14 ms·

On Jony Ive Leaving Apple

529 points by deca6cda37d0 7y ago

gigatexal 7y ago
Damn. This is not good. But I understand. He has other interests. And it’s time to check those out. That the other remaining design people will report to the COO sounds like design by committee which could be terrible. But then it could be great. Time will tell.
jph 7y ago
Suppose you're Jony Ive, and you've designed so much for Apple-- computers, fonts, even Apple Park-- what would entice you to leave? I speculate his reason must be to design something massively popular, that so many people in the world touch every day, that blends computers and architecture. And that his reason must a project so big that it can't reasonably fit inside Apple Park, both in terms of physical space and in terms of manufacturing partnerships where the team must be on site. I speculate he's leaving Apple to design the Apple car. Replies: 1) If Ive wanted to retire, I'd expect he could; he has mountains of money, and has achieved tremendous success in the marketplace. 2) If Ive were forced out, I'd expect an announcement akin to "will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook", not "founding an agency with Apple as a client". 3) Why leave now? Because Apple just bought a big piece of the car project, Drive.ai.
- CharlesW 7y ago
  > I speculate he's leaving Apple to design the Apple car. If you think Gruber is correct ("You’re either at Apple or you’re not" rings very true to me), Ive is done with Apple. The completion of Apple Park represents the culmination of his transition to architecture.
  - christoph 7y ago
    The problem becomes where he would go (that is, what he would build) next. He's designed the HQ of one of the biggest companies in the world down to the smallest details. A company so deeply intertwined with his own persona and DNA. Bizarrely, I can see him somewhat disappearing off into the sunset - he might still do some design work when he chooses and have some passion projects, but outside of Apple, it's deadlines, limitless budgets, ability to acquire anything it deems necessary, etc. maybe he's achieved all he wants to?
    - mrep 7y ago
      > Bizarrely Why Bizarrely? The guy is probably worth millions if not tens of millions. He can probably live a lavish life off of 4% gains for the rest of his life and there is nothing wrong with that.
      - contingencies 7y ago
        He owns a (large) private jet. He's worth many tens to hundreds of millions, if not billions. Probably owns significant Apple stock plus average of at least mid six figure salary times decades.
      - Skunkleton 7y ago
        > The guy is probably worth millions if not tens of millions. The guy is worth north of 400 million.
      - necroforest 7y ago
        try hundreds... or at least, he was worth ~130m in 2013.
      - christoph 7y ago
        I would guess hundreds of millions, if not way more. I'm sure his salary was reported as being $30m base + $25m stock per year back in 2011. I said bizarrely because in these situations the media & general public seem to always think that people like this can't survive without work. The guy is undoubtedly incredibly passionate about design and almost certainly a workaholic. The grandparent is talking about him going on design the future of automobiles - maybe, maybe not. It felt like I was suggesting something against the grain, which was why I prefaced it with "bizarrely".
      - simonebrunozzi 7y ago
        Probably ~$450M, give or take.
    - camillomiller 7y ago
      You’re underestimating the luxury industry... there’s plenty of 1%-era willing to pay for an outrageously expensive door handle designed by Ive
  - nikofeyn 7y ago
    given the expected reaction to apple park by employees and high level VPs (one who reportedly refused to work there), i am sure ive will continue to find “success” in his quest in taking the rectangle and circle to the extreme.
- paxy 7y ago
  > leaving Apple to design the Apple car Play that again in your head
  - corndoge 7y ago
    If this is a foreign concept to you, research the many companies that Cisco spun off to develop new technology and subsequently spun back in. While not a common pattern it is a recognizable one. It is possible that is what is happening here.
- zild3d 7y ago
  > and you've designed so much for Apple-- computers, fonts, even Apple Park-- what would entice you to leave? Designing things for not Apple. Not designing for just 1 brand anymore.
  - JustSomeNobody 7y ago
    This. Designers and creatives move on eventually because they have to to get the juices flowing again. Even Ive was constrained by "what it means to be Apple." Now, he doesn't have that constraint. And no, I don't think he alone fully got to design what it meant to be Apple.
- utopcell 7y ago
  A car is significantly more complicated than its design language. It would probably make sense to contract for designing the next Tesla car, which he would not be able to do while at Apple.
- nonconvergent 7y ago
  Ive designed Apple Park? Suddenly the glass windows employees kept walking into and getting concussions makes TOO MUCH SENSE. https://futurism.com/apple-employees-windows-headquarters https://futurism.com/apple-employees-windows-headquarters
  - wmeredith 7y ago
    Unapologetically clear.
- discordance 7y ago
  Maslow's heirarchy would have been achieved a while back for him. What's the extension of that?
  - bodi 7y ago
    Meaning making, service, philanthrophy.
- unsignedchar 7y ago
  Or maybe a real spaceship, for which the new Apple HQ was the prototype?
- cgy1 7y ago
  I know he's previously talked about wanting his kids to grow up in the UK. Perhaps having finished Apple Park closes one chapter of his life and finally gives him a good enough of a reason to go back to the UK.
  - tpowell 7y ago
    I thought he was already splitting his time between London and Cupertino around the time he took on his grander title several years ago. Apple Park was likely a rewarding (new!) endeavor, but their largely iterative product line probably doesn't inspire like it did in earlier years, and he's built a well-oiled machine of a design team to carry the torch (I agree with Gruber on needing a design decider, though). Being halfway around the world from your true home for work with hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank gets old. He's definitley made his dent in the universe.
- pnash 7y ago
  How many companies besides Apple can afford to bring Ive on as a contractor and implement his level of perfection? How many companies will continue investing until they have the perfect color “white”, the new ceramics, or the unibody designs that require completely new tooling? I worry that Ive will quickly grow frustrated when he realizes that he is a consultant, and at the end of the day, it will be the company that makes the final decision.Will Ive want his name to be associated with an object that was deemed “good enough” by the hiring company? Understanding the culture of an organization, the strengths and weaknesses of its executives, what the organization is capable as a whole.. that kind of access and connection comes when you are deeply integrated within it. As consultant, you are an external party, an outsider. No matter how good your ideas are, it is up to the client to decide whether or not they will be implemented. I see Ive as the next Terry Gilliam trying to pitch Brazil! to a set of executives, except Gilliam was able to work with Criterion to ultimately release a 3 version box set: his version, what the executives wanted, and what was released in the theatre. Three completely different movies that highlight the clueless executives and the genius of Gilliam. Or maybe he spends some time with his family and is a secret force behind the scenes, donating time to universities and design schools, trying to encourage the next generation.
  - cat199 7y ago
    why does he have to work 'for' anyone? seems to be loaded & well connected enough to easily do several of his own things..
    - evancox100 7y ago
      The announcement literally says he will be starting his own design firm, and presumably said firm will perform work on behalf of clients.
      - cat199 7y ago
        with capital, having your own firm doesn't have to mean 'working for', one can just as easily 'work with' or initiate one's own collaborations
- lonelappde 7y ago
  He's probably semi retiring, so he's setting up a company where he can set his own hours and projects and do whatever he wants while getting a percentage of the revenue.
  - dwaite 7y ago
    It will also likely be in the UK.
- sidcool 7y ago
  The biggest thing to entice most people could be an individualistic legacy. Under Apple, Ive's designs are not his own. With a separate entity, Ive probably intends to have products under his name that have massive impact.
- futhey 7y ago
  Just an opinion, but the most capitalized company on earth spending less than $10m on some engineering talent or patents from Drive.ai shouldn't lead one to speculate. Agree with your line of thinking though. It's more interesting to speculate on what could lure someone like that away, than just assume the mundane.
Isamu 7y ago
>Today’s MacBooks are worse computers but more beautiful devices than the ones they replaced. Is that directly attributable to Jony Ive? With these keyboards in particular, I believe the answer is yes. Until now design was king at Apple. Will his departure bring balance back, or will design lose out to the other teams?
- Shivetya 7y ago
  well maybe they will start designing again for the customers that made Apple Mac products popular. I swear for the last five or so years Apple was designing for themselves and with the Mac Pro for people they thought deserved to be their customer and not the customers they had; as in the ones that badgered them for a replacement at a similar price point to the trash can which itself was designed for who?
  - _jal 7y ago
    I'm not sure which segment in particular you have in mind, but whichever one, I'm pretty sure the answer is "no". The big problem with that is that they are utterly enormous; all of their "traditional" niches combined are dwarfed by their casual user base. Creative professionals are just not a big market, comparatively; neither are folks who just want a great unix laptop. (And command line nerds in particular are becoming less and less welcome; this is why I'm probably typing on my last Mac.) But the second problem is that, even if somehow Ives leaving meant that the scales fell from every Apple employee's eyes and suddenly they all wanted to put back the scripting languages, make machines specifically dedicated to running Pro Tools or After Effects and bundle every mac with a copy of 3 in Three, they still have a multiyear product pipeline. You don't turn that ship quickly.
    - nikanj 7y ago
      Meanwhile Microsoft is bending over backwards to cater to the command line geeks. Would not have predicted this a few years ago. Apparently they’ve remembered the old ”Developers developers developers” mantra again.
petilon 7y ago
> Ive is, to state the obvious, preternaturally talented. But in the post-Jobs era, with all of Apple design, hardware and software, under his control, we’ve seen the software design decline and the hardware go wonky. These two sentences don't make sense when read together. If Apple design -- hardware and software -- declined during Ive's rein that, to me, is evidence that Ive is not preternaturally talented. The moment iOS 7 was unveiled at WWDC I knew Emperor Ive is wearing no clothes. The number of basic design mistakes iOS 7 was astounding.
- coatol5 7y ago
  Mind catching me up on what was wrong with iOS7?
  - emsy 7y ago
    The number one issue that's slowly getting fixed is not knowing which text is clickable or just a label. Then there were slow animations, arguably bad icons and inconsistent font usage. That's what I remember at least, I hope my memory's not failing me.
    - sprafa 7y ago
      Some of the very early icons were so garish I remember being astonished by them.
    - lonelappde 7y ago
      The main thing was the horrific unreadable Helvetica Neue Ultralight system font.
    - samstave 7y ago
      If your memory is failing you, please make an appointment at the Genius Bar and someone will tell you why your memory is out of warranty and you just need to buy a new body. Simple! Also - you may try talking to Peter Thiel to inject your memory with more life essence... Oh wait, that may have been the Skeksis!!!
  - 7y ago
Skunkleton 7y ago
> I don’t worry that Apple is in trouble because Jony Ive is leaving; I worry that Apple is in trouble because he’s not being replaced. I'm sorry, but I don't understand why out of all of the skill sets that go into creating a product, "design" should be the only one with a dedicated C-level executive. To me it seems much healthier for the needs of the mechanical engineers (for example) to have equal weight with the needs of the designers.
- armadsen 7y ago
  Because design is extremely and uniquely important to Apple’s success compared to its competitors. It’s why you know who Jony Ive is and have no idea who is responsible for mechanical engineering at Apple. (I say this as an engineer myself.)
  - Skunkleton 7y ago
    The importance of design at apple is completely irrefutable. All I am saying is that Apple should avoid more butterfly switch fiascos, and one way to do that is to put the designers on a level playing field.
    - azernik 7y ago
      Industrial design includes functionality. Ives' problem wasn't that he put design over other things; it's that he put form over function in his design decisions and had a very narrow set of design principles (minimalism, thinness) that he followed too religiously.
  - HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
    How much does design impact what you are and are not allowed to do? Are you, as an engineer, required to use Macs, or can you use a PC as well?
- rorykoehler 7y ago
  Designing is strategy engineering is detail. Engineering sits one level below design in the decision chain. It's the same reason the CTO is C-suite and the VP of Engineering isn't.
mc32 7y ago
Gruber is trying to read the tea leaves, but I think he's overconfident in his read. Also, I really don't get the Monday Night quarterbacking that's evident throughout his whole piece. Maybe he's upset, maybe he's held back and now feels free to offer opinion --but I think it's just that. An abrupt opinion. That said, I wonder who Apple will try to snatch? Who are some other good designers out there? MS has some nice HW design. Google to me does not. Nokia? I'm sure there are some others, but can't think of any ATM.
- draw_down 7y ago
  > I think it's just that. An abrupt opinion. Well, that is what Gruber’s blog is for, isn’t it. Gruber’s opinions. Edit: just saw Mossberg describe Gruber’s post as “right on the nose”. Believe what you like.
- robmiller 7y ago
  MS outsources some of their product industrial design, https://pensar.com/project-gallery/consumer/ https://pensar.com/project-gallery/consumer/
  - statictype 7y ago
    They also outsource some of their artwork as well. https://www.frogdesign.com/portfolio/microsoft-office https://www.frogdesign.com/portfolio/microsoft-office
- brianpgordon 7y ago
  Perhaps some top talent might be enticed to flee the ailing Huawei? There's also Samsung.
- hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
  I'd don't really agree with what you and many other commenters seem to be saying that Gruber is "Monday Night quarterbacking" or bashing Ive. I mean, he says Ive is a "preternaturally talented designer" but that post Jobs that "software design has declined and hardware gone wonky." Does anyone really disagree with that statement? Ive is amazing but Ive and Jobs were magic. I think the bigger thrust of Gruber's piece is his closing sentence, with which I wholeheartedly agree: "I don’t worry that Apple is in trouble because Jony Ive is leaving; I worry that Apple is in trouble because he’s not being replaced."
olliej 7y ago
I share his concerns about not appointing a C level design executive. You need design (at Apple) to not be cost driven
- Kovah 7y ago
  I can imagine that there is actually nobody who wants to be the new CDO. I mean.. you would have to take over the design lead for the world's most valuable company. Also take over what I've created and build up on this. But also be prepared to be talked down by existing folks at Apple to follow their expectations, like "you have no clue what we really need". Someone with great bravery and mental strength would be needed here. I am not that into design at all so excuse my question: is there someone who would probably be the perfect fit for this position, at least design-wise?
- UIZealot 7y ago
  Jony Ive had been the CDO for years and the results weren't great. It's not that Jony Ive isn't a great designer. It's just that it's difficult to judge your own work, no matter how good you are. What they need, more than a CDO, is someone who they have to run every design by, someone (EDIT: with an impeccable eye) who is not afraid to say no. In other words, someone who can fill the role Steve Jobs used to play. I, for one, nominate the great John Siracusa, for this job. See http://hypercritical.co/fatbits/2009/05/06/hypercritical http://hypercritical.co/fatbits/2009/05/06/hypercritical
  - unethical_ban 7y ago
    Why isn't that Cook? Without knowing Apple internally, the point is that the staff under the COO (if the "C"s have their own divisions) are the back office, the accounting, HR, IT, and other shared services accross an organization. There isn't necessarily creativity as a mission.
    - UIZealot 7y ago
      Cook would've been perfect if he had that critical eye, and he would've been the perfect replacement for Steve Jobs then. Alas, he's an operations guy, design is not really his forte. And that, my friend, is the reason we are in this nine circle of flat design hell.
cat199 7y ago
> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The 1 second it took me to google revealed he is British, and apple is all about showing off your "class".. so yeah.
- ruytlm 7y ago
  This baffled me as well. The US may not grant titles of nobility, but it has an awful lot of other titles that are given and used similarly; in my experience typically military ranks, or former political office titles. Also, Ive's title may not have been awarded by the US, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be acknowledged in what is an official piece of communication from one of the worlds largest companies. To be facetious, one could also say that it is a surprise to hear outrage at the use of 'Sir' given that everyone in the US seems to call everyone else 'sir' or 'ma'am' all the time.
  - _jal 7y ago
    There is a tradition of anti-nobility sentiment in US culture as old as, well, the US. It is literally written into the Constitution[1]. How much you were exposed to it probably depends on where you grew up; I think it is louder in the north east, and I don't hear it much in California. Personally, I am more annoyed at being sir-ed constantly. I much prefer to reserve it as a genuine term of respect, not a generic form of address. [1] Article I, section 9.
    - bin0 7y ago
      > I think it is louder in the north east Loud in the South, certainly. That's how I was raised, and it's used as a respectful, though somewhat common/generic, term of address. I don't know that I or many Americans would be comfortable with the social implications of referring to some one as "sir" out of respect the way you describe it; it implies superiority rather than respect.
  - ronilan 7y ago
    The “Titles of Nobility Amendment” [1] to the constitution was never ratified by the states (though it did pass Congress), and the Canadian Nickle Resolution [2] was never enacted as a law, but the idea they convey is as clear and as valid today as it was back then. I have never seen any mention of this issue in public forums, so I think it is good that Gruber brings it up. And I kind of like how succinctly he puts it: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in America. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titles_of_Nobility_Amendment https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titles_of_Nobility_Amendment [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_titles_debate https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_titles_debate
doe88 7y ago
I respect John Gruber but on this one I find it a bit too easy to lash-out (rightly or wrongly) on Jony Ive only when the man stepped-out of his job at Apple. It would have been a bit more courageous to have said these things when he was still there. More on the point though, I'm not in the camp of those believing that in this day and age in a company as big as Apple you can assign all the mistakes (or successes) to a single man. For instance, to think Jony Ive being even remotely responsible for the keyboard debacle seems preposterous to me.
- dangwu 7y ago
  > For instance, to think Jony Ive being even remotely responsible for the keyboard debacle seems preposterous to me. I can definitely picture a world where Jony’s ruthless push for thin and light resulted in the butterfly keyboard.
- nilkn 7y ago
  To be an executive is to be responsible for execution. Someone who allows major blunders to happen under their watch is not a successful executive, whether they were personally responsible or not. You can't make excuses as an executive. You can't say "there wasn't enough quality control," because you have the power to create the quality control process necessary to prevent the blunder. You can't say "I wasn't aware there was this risk of keyboard defects," because you have the power to create reporting structures that will surface such risks to all key stakeholders, including you. You can't say "I didn't have time to focus on functional deficiencies or risks because I was focused on aesthetics," because you have the power to hire and delegate to the most talented employees in the world; you have the power to do whatever is necessary so that you do have the time to focus on what needs to be focused on. You can't say "I didn't worry about functional risks because I wanted to focus on design," because your job is to execute, not to do what you want to do.
  - tornadron 7y ago
    ...Steve Jobs folklore: Steve Jobs told employees a short story when they were promoted to vice president at Apple. Jobs would tell the VP that if the garbage in his office was not being emptied, Jobs would naturally demand an explanation from the janitor. "Well, the lock on the door was changed,' the janitor could reasonably respond. "And I couldn't get a key." The janitor's response is reasonable. It's an understandable excuse. The janitor can't do his job without a key. As a janitor, he's allowed to have excuses. "When you're the janitor, reasons matter," Jobs told his newly-minted VPs. "Somewhere between the janitor and the CEO, reasons stop mattering." "In other words,' (Jobs continued,) "when the employee becomes a vice president, he or she must vacate all excuses for failure. A vice president is responsible for any mistakes that happen, and it doesn't matter what you say."
deleted 7y ago
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brandonfro 7y ago
I remember reading somewhere that Jony said if he weren’t designing computers he would like to be designing cups.
- dokem 7y ago
  Sounds hyperbolic.
archagon 7y ago
Why is this article attributing the San Francisco font design to Ive?
- panacea 7y ago
  He singed off on it.
povertyworld 7y ago
Everyone is talking about the keyboards, but I want to know about the Mac Pros. I'm assuming Ive is responsible for the cylinder, but is he involved in the return to the cheese grater, or did that happen while he was off designing glass doors at the Apple building? The keyboards aren't the first stinker on Ive's watch.
- zoeysaurusrex 7y ago
  Sure, you are pointing out his failings, but I’d say his successes outnumber his failings.
- mantap 7y ago
  Learned helplessness runs wild at Apple. If you listen to them, they say that with the trashcan they had "designed themselves into a corner", and that's why it took them six years to design a new enclosure. As if it is beyond the capabilities of one of the world's richest and most powerful corporations to design a new enclosure every year. The trashcan Mac Pro was OK. The design was perhaps uninspired but it did provide adequate cooling for the 2013 Xeons that they were using. It so transpired that the design did not provide ample cooling for Intel's recent CPUs. But so what? Just change it. The actual problem with the 2013 Mac Pro was operational. They decided to build it in the US. They made a big, high-tech factory with a large degree of automation. That's a great way to build a high volume product. It's a terrible way to build a $3000 niche computer.
  - usrusr 7y ago
    > They made a big, high-tech factory with a large degree of automation. That's a great way to build a high volume product. It's a terrible way to build a $3000 niche computer. The hidden cost of high wages: automation induced product inflexibility. It's not even limited to low-volume products: if you had 100x the demand and the production capacity to match, you'd still want to run your expensive automation pipeline mostly unchanged for almost as many years as with a low-volume product. Only some of the up-front cost of automation is fixed per product change, another part is fixed per throughput * product change and this part will hit you at 100/day as hard as at 10000/day.
jmull 7y ago
> I’ve never been an “Apple is doomed without Steve Jobs” person. But... Ah, pundits believe Apple Is Doomed! The sentiment is reassuring. All seems well.
1-6 7y ago
The title should have been, "Jony Ive left Apple" You've missed a sweet opportunity...
EGreg 7y ago
I ain’t John Gruber. But here was my take a few years ago and I stand by it today: http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=234 http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=234
coherentpony 7y ago
> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The Title of Nobility Clause prevents the federal government from granting titles of nobility. That's it. It doesn't prevent other countries from granting them to their citizens, and Ive is British. There are plenty of titles that aren't of nobility in the US. Here's a few: Mr. President, Congresswoman, General, Colonel, and Mayor.
- gchokov 7y ago
  Indeed. Plus some people think the United States is the only country on this planet.
  - sosborn 7y ago
    Or, perhaps, Gruber was just adding in some humor.
- wbronitsky 7y ago
  What’s with the unnecessary pedantry here? It is getting exhausting to see people on HN constantly resorting to common denominator pedantry
- markdown 7y ago
  Doctor.
- itronitron 7y ago
  It's certainly possible that Apple addressed him as 'Sir Jony Ive' in the memo to make him appear as a pompous ass to the rest of the company, so that they would be happier about his leaving.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
thomasjudge 7y ago
I would go John Gruber one further and say that Apple needs not just a chief design officer, but a chief PRODUCT officer. Steve Jobs was not just a design guru, he was a PRODUCT guru. Design is an integral element to Apple products, but product strategy is more than just design. The obsession with thinness that Gruber cites is one way in which Apple's design - and product - strategy has gone off the rails, but there are many others. What is the Macbook product strategy and segmentation strategy anymore? Why did it take FIVE YEARS to get a redesigned Mac Pro out? I could go on..
- dang 7y ago
  Could you please not use allcaps for emphasis? This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
- _ph_ 7y ago
  Best comment I have read so far. While Apple certainly is a company, where the head designer is rightfully one of the most influential positions, it should be the lead position as it was in the recent years. The golden years were those, where Steve Jobs was the chief product officer. The person, who can tell designers when they start making something look nicer but less useful. The MacBook keyboard disaster was only the tip of the iceberg, where the keyboard just wouldn't work properly. But it runs much deeper. The whole non-serviceability of their computers and the limitations which cut down in the usability. Just think of the glued together iMacs. The iMac is already a controversial product, having an all-in-one machine as their main desktop product. But why should is it impossible to easily access its components for the limited things you can do with them? As it turns out, the early iMacs were reasonably accessible. I still have a G5 iMac, which can be opened with a single screw drsiver. So unless it was someone else forcing these decisions onto Ive, I think he really was missing Steve in recent years and there was no one at Apple to really challenge him. And however good and talented anyone is, I think to go from a good idea to a great product, everyone needs to be challenged at each step. Only through the following discussions the necessary refinements can be recognized and achieved.
- pas 7y ago
  Design used to refer to product design. And chief product guys/gals do product design. The two are inseparable, because they are the same. Maybe design got associated with aesthetics more and product with functionality and interaction, but this kind of reductionism is harmful.
beardedman 7y ago
I don't understand the unnecessary tone John Gruber uses in this article. > Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The US isn't the only country on the map (surprisingly enough, I know). And who cares if Jony Ive is starting his own thing? Why would that be "pure spin"? Apple is not in its renaissance days anymore - whilst Jony Ive might have been critical back then - Apple is just not the same company anymore. There are a lot more people responsible for the "magic" these days (which is a good thing).
- jedberg 7y ago
  Yeah that bugged me too. We still call the Queen "Queen" even when she's in the US. We don't assign titles of nobility, but we certainly respect them.
  - nostromo 7y ago
    “Queen” is a title, like “president” or even “janitor.” “Sir” is an honorific. Like “his holiness” or “your honor” or “her majesty.” We use titles all the time in the US but rarely use honorifics (with a few exceptions).
    - nikanj 7y ago
      Doctors and reverends are called with honorifics all the time.
    - DoreenMichele 7y ago
      In the Deep South, it's not that unusual to say Mr./Ms. (First name) as a show of respect. When I worked at Aflac, the sole remaining (living) founder, Paul Amos, was routinely internally referred to as Mr. Paul.
  - lazugod 7y ago
    I don’t think Americans unanimously respect titles of nobility, and I think Gruber’s point is that he personally doesn’t respect them and wishes Apple didn’t respect them either. Whether this is a consistent point of his, whether Gruber has always referred to the Queen as Elizabeth Windsor, I don’t know. But I wouldn’t conflate convenience with respect. “The Queen” is a very easy name to remember and use informally without necessarily supporting monarchy. Like, I wouldn’t call Captain Blackbeard “Captain Blackbeard” out of respect for piracy.
jpswade 7y ago
> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. That's pretty disrespectful and ignorant to other cultures and customs. It made me realise that this whole article is really spiteful and negative. It doesn't contribute anything to making things better.
- camillomiller 7y ago
  I agree with the Sir part, but it’s clearly Gruber’s irony there. The article being negative isn’t a proper critique though: it’s a pundit writing, it’s not their role to make things better, but to point out fallacies and pain points. He did, in my opinion quite properly.
- Doctor_Fegg 7y ago
  Exactly. Ive is a British citizen and the story was broken in the Financial Times, a British newspaper. Maybe we should have just referred to plain "Barack Obama" over here because fuck this President shit, we don't have an elected head of state in the United Kingdom?
  - founderling 7y ago
    and the story was broken in the Financial Times, a British newspaper. He is quoting and criticizing the Apple website.
  - acomjean 7y ago
    President is his job. Best I can tell, Sir is a title bestowed by the monarchy on people they like.
    - Doctor_Fegg 7y ago
      According to Wikipedia: > all living former U.S. Presidents continue to be addressed as "Mr. President" President isn't Obama's job any more. Sadly.
    - wyclif 7y ago
AJRF 7y ago
Could you DREAM of a world where DaringFireball posted an article disrespecting and demeaning Sir Jony Ive this time last week? What use is a pundit like this when they are on rails to just spin any and every piece of Apple news to protect the mothership, at this point any words from Gruber have lost all objectivity.
n1000 7y ago
To me it seems like somebody is afraid to make a tough decision. There have been indications that Ive wants to get out for quite a while. So they offered him more and more to make him stay. As the article says, they promoted his C-level job to a A-level one. They gave him ever more freedom, power, and probably money. Now came the point where his willingness to leave became too big. The obvious choice would have been a full divorce. Of course that is hard. But now Apple is basically outsourcing one of its core competences, product design. That is both dangerous and embarrassing for such an iconic company.
- randomsearch 7y ago
  Surely the outsourcing is just spin to try to retain employees who would otherwise jump ship when the second half of the amazing partnership departs.
- dbbk 7y ago
  > But now Apple is basically outsourcing one of its core competences, product design. The leadership of the design team is still in place. All Jony has been in recent years is essentially a Creative Director overseeing them. It's not like all of Apple's product design is now being handled by an outside company.
  - bayareanative 7y ago
    Yes, although IDEO could probably do a better job.
baxuz 7y ago
Wow this website is bad. Almost as bad as HN

529 points by deca6cda37d0 7y ago

Damn. This is not good. But I understand. He has other interests. And it’s time to check those out. That the other remaining design people will report to the COO sounds like design by committee which could be terrible. But then it could be great. Time will tell.

jph 7y ago

Suppose you're Jony Ive, and you've designed so much for Apple-- computers, fonts, even Apple Park-- what would entice you to leave? I speculate his reason must be to design something massively popular, that so many people in the world touch every day, that blends computers and architecture. And that his reason must a project so big that it can't reasonably fit inside Apple Park, both in terms of physical space and in terms of manufacturing partnerships where the team must be on site. I speculate he's leaving Apple to design the Apple car. Replies: 1) If Ive wanted to retire, I'd expect he could; he has mountains of money, and has achieved tremendous success in the marketplace. 2) If Ive were forced out, I'd expect an announcement akin to "will serve as an advisor to CEO Tim Cook", not "founding an agency with Apple as a client". 3) Why leave now? Because Apple just bought a big piece of the car project, Drive.ai.

CharlesW 7y ago
> I speculate he's leaving Apple to design the Apple car. If you think Gruber is correct ("You’re either at Apple or you’re not" rings very true to me), Ive is done with Apple. The completion of Apple Park represents the culmination of his transition to architecture.
- christoph 7y ago
  The problem becomes where he would go (that is, what he would build) next. He's designed the HQ of one of the biggest companies in the world down to the smallest details. A company so deeply intertwined with his own persona and DNA. Bizarrely, I can see him somewhat disappearing off into the sunset - he might still do some design work when he chooses and have some passion projects, but outside of Apple, it's deadlines, limitless budgets, ability to acquire anything it deems necessary, etc. maybe he's achieved all he wants to?
  - mrep 7y ago
    > Bizarrely Why Bizarrely? The guy is probably worth millions if not tens of millions. He can probably live a lavish life off of 4% gains for the rest of his life and there is nothing wrong with that.
    - contingencies 7y ago
      He owns a (large) private jet. He's worth many tens to hundreds of millions, if not billions. Probably owns significant Apple stock plus average of at least mid six figure salary times decades.
    - Skunkleton 7y ago
      > The guy is probably worth millions if not tens of millions. The guy is worth north of 400 million.
    - necroforest 7y ago
      try hundreds... or at least, he was worth ~130m in 2013.
    - christoph 7y ago
      I would guess hundreds of millions, if not way more. I'm sure his salary was reported as being $30m base + $25m stock per year back in 2011. I said bizarrely because in these situations the media & general public seem to always think that people like this can't survive without work. The guy is undoubtedly incredibly passionate about design and almost certainly a workaholic. The grandparent is talking about him going on design the future of automobiles - maybe, maybe not. It felt like I was suggesting something against the grain, which was why I prefaced it with "bizarrely".
    - simonebrunozzi 7y ago
      Probably ~$450M, give or take.
  - camillomiller 7y ago
    You’re underestimating the luxury industry... there’s plenty of 1%-era willing to pay for an outrageously expensive door handle designed by Ive
- nikofeyn 7y ago
  given the expected reaction to apple park by employees and high level VPs (one who reportedly refused to work there), i am sure ive will continue to find “success” in his quest in taking the rectangle and circle to the extreme.
paxy 7y ago
> leaving Apple to design the Apple car Play that again in your head
- corndoge 7y ago
  If this is a foreign concept to you, research the many companies that Cisco spun off to develop new technology and subsequently spun back in. While not a common pattern it is a recognizable one. It is possible that is what is happening here.
zild3d 7y ago
> and you've designed so much for Apple-- computers, fonts, even Apple Park-- what would entice you to leave? Designing things for not Apple. Not designing for just 1 brand anymore.
- JustSomeNobody 7y ago
  This. Designers and creatives move on eventually because they have to to get the juices flowing again. Even Ive was constrained by "what it means to be Apple." Now, he doesn't have that constraint. And no, I don't think he alone fully got to design what it meant to be Apple.
utopcell 7y ago
A car is significantly more complicated than its design language. It would probably make sense to contract for designing the next Tesla car, which he would not be able to do while at Apple.
nonconvergent 7y ago
Ive designed Apple Park? Suddenly the glass windows employees kept walking into and getting concussions makes TOO MUCH SENSE. https://futurism.com/apple-employees-windows-headquarters https://futurism.com/apple-employees-windows-headquarters
- wmeredith 7y ago
  Unapologetically clear.
discordance 7y ago
Maslow's heirarchy would have been achieved a while back for him. What's the extension of that?
- bodi 7y ago
  Meaning making, service, philanthrophy.
unsignedchar 7y ago
Or maybe a real spaceship, for which the new Apple HQ was the prototype?
cgy1 7y ago
I know he's previously talked about wanting his kids to grow up in the UK. Perhaps having finished Apple Park closes one chapter of his life and finally gives him a good enough of a reason to go back to the UK.
- tpowell 7y ago
  I thought he was already splitting his time between London and Cupertino around the time he took on his grander title several years ago. Apple Park was likely a rewarding (new!) endeavor, but their largely iterative product line probably doesn't inspire like it did in earlier years, and he's built a well-oiled machine of a design team to carry the torch (I agree with Gruber on needing a design decider, though). Being halfway around the world from your true home for work with hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank gets old. He's definitley made his dent in the universe.
pnash 7y ago
How many companies besides Apple can afford to bring Ive on as a contractor and implement his level of perfection? How many companies will continue investing until they have the perfect color “white”, the new ceramics, or the unibody designs that require completely new tooling? I worry that Ive will quickly grow frustrated when he realizes that he is a consultant, and at the end of the day, it will be the company that makes the final decision.Will Ive want his name to be associated with an object that was deemed “good enough” by the hiring company? Understanding the culture of an organization, the strengths and weaknesses of its executives, what the organization is capable as a whole.. that kind of access and connection comes when you are deeply integrated within it. As consultant, you are an external party, an outsider. No matter how good your ideas are, it is up to the client to decide whether or not they will be implemented. I see Ive as the next Terry Gilliam trying to pitch Brazil! to a set of executives, except Gilliam was able to work with Criterion to ultimately release a 3 version box set: his version, what the executives wanted, and what was released in the theatre. Three completely different movies that highlight the clueless executives and the genius of Gilliam. Or maybe he spends some time with his family and is a secret force behind the scenes, donating time to universities and design schools, trying to encourage the next generation.
- cat199 7y ago
  why does he have to work 'for' anyone? seems to be loaded & well connected enough to easily do several of his own things..
  - evancox100 7y ago
    The announcement literally says he will be starting his own design firm, and presumably said firm will perform work on behalf of clients.
    - cat199 7y ago
      with capital, having your own firm doesn't have to mean 'working for', one can just as easily 'work with' or initiate one's own collaborations
lonelappde 7y ago
He's probably semi retiring, so he's setting up a company where he can set his own hours and projects and do whatever he wants while getting a percentage of the revenue.
- dwaite 7y ago
  It will also likely be in the UK.
sidcool 7y ago
The biggest thing to entice most people could be an individualistic legacy. Under Apple, Ive's designs are not his own. With a separate entity, Ive probably intends to have products under his name that have massive impact.
futhey 7y ago
Just an opinion, but the most capitalized company on earth spending less than $10m on some engineering talent or patents from Drive.ai shouldn't lead one to speculate. Agree with your line of thinking though. It's more interesting to speculate on what could lure someone like that away, than just assume the mundane.

Isamu 7y ago

>Today’s MacBooks are worse computers but more beautiful devices than the ones they replaced. Is that directly attributable to Jony Ive? With these keyboards in particular, I believe the answer is yes. Until now design was king at Apple. Will his departure bring balance back, or will design lose out to the other teams?

Shivetya 7y ago
well maybe they will start designing again for the customers that made Apple Mac products popular. I swear for the last five or so years Apple was designing for themselves and with the Mac Pro for people they thought deserved to be their customer and not the customers they had; as in the ones that badgered them for a replacement at a similar price point to the trash can which itself was designed for who?
- _jal 7y ago
  I'm not sure which segment in particular you have in mind, but whichever one, I'm pretty sure the answer is "no". The big problem with that is that they are utterly enormous; all of their "traditional" niches combined are dwarfed by their casual user base. Creative professionals are just not a big market, comparatively; neither are folks who just want a great unix laptop. (And command line nerds in particular are becoming less and less welcome; this is why I'm probably typing on my last Mac.) But the second problem is that, even if somehow Ives leaving meant that the scales fell from every Apple employee's eyes and suddenly they all wanted to put back the scripting languages, make machines specifically dedicated to running Pro Tools or After Effects and bundle every mac with a copy of 3 in Three, they still have a multiyear product pipeline. You don't turn that ship quickly.
  - nikanj 7y ago
    Meanwhile Microsoft is bending over backwards to cater to the command line geeks. Would not have predicted this a few years ago. Apparently they’ve remembered the old ”Developers developers developers” mantra again.

petilon 7y ago

> Ive is, to state the obvious, preternaturally talented. But in the post-Jobs era, with all of Apple design, hardware and software, under his control, we’ve seen the software design decline and the hardware go wonky. These two sentences don't make sense when read together. If Apple design -- hardware and software -- declined during Ive's rein that, to me, is evidence that Ive is not preternaturally talented. The moment iOS 7 was unveiled at WWDC I knew Emperor Ive is wearing no clothes. The number of basic design mistakes iOS 7 was astounding.

coatol5 7y ago
Mind catching me up on what was wrong with iOS7?
- emsy 7y ago
  The number one issue that's slowly getting fixed is not knowing which text is clickable or just a label. Then there were slow animations, arguably bad icons and inconsistent font usage. That's what I remember at least, I hope my memory's not failing me.
  - sprafa 7y ago
    Some of the very early icons were so garish I remember being astonished by them.
  - lonelappde 7y ago
    The main thing was the horrific unreadable Helvetica Neue Ultralight system font.
  - samstave 7y ago
    If your memory is failing you, please make an appointment at the Genius Bar and someone will tell you why your memory is out of warranty and you just need to buy a new body. Simple! Also - you may try talking to Peter Thiel to inject your memory with more life essence... Oh wait, that may have been the Skeksis!!!
- 7y ago

Skunkleton 7y ago

> I don’t worry that Apple is in trouble because Jony Ive is leaving; I worry that Apple is in trouble because he’s not being replaced. I'm sorry, but I don't understand why out of all of the skill sets that go into creating a product, "design" should be the only one with a dedicated C-level executive. To me it seems much healthier for the needs of the mechanical engineers (for example) to have equal weight with the needs of the designers.

armadsen 7y ago
Because design is extremely and uniquely important to Apple’s success compared to its competitors. It’s why you know who Jony Ive is and have no idea who is responsible for mechanical engineering at Apple. (I say this as an engineer myself.)
- Skunkleton 7y ago
  The importance of design at apple is completely irrefutable. All I am saying is that Apple should avoid more butterfly switch fiascos, and one way to do that is to put the designers on a level playing field.
  - azernik 7y ago
    Industrial design includes functionality. Ives' problem wasn't that he put design over other things; it's that he put form over function in his design decisions and had a very narrow set of design principles (minimalism, thinness) that he followed too religiously.
- HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
  How much does design impact what you are and are not allowed to do? Are you, as an engineer, required to use Macs, or can you use a PC as well?
rorykoehler 7y ago
Designing is strategy engineering is detail. Engineering sits one level below design in the decision chain. It's the same reason the CTO is C-suite and the VP of Engineering isn't.

mc32 7y ago

Gruber is trying to read the tea leaves, but I think he's overconfident in his read. Also, I really don't get the Monday Night quarterbacking that's evident throughout his whole piece. Maybe he's upset, maybe he's held back and now feels free to offer opinion --but I think it's just that. An abrupt opinion. That said, I wonder who Apple will try to snatch? Who are some other good designers out there? MS has some nice HW design. Google to me does not. Nokia? I'm sure there are some others, but can't think of any ATM.

draw_down 7y ago
> I think it's just that. An abrupt opinion. Well, that is what Gruber’s blog is for, isn’t it. Gruber’s opinions. Edit: just saw Mossberg describe Gruber’s post as “right on the nose”. Believe what you like.
robmiller 7y ago
MS outsources some of their product industrial design, https://pensar.com/project-gallery/consumer/ https://pensar.com/project-gallery/consumer/
- statictype 7y ago
  They also outsource some of their artwork as well. https://www.frogdesign.com/portfolio/microsoft-office https://www.frogdesign.com/portfolio/microsoft-office
brianpgordon 7y ago
Perhaps some top talent might be enticed to flee the ailing Huawei? There's also Samsung.
hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
I'd don't really agree with what you and many other commenters seem to be saying that Gruber is "Monday Night quarterbacking" or bashing Ive. I mean, he says Ive is a "preternaturally talented designer" but that post Jobs that "software design has declined and hardware gone wonky." Does anyone really disagree with that statement? Ive is amazing but Ive and Jobs were magic. I think the bigger thrust of Gruber's piece is his closing sentence, with which I wholeheartedly agree: "I don’t worry that Apple is in trouble because Jony Ive is leaving; I worry that Apple is in trouble because he’s not being replaced."

olliej 7y ago

I share his concerns about not appointing a C level design executive. You need design (at Apple) to not be cost driven

Kovah 7y ago
I can imagine that there is actually nobody who wants to be the new CDO. I mean.. you would have to take over the design lead for the world's most valuable company. Also take over what I've created and build up on this. But also be prepared to be talked down by existing folks at Apple to follow their expectations, like "you have no clue what we really need". Someone with great bravery and mental strength would be needed here. I am not that into design at all so excuse my question: is there someone who would probably be the perfect fit for this position, at least design-wise?
UIZealot 7y ago
Jony Ive had been the CDO for years and the results weren't great. It's not that Jony Ive isn't a great designer. It's just that it's difficult to judge your own work, no matter how good you are. What they need, more than a CDO, is someone who they have to run every design by, someone (EDIT: with an impeccable eye) who is not afraid to say no. In other words, someone who can fill the role Steve Jobs used to play. I, for one, nominate the great John Siracusa, for this job. See http://hypercritical.co/fatbits/2009/05/06/hypercritical http://hypercritical.co/fatbits/2009/05/06/hypercritical
- unethical_ban 7y ago
  Why isn't that Cook? Without knowing Apple internally, the point is that the staff under the COO (if the "C"s have their own divisions) are the back office, the accounting, HR, IT, and other shared services accross an organization. There isn't necessarily creativity as a mission.
  - UIZealot 7y ago
    Cook would've been perfect if he had that critical eye, and he would've been the perfect replacement for Steve Jobs then. Alas, he's an operations guy, design is not really his forte. And that, my friend, is the reason we are in this nine circle of flat design hell.

cat199 7y ago

> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The 1 second it took me to google revealed he is British, and apple is all about showing off your "class".. so yeah.

ruytlm 7y ago
This baffled me as well. The US may not grant titles of nobility, but it has an awful lot of other titles that are given and used similarly; in my experience typically military ranks, or former political office titles. Also, Ive's title may not have been awarded by the US, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be acknowledged in what is an official piece of communication from one of the worlds largest companies. To be facetious, one could also say that it is a surprise to hear outrage at the use of 'Sir' given that everyone in the US seems to call everyone else 'sir' or 'ma'am' all the time.
- _jal 7y ago
  There is a tradition of anti-nobility sentiment in US culture as old as, well, the US. It is literally written into the Constitution[1]. How much you were exposed to it probably depends on where you grew up; I think it is louder in the north east, and I don't hear it much in California. Personally, I am more annoyed at being sir-ed constantly. I much prefer to reserve it as a genuine term of respect, not a generic form of address. [1] Article I, section 9.
  - bin0 7y ago
    > I think it is louder in the north east Loud in the South, certainly. That's how I was raised, and it's used as a respectful, though somewhat common/generic, term of address. I don't know that I or many Americans would be comfortable with the social implications of referring to some one as "sir" out of respect the way you describe it; it implies superiority rather than respect.
- ronilan 7y ago
  The “Titles of Nobility Amendment” [1] to the constitution was never ratified by the states (though it did pass Congress), and the Canadian Nickle Resolution [2] was never enacted as a law, but the idea they convey is as clear and as valid today as it was back then. I have never seen any mention of this issue in public forums, so I think it is good that Gruber brings it up. And I kind of like how succinctly he puts it: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in America. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titles_of_Nobility_Amendment https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titles_of_Nobility_Amendment [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_titles_debate https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_titles_debate

doe88 7y ago

I respect John Gruber but on this one I find it a bit too easy to lash-out (rightly or wrongly) on Jony Ive only when the man stepped-out of his job at Apple. It would have been a bit more courageous to have said these things when he was still there. More on the point though, I'm not in the camp of those believing that in this day and age in a company as big as Apple you can assign all the mistakes (or successes) to a single man. For instance, to think Jony Ive being even remotely responsible for the keyboard debacle seems preposterous to me.

dangwu 7y ago
> For instance, to think Jony Ive being even remotely responsible for the keyboard debacle seems preposterous to me. I can definitely picture a world where Jony’s ruthless push for thin and light resulted in the butterfly keyboard.
nilkn 7y ago
To be an executive is to be responsible for execution. Someone who allows major blunders to happen under their watch is not a successful executive, whether they were personally responsible or not. You can't make excuses as an executive. You can't say "there wasn't enough quality control," because you have the power to create the quality control process necessary to prevent the blunder. You can't say "I wasn't aware there was this risk of keyboard defects," because you have the power to create reporting structures that will surface such risks to all key stakeholders, including you. You can't say "I didn't have time to focus on functional deficiencies or risks because I was focused on aesthetics," because you have the power to hire and delegate to the most talented employees in the world; you have the power to do whatever is necessary so that you do have the time to focus on what needs to be focused on. You can't say "I didn't worry about functional risks because I wanted to focus on design," because your job is to execute, not to do what you want to do.
- tornadron 7y ago
  ...Steve Jobs folklore: Steve Jobs told employees a short story when they were promoted to vice president at Apple. Jobs would tell the VP that if the garbage in his office was not being emptied, Jobs would naturally demand an explanation from the janitor. "Well, the lock on the door was changed,' the janitor could reasonably respond. "And I couldn't get a key." The janitor's response is reasonable. It's an understandable excuse. The janitor can't do his job without a key. As a janitor, he's allowed to have excuses. "When you're the janitor, reasons matter," Jobs told his newly-minted VPs. "Somewhere between the janitor and the CEO, reasons stop mattering." "In other words,' (Jobs continued,) "when the employee becomes a vice president, he or she must vacate all excuses for failure. A vice president is responsible for any mistakes that happen, and it doesn't matter what you say."

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

brandonfro 7y ago

I remember reading somewhere that Jony said if he weren’t designing computers he would like to be designing cups.

dokem 7y ago
Sounds hyperbolic.

archagon 7y ago

Why is this article attributing the San Francisco font design to Ive?

panacea 7y ago
He singed off on it.

povertyworld 7y ago

Everyone is talking about the keyboards, but I want to know about the Mac Pros. I'm assuming Ive is responsible for the cylinder, but is he involved in the return to the cheese grater, or did that happen while he was off designing glass doors at the Apple building? The keyboards aren't the first stinker on Ive's watch.

zoeysaurusrex 7y ago
Sure, you are pointing out his failings, but I’d say his successes outnumber his failings.
mantap 7y ago
Learned helplessness runs wild at Apple. If you listen to them, they say that with the trashcan they had "designed themselves into a corner", and that's why it took them six years to design a new enclosure. As if it is beyond the capabilities of one of the world's richest and most powerful corporations to design a new enclosure every year. The trashcan Mac Pro was OK. The design was perhaps uninspired but it did provide adequate cooling for the 2013 Xeons that they were using. It so transpired that the design did not provide ample cooling for Intel's recent CPUs. But so what? Just change it. The actual problem with the 2013 Mac Pro was operational. They decided to build it in the US. They made a big, high-tech factory with a large degree of automation. That's a great way to build a high volume product. It's a terrible way to build a $3000 niche computer.
- usrusr 7y ago
  > They made a big, high-tech factory with a large degree of automation. That's a great way to build a high volume product. It's a terrible way to build a $3000 niche computer. The hidden cost of high wages: automation induced product inflexibility. It's not even limited to low-volume products: if you had 100x the demand and the production capacity to match, you'd still want to run your expensive automation pipeline mostly unchanged for almost as many years as with a low-volume product. Only some of the up-front cost of automation is fixed per product change, another part is fixed per throughput * product change and this part will hit you at 100/day as hard as at 10000/day.

jmull 7y ago

> I’ve never been an “Apple is doomed without Steve Jobs” person. But... Ah, pundits believe Apple Is Doomed! The sentiment is reassuring. All seems well.

1-6 7y ago

The title should have been, "Jony Ive left Apple" You've missed a sweet opportunity...

EGreg 7y ago

I ain’t John Gruber. But here was my take a few years ago and I stand by it today: http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=234 http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=234

coherentpony 7y ago

> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The Title of Nobility Clause prevents the federal government from granting titles of nobility. That's it. It doesn't prevent other countries from granting them to their citizens, and Ive is British. There are plenty of titles that aren't of nobility in the US. Here's a few: Mr. President, Congresswoman, General, Colonel, and Mayor.

gchokov 7y ago
Indeed. Plus some people think the United States is the only country on this planet.
- sosborn 7y ago
  Or, perhaps, Gruber was just adding in some humor.
wbronitsky 7y ago
What’s with the unnecessary pedantry here? It is getting exhausting to see people on HN constantly resorting to common denominator pedantry
markdown 7y ago
Doctor.
itronitron 7y ago
It's certainly possible that Apple addressed him as 'Sir Jony Ive' in the memo to make him appear as a pompous ass to the rest of the company, so that they would be happier about his leaving.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

thomasjudge 7y ago

I would go John Gruber one further and say that Apple needs not just a chief design officer, but a chief PRODUCT officer. Steve Jobs was not just a design guru, he was a PRODUCT guru. Design is an integral element to Apple products, but product strategy is more than just design. The obsession with thinness that Gruber cites is one way in which Apple's design - and product - strategy has gone off the rails, but there are many others. What is the Macbook product strategy and segmentation strategy anymore? Why did it take FIVE YEARS to get a redesigned Mac Pro out? I could go on..

dang 7y ago
Could you please not use allcaps for emphasis? This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
_ph_ 7y ago
Best comment I have read so far. While Apple certainly is a company, where the head designer is rightfully one of the most influential positions, it should be the lead position as it was in the recent years. The golden years were those, where Steve Jobs was the chief product officer. The person, who can tell designers when they start making something look nicer but less useful. The MacBook keyboard disaster was only the tip of the iceberg, where the keyboard just wouldn't work properly. But it runs much deeper. The whole non-serviceability of their computers and the limitations which cut down in the usability. Just think of the glued together iMacs. The iMac is already a controversial product, having an all-in-one machine as their main desktop product. But why should is it impossible to easily access its components for the limited things you can do with them? As it turns out, the early iMacs were reasonably accessible. I still have a G5 iMac, which can be opened with a single screw drsiver. So unless it was someone else forcing these decisions onto Ive, I think he really was missing Steve in recent years and there was no one at Apple to really challenge him. And however good and talented anyone is, I think to go from a good idea to a great product, everyone needs to be challenged at each step. Only through the following discussions the necessary refinements can be recognized and achieved.
pas 7y ago
Design used to refer to product design. And chief product guys/gals do product design. The two are inseparable, because they are the same. Maybe design got associated with aesthetics more and product with functionality and interaction, but this kind of reductionism is harmful.

beardedman 7y ago

I don't understand the unnecessary tone John Gruber uses in this article. > Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. The US isn't the only country on the map (surprisingly enough, I know). And who cares if Jony Ive is starting his own thing? Why would that be "pure spin"? Apple is not in its renaissance days anymore - whilst Jony Ive might have been critical back then - Apple is just not the same company anymore. There are a lot more people responsible for the "magic" these days (which is a good thing).

jedberg 7y ago
Yeah that bugged me too. We still call the Queen "Queen" even when she's in the US. We don't assign titles of nobility, but we certainly respect them.
- nostromo 7y ago
  “Queen” is a title, like “president” or even “janitor.” “Sir” is an honorific. Like “his holiness” or “your honor” or “her majesty.” We use titles all the time in the US but rarely use honorifics (with a few exceptions).
  - nikanj 7y ago
    Doctors and reverends are called with honorifics all the time.
  - DoreenMichele 7y ago
    In the Deep South, it's not that unusual to say Mr./Ms. (First name) as a show of respect. When I worked at Aflac, the sole remaining (living) founder, Paul Amos, was routinely internally referred to as Mr. Paul.
- lazugod 7y ago
  I don’t think Americans unanimously respect titles of nobility, and I think Gruber’s point is that he personally doesn’t respect them and wishes Apple didn’t respect them either. Whether this is a consistent point of his, whether Gruber has always referred to the Queen as Elizabeth Windsor, I don’t know. But I wouldn’t conflate convenience with respect. “The Queen” is a very easy name to remember and use informally without necessarily supporting monarchy. Like, I wouldn’t call Captain Blackbeard “Captain Blackbeard” out of respect for piracy.

jpswade 7y ago

> Fifth: Fuck this “sir” shit. We don’t have titles in the United States. That's pretty disrespectful and ignorant to other cultures and customs. It made me realise that this whole article is really spiteful and negative. It doesn't contribute anything to making things better.

camillomiller 7y ago
I agree with the Sir part, but it’s clearly Gruber’s irony there. The article being negative isn’t a proper critique though: it’s a pundit writing, it’s not their role to make things better, but to point out fallacies and pain points. He did, in my opinion quite properly.
Doctor_Fegg 7y ago
Exactly. Ive is a British citizen and the story was broken in the Financial Times, a British newspaper. Maybe we should have just referred to plain "Barack Obama" over here because fuck this President shit, we don't have an elected head of state in the United Kingdom?
- founderling 7y ago
  and the story was broken in the Financial Times, a British newspaper. He is quoting and criticizing the Apple website.
- acomjean 7y ago
  President is his job. Best I can tell, Sir is a title bestowed by the monarchy on people they like.
  - Doctor_Fegg 7y ago
    According to Wikipedia: > all living former U.S. Presidents continue to be addressed as "Mr. President" President isn't Obama's job any more. Sadly.
  - wyclif 7y ago

AJRF 7y ago

Could you DREAM of a world where DaringFireball posted an article disrespecting and demeaning Sir Jony Ive this time last week? What use is a pundit like this when they are on rails to just spin any and every piece of Apple news to protect the mothership, at this point any words from Gruber have lost all objectivity.

n1000 7y ago

To me it seems like somebody is afraid to make a tough decision. There have been indications that Ive wants to get out for quite a while. So they offered him more and more to make him stay. As the article says, they promoted his C-level job to a A-level one. They gave him ever more freedom, power, and probably money. Now came the point where his willingness to leave became too big. The obvious choice would have been a full divorce. Of course that is hard. But now Apple is basically outsourcing one of its core competences, product design. That is both dangerous and embarrassing for such an iconic company.

randomsearch 7y ago
Surely the outsourcing is just spin to try to retain employees who would otherwise jump ship when the second half of the amazing partnership departs.
dbbk 7y ago
> But now Apple is basically outsourcing one of its core competences, product design. The leadership of the design team is still in place. All Jony has been in recent years is essentially a Creative Director overseeing them. It's not like all of Apple's product design is now being handled by an outside company.
- bayareanative 7y ago
  Yes, although IDEO could probably do a better job.

baxuz 7y ago

Wow this website is bad. Almost as bad as HN