget, not something you'd expect a random punter to carry. It was in many ways the iPod's success that created that environment.

astrodust 10y ago

> He has moved the focus away from computers... The market moved away from computers, not Tim. PC sales are imploding, that whole market is a shell of what it used to be. A desktop computer is not an essential piece of kit any more, and even a laptop is a luxury. Many people survive almost exclusively on their phone or tablet, they have little to no need for an actual computer. IBM divested itself of desktop computers, HP's flirted with the idea for over a decade, and Dell had to undergo a huge restructuring just to survive. Every single PC manufacturer is getting pounded by dwindling sales. So yeah, he's a bozo.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]