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I didn't want to be this explicit with my point because I think it's patronizing. But your comment isn't responding to what I intended to say, so here it is. I'

I didn't want to be this explicit with my point because I think it's patronizing. But your comment isn't responding to what I intended to say, so here it is. I'm not talking about ideological design mandates and I'm not talking about perfect rationality. I'm talking about charitable estimation of competency and an assumption of baseline rationality. Apple is one of the most valuable and critically examined companies in the world, with 125,000 employees and end-to-end vertical integration across its hardware and software development process. In consideration of feedback from design decisions, like choosing to develop progressively thinner products, removing physical function keys and implementing touchbars, why would Apple make those decisions? More importantly, why would Apple double down on these decisions in a line refresh of the product 18 months after the initial launch? Presumably Apple is well aware of the number of developers who use their machines, and presumably Apple is aware of developer feedback (again: basic competency as an organization). So let's reframe this question as follows: why would Apple, with all its resources and talent for research and development, choose to double down on a controversial design mandate instead of rolling back the keyboard to the version most widely praised? A very reasonable answer is that customers in the aggregate - developers included - don't care that much about the touchbar or the virtual function keys, and will continue to buy the products. Regardless of my own opinion about the keyboard design, I try to approach this from the perspective that as a single individual with vastly fewer resources than Apple, I likely have a fundamentally less perfect understanding of Apple's product goals, customer demographic and design initiatives. So if I see an incongruence that seems to have a simple answer ("Why doesn't Apple just do the thing everyone clearly wants"), my instinct is that my priors are incorrect and/or it's actually not simple at all.

kolpa 8y ago
Apple has built a substantial quality lead over competitors, over the years. That gives them a lot of room to make mistakes (like removing a useful key from the keyboard) while maintaining sales. That doesn't mean every decision they make is perfect. Think of the thickness thing - Apple made billions of dollars before it wasn't even possible to make razor thin laptops. Is razor-thinness, to the point of losing port connectivity in a Pro device, really necessary or optimal?
scottlamb 8y ago
Your charitable estimation of Apple's competency and baseline rationality is a reasonable one and absolutely could be correct, and I agree it would follow that your priors are incorrect and/or it's actually not simple at all. But I find jdietrich's argument totally plausible. They could have tons of negative user feedback that they ignored. "They" probably being a handful of designers (so the total number of talented people at Apple is basically irrelevant). Apple's always had a certain arrogance. They (believe they) know what customers want better than their customers do: in this case a thinner and thinner laptop. Sometimes they're right. Sometimes they lose their way and I end up with a really expensive MacBook Pro that I hate typing on. I've certainly seen a few cases inside Google where a small team ignored dogfood feedback from other Googlers ("you aren't the user", basically), then were shocked when they got the same feedback from real users. It's absolutely possible for a small number of people inside a giant organization to make decisions that later bite them. I don't have any particular reason to believe Apple's immune to this.
jdietrich 8y ago
>why would Apple, with all its resources and talent for research and development, choose to double down on a controversial design mandate instead of rolling back the keyboard to the version most widely praised? Because their approach to design is completely unique. Their industrial design studio is small, insular and incredibly secretive. That studio has almost complete independence; most Apple employees won't see a new product until the design is finalised and ready for launch. They have an overt belief in the wisdom of ignoring user feedback and media criticism, going back to the original Macintosh. They don't think that their role is to provide people with what they want, but what they should want. https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Apple-Americas-Admired-Secretive-Company/dp/145551215X https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Apple-Americas-Admired-Secreti... That approach is one of Apple's greatest assets. They were right to ignore the people who said that a computer needed serial ports and a floppy disk drive. They were right to ignore the people who said that a phone needed buttons. They're willing to ignore conventional wisdom and the demands of the market in favour of a singular design vision for what technology should be. They're willing to tell their customers trust us, this is for the best. That approach is necessary if you're going to be a highly innovative company that creates entire new categories of product, but it's not right 100% of the time and it can be infuriatingly stubborn. The strain relief on the MagSafe connector was too short. Any cable manufacturer would tell you that it was too short. Any electrical engineer would tell you that it was too short. The internet was full of pictures of frayed (and sometimes charred) MagSafe cables. The Apple store website was full of one-star reviews for MagSafe power adaptors that had frayed. Apple did nothing for over five years until a class action forced their hand; they offered replacements, but didn't fix the defect.

kolpa 8y ago

Apple has built a substantial quality lead over competitors, over the years. That gives them a lot of room to make mistakes (like removing a useful key from the keyboard) while maintaining sales. That doesn't mean every decision they make is perfect. Think of the thickness thing - Apple made billions of dollars before it wasn't even possible to make razor thin laptops. Is razor-thinness, to the point of losing port connectivity in a Pro device, really necessary or optimal?

scottlamb 8y ago

Your charitable estimation of Apple's competency and baseline rationality is a reasonable one and absolutely could be correct, and I agree it would follow that your priors are incorrect and/or it's actually not simple at all. But I find jdietrich's argument totally plausible. They could have tons of negative user feedback that they ignored. "They" probably being a handful of designers (so the total number of talented people at Apple is basically irrelevant). Apple's always had a certain arrogance. They (believe they) know what customers want better than their customers do: in this case a thinner and thinner laptop. Sometimes they're right. Sometimes they lose their way and I end up with a really expensive MacBook Pro that I hate typing on. I've certainly seen a few cases inside Google where a small team ignored dogfood feedback from other Googlers ("you aren't the user", basically), then were shocked when they got the same feedback from real users. It's absolutely possible for a small number of people inside a giant organization to make decisions that later bite them. I don't have any particular reason to believe Apple's immune to this.

jdietrich 8y ago

>why would Apple, with all its resources and talent for research and development, choose to double down on a controversial design mandate instead of rolling back the keyboard to the version most widely praised? Because their approach to design is completely unique. Their industrial design studio is small, insular and incredibly secretive. That studio has almost complete independence; most Apple employees won't see a new product until the design is finalised and ready for launch. They have an overt belief in the wisdom of ignoring user feedback and media criticism, going back to the original Macintosh. They don't think that their role is to provide people with what they want, but what they should want. https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Apple-Americas-Admired-Secretive-Company/dp/145551215X https://www.amazon.com/Inside-Apple-Americas-Admired-Secreti... That approach is one of Apple's greatest assets. They were right to ignore the people who said that a computer needed serial ports and a floppy disk drive. They were right to ignore the people who said that a phone needed buttons. They're willing to ignore conventional wisdom and the demands of the market in favour of a singular design vision for what technology should be. They're willing to tell their customers trust us, this is for the best. That approach is necessary if you're going to be a highly innovative company that creates entire new categories of product, but it's not right 100% of the time and it can be infuriatingly stubborn. The strain relief on the MagSafe connector was too short. Any cable manufacturer would tell you that it was too short. Any electrical engineer would tell you that it was too short. The internet was full of pictures of frayed (and sometimes charred) MagSafe cables. The Apple store website was full of one-star reviews for MagSafe power adaptors that had frayed. Apple did nothing for over five years until a class action forced their hand; they offered replacements, but didn't fix the defect.