4 ms·

Apple is perhaps the continuator of Diet Rams philosophie of design. Jonathan Ive was totally a fan of the German designer Rams. You can really feel it in the s

Apple is perhaps the continuator of Diet Rams philosophie of design. Jonathan Ive was totally a fan of the German designer Rams. You can really feel it in the simplicity of Apple products. I am a big fan also even if less gifted.

gwern 6y ago
I watched the Hustwit documentary on Rams this year too, and while I liked the documentary (my review: https://www.gwern.net/Movie-reviews#rams https://www.gwern.net/Movie-reviews#rams ), I felt it put a finger on why Apple imitates Rams's surface but doesn't actually live up to his philosophy. Rams's radio and chair etc are all fully functional. Rams removed the accidental complexity by careful design, leaving only the essential complexity (the user still has to choose a radio channel, the radio can't choose it for him!). But there is a difference between removing accidental complexity and hiding intrinsic complexity. Apple's approach is, all too often, to avoid intrinsic complexity and optimize for a surface simplicity which actually shoves away all the hard problems by either forbidding them or relegating them to the CLI or 'power user' tools or makes it the devs' problem. This makes for products which look great sitting in the Apple Store, but then as you try to do anything complex or hard... You run straight into Tog's "third-user" critique: https://asktog.com/atc/the-third-user/ https://asktog.com/atc/the-third-user/ Apple's products are far more shiny than empowering or deep solutions. (Who would ever dare compare an iPad with a Smalltalk or Lisp Machine?) So you get inordinate attention to making the perfect squircled corner, but meanwhile, you have to grip your iPhone right for the antenna to work, or your keyboard breaks at the dust from the drop of a hat, and as always, the web browser lags half a decade behind and can't play basic audio file formats like OGG Vorbis, and Mac OS X ships with breaking bugs; this isn't even reaching the standards of basic competence, much less truly fulfilling Rams's 10 principles and creating user-empowering interfaces and violins of the mind.
systemvoltage 6y ago
There is a remarkable difference in Jony Ive's approach towards design and Dieter's despite of his inspiration (OSX calc, iPod, etc.). For e.g., Dieter truly explored texture of the surfaces not from an aesthetic goal, but as a tool to aid functionlism (knobs have knurling, sliders have striations, grippy things had rough texture, areas that shouldn't be touched were gloss). Jony just made things beautiful that sold well because that's what sells. That's what luxury brands do. He threw away the german functionalism that Dieter is so well known for, and adopted the hollow aesthetics of his work. Jony was obsessed with how a thing looks more than how a think works (besides the fact that Apple mouse is horrendous to use, it at one point had a charging port under the mouse). He ignored and still to this day ignores ergonomics, transparency, affordances, feedback and many aspects of design that are fundamental to designing a product that interfaces with humans. Instead of looking up to the challenge to make products more usable whilst keeping a consistent coherent aesthetics, he prefers to hide things or flat out omit important features so that the design is clean. He almost had an authoritarian role at Apple - engineering had to bow down to him. About the only thing Jony Ive did with Dieter Rams was adopted minimalism for the sake of aesthetic goals. Dieter would never design a clock that had a transparent face, made legibility poor and had white numerals on clear glass (which does not guarantee contrast): https://watchesbysjx.com/2013/10/jaeger-lecoultre-newson-atmos-and-memovox-customised-by-jony-ive-and-marc-newson-for-red-charity.html https://watchesbysjx.com/2013/10/jaeger-lecoultre-newson-atm... Jony Ive IMO is one of the worst designers in modern history despite of his success.
- nicoburns 6y ago
  Some of Ive's designs were highly functional. The iPod clickwheel is probably the best example. Much, much better than other contemporary music player interfaces.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    If you read Walter Isaacson’s biography of Apple, it wasn’t that clear who’s idea it was.
    - systemvoltage 6y ago
      Steve Jobs*, not Apple :-).
  - laut 6y ago
    Apple copied that from the Beocom 6000 phone by Bang & Olufsen.
- sidpatil 6y ago
  > it at one point had a charging port under the mouse I've read that the motivation for this decision was to ensure that the customer would use the device wirelessly as intended. I guess it could be beneficial for the battery as well. In any case, it proves your point further.
  - johnwalkr 6y ago
    I understood this as a feature when, after using the Apple mouse with this charging port, I got a Logitech Bluetooth mouse as I needed a middle mouse button for one program. It happens to have a front facing charging port. The mouse worked well and I recommended it to colleagues. On occasions when the battery died, I left a USB cable plugged in and assumed I was using the mouse by USB. At some point I realized it was for charging only after wasting time on “i don’t understand, even after I turn off Bluetooth, the USB interface doesn’t work.” A few times since then I’ve helped colleagues troubleshoot by informing them that there is no USB data interface and they should be checking Bluetooth and not swapping out cables. In both cases (Apple and Logitech), a “charge only” label would have been nice.
sfifs 6y ago
I feel Apple is literally the anti-thesis of Dieter Rams. Johnny Ive's design philosophy i have always felt is very much "form over function" and has resulted in horrific abominations like skeuomorphism and mobile radios that don't have enough signal and touch bar. Even with Johnny Ive partly out of the picture I to this day find it inefficient and difficult to meaningfully use my daughter's iPad.
- grzm 6y ago
  Scott Forstall (along with Jobs) was the skeuomorphism proponent, not Ive. iOS 7's huge shift to "flat" design was after Forstall resigned and Ive's vision of mobile design fully took over.
  - sfifs 6y ago
    Oh good to know! Thanks!

gwern 6y ago

I watched the Hustwit documentary on Rams this year too, and while I liked the documentary (my review: https://www.gwern.net/Movie-reviews#rams https://www.gwern.net/Movie-reviews#rams ), I felt it put a finger on why Apple imitates Rams's surface but doesn't actually live up to his philosophy. Rams's radio and chair etc are all fully functional. Rams removed the accidental complexity by careful design, leaving only the essential complexity (the user still has to choose a radio channel, the radio can't choose it for him!). But there is a difference between removing accidental complexity and hiding intrinsic complexity. Apple's approach is, all too often, to avoid intrinsic complexity and optimize for a surface simplicity which actually shoves away all the hard problems by either forbidding them or relegating them to the CLI or 'power user' tools or makes it the devs' problem. This makes for products which look great sitting in the Apple Store, but then as you try to do anything complex or hard... You run straight into Tog's "third-user" critique: https://asktog.com/atc/the-third-user/ https://asktog.com/atc/the-third-user/ Apple's products are far more shiny than empowering or deep solutions. (Who would ever dare compare an iPad with a Smalltalk or Lisp Machine?) So you get inordinate attention to making the perfect squircled corner, but meanwhile, you have to grip your iPhone right for the antenna to work, or your keyboard breaks at the dust from the drop of a hat, and as always, the web browser lags half a decade behind and can't play basic audio file formats like OGG Vorbis, and Mac OS X ships with breaking bugs; this isn't even reaching the standards of basic competence, much less truly fulfilling Rams's 10 principles and creating user-empowering interfaces and violins of the mind.

systemvoltage 6y ago

There is a remarkable difference in Jony Ive's approach towards design and Dieter's despite of his inspiration (OSX calc, iPod, etc.). For e.g., Dieter truly explored texture of the surfaces not from an aesthetic goal, but as a tool to aid functionlism (knobs have knurling, sliders have striations, grippy things had rough texture, areas that shouldn't be touched were gloss). Jony just made things beautiful that sold well because that's what sells. That's what luxury brands do. He threw away the german functionalism that Dieter is so well known for, and adopted the hollow aesthetics of his work. Jony was obsessed with how a thing looks more than how a think works (besides the fact that Apple mouse is horrendous to use, it at one point had a charging port under the mouse). He ignored and still to this day ignores ergonomics, transparency, affordances, feedback and many aspects of design that are fundamental to designing a product that interfaces with humans. Instead of looking up to the challenge to make products more usable whilst keeping a consistent coherent aesthetics, he prefers to hide things or flat out omit important features so that the design is clean. He almost had an authoritarian role at Apple - engineering had to bow down to him. About the only thing Jony Ive did with Dieter Rams was adopted minimalism for the sake of aesthetic goals. Dieter would never design a clock that had a transparent face, made legibility poor and had white numerals on clear glass (which does not guarantee contrast): https://watchesbysjx.com/2013/10/jaeger-lecoultre-newson-atmos-and-memovox-customised-by-jony-ive-and-marc-newson-for-red-charity.html https://watchesbysjx.com/2013/10/jaeger-lecoultre-newson-atm... Jony Ive IMO is one of the worst designers in modern history despite of his success.

nicoburns 6y ago
Some of Ive's designs were highly functional. The iPod clickwheel is probably the best example. Much, much better than other contemporary music player interfaces.
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  If you read Walter Isaacson’s biography of Apple, it wasn’t that clear who’s idea it was.
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    Steve Jobs*, not Apple :-).
- laut 6y ago
  Apple copied that from the Beocom 6000 phone by Bang & Olufsen.
sidpatil 6y ago
> it at one point had a charging port under the mouse I've read that the motivation for this decision was to ensure that the customer would use the device wirelessly as intended. I guess it could be beneficial for the battery as well. In any case, it proves your point further.
- johnwalkr 6y ago
  I understood this as a feature when, after using the Apple mouse with this charging port, I got a Logitech Bluetooth mouse as I needed a middle mouse button for one program. It happens to have a front facing charging port. The mouse worked well and I recommended it to colleagues. On occasions when the battery died, I left a USB cable plugged in and assumed I was using the mouse by USB. At some point I realized it was for charging only after wasting time on “i don’t understand, even after I turn off Bluetooth, the USB interface doesn’t work.” A few times since then I’ve helped colleagues troubleshoot by informing them that there is no USB data interface and they should be checking Bluetooth and not swapping out cables. In both cases (Apple and Logitech), a “charge only” label would have been nice.

sfifs 6y ago

I feel Apple is literally the anti-thesis of Dieter Rams. Johnny Ive's design philosophy i have always felt is very much "form over function" and has resulted in horrific abominations like skeuomorphism and mobile radios that don't have enough signal and touch bar. Even with Johnny Ive partly out of the picture I to this day find it inefficient and difficult to meaningfully use my daughter's iPad.

grzm 6y ago
Scott Forstall (along with Jobs) was the skeuomorphism proponent, not Ive. iOS 7's huge shift to "flat" design was after Forstall resigned and Ive's vision of mobile design fully took over.
- sfifs 6y ago
  Oh good to know! Thanks!