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Another former Googler here (from waaaaaaayyyy back -- I was employee #104). The reason Google is the way it is, and many organizations are the way they are, i

by lisper 5y ago

Another former Googler here (from waaaaaaayyyy back -- I was employee #104). The reason Google is the way it is, and many organizations are the way they are, is that they are trying to reproduce the circumstances that led to their initial success. Google initially succeeded by solving what was at the time a Really Hard Problem, and so the people at the top want to reproduce that by encouraging people to solve more Really Hard Problems. Apple has fallen into the exact same trap. Their initial success came from building a Cool New Thing, and so they are constantly trying to build the next Cool New Thing. The problem is that at some point the product has actually converged to a local design maximum and so making further changes to it in order to produce something New and Cool is not actually an improvement. But it doesn't work because it's sn inductive fallacy. Just because solving a Really Hard Problem or making a Cool New Thing led to success once does not mean that doing these things will lead to success in general. But the memory of that initial success is really hard to get past, especially when it was as earth-shattering as the initial Google search engine, or the Mac or the iPhone. (Apple has actually done better than most companies at reproducing their initial success. They've done it at least five times, with the Apple II, the Mac, OSX, the iPod and the iPhone. But then there is the touch bar, the butterfly keyboard, the flat look...)

brokencode 5y ago
I think Apple has done a fantastic job of incremental improvements on their products rather than chasing the next cool thing. Can you name a company that has actually been doing this better? For instance, they often resist new technologies like high refresh rate or OLED screens, 5G, etc., until they feel the technology is developed sufficiently and won’t impact battery life. There are other brands that compete by making a list of features rather than a coherent product. Of the examples you named, both the Touch Bar and the butterfly keyboard are gone now, and the latest Macs are the best Macs ever. That shows a willingness to try new things, while also showing that they have good judgement in the long term and a willingness to move away from what doesn’t work. Also, the iPad and Apple Watch haven’t been as important to Apple as the iPhone, but they are still original and category-defining products that I would call innovative. Not every new product needs to double your company’s market cap to be a big success in the category.
- lumost 5y ago
  I haven't worked at apple, but I suspect that this is the result of only having <20 core products (including services such as the app store). This generally implies that there are a very small number of internal employees who built those core products, and in most organizations this leads to a resistance to change. Some companies like to spam new products, others like to perfect what they have.
  - nickelcitymario 5y ago
    I'm not sure if you're saying it's a bad thing that they have <20 core products? I've always considered that a strength and a remarkable show of discipline, especially when they're willing to kill perfectly good products in order to create imperfectly great ones.
  - judge2020 5y ago
    Apple spent ~22B in R&D in 2021, but they definitely have large-scale decision makers expecting near-perfection on anything considered for released, probably before they even push it to DVT.
    - lumost 5y ago
      Resistance to change has an odd correlation with R&D spending. A company that refuses to change their products may spend more on R&D than one changing products all the time, as the cost of each change is much higher.
    - dekhn 5y ago
      R&D spending at FAAMG includes all software development work, regardless of whether it's research.
- lisper 5y ago
  > Can you name a company that has actually been doing this better? No. But that doesn't mean that Apple hasn't fallen prey to this phenomenon. It just means that they set the bar incredibly high to begin with. My first Apple was an Apple II, and I have never been without an Apple product since then. I currently own three Apple phones and eight Apple laptops. But for me the overall usability and quality of Apple products has been in decline over the last decade or so. I still run Mavericks on many of my machines because it was the last version of MacOS that Just Worked.
apozem 5y ago
That makes sense. Googlers keep dumping out technically interesting products with no go-to-market strategy because one time doing that, they made a perpetual money machine (search ads). The problem is it’s 20 years later, technology has changed and not all markets are like search. Throwing something out there is fine when it’s a magic website that answers your questions. When it’s, say, a half-baked messaging app none of your friends use, not so much.
bern4444 5y ago
I think Apple continues to innovate in new product categories. Apple Watch AirPods M1 Chip Services (Apple TV+, Apple Pay, Music, Fitness, iCloud etc). I include iCloud for services likeHide My Email and Private Relay. They do this all while maintaining a consistent release cycle of upgraded versions of their hardware (new iphones, macs etc). Also, everything in the list above has been developed under Tim Cook which is also impressive. He's been able to maintain Apple's ability to expand into new products and services.
- jldugger 5y ago
  You realize that's his point right? Each of those is trying to be the Cool New Thing, and part of what distracts the company while it ships butterfly keyboards, touchbars without escape keys, AntennaGate, whatever plagued HomePod so much they quietly discontinued it. Polish and Attention To Detail is outsourced to execs, who are increasingly spread thin.
  - vlovich123 5y ago
    AirPods in their first year shipped more bluetooth headsets than the all bluetooth headsets from all other manufacturers combined ever (or something insane like that). AirPods by itself is a Fortune 500 company. Apple Watch is a Fortune 100. AirTags is a 1B revenue business. Their scale is so immense that "flops" means "not a breakout success that resulted in a massive instantaneous increase to their bottom line". It also means the pressure is on them to have everything right (from the HW side) from the initial launch in terms of volume, build quality, reliability, & value add or they will have a meaningful setback to an expensive proposition (no room for exploring with smaller-scale things which is where competitors should start - Oura for example).
  - bern4444 5y ago
    But it hasn't distracted the company. Each of those things I listed are massive successes in their own right. Not everything Apple does is a success, but they have gotten it more right far more often than wrong. The M1 chip affects also their entire existing computer line. AirPods work beautifully across iphones, macs, and ipads. Apple watch integrates flawlessly with my iphone (answer calls, play pause etc). These are accessory products that reinforce the main ones which they continue to upgrade beautifully every year. They are able to balance both (Cool New Thing and upgrade cycles) and through it all, keep their product list to a relatively small number of items/skus. Compared to google who offers so many additional services and applications.
loudthing 5y ago
... the Lisa, the Apple III, firewire, calling wifi "Airport" for way too long, that home speaker boombox thing, the weird round mouse that came with the iMac, ... But seriously, I remember reading on here a comment from a previous Apple employee that all of their products are designed with the primary goal of looking good in a keynote presentation, which makes sense for their image, but results in underdeveloped products that "disappear" after a few years.
LegitShady 5y ago
google should work on some really hard problems they've ignored - customer service, privacy, etc. It's why the only business I do with google now is in places where they essentially don't have competition, and only when I absolutely have to.
nunez 5y ago
seven times if you include AirPods and the Apple Watch

by lisper 5y ago

brokencode 5y ago

I think Apple has done a fantastic job of incremental improvements on their products rather than chasing the next cool thing. Can you name a company that has actually been doing this better? For instance, they often resist new technologies like high refresh rate or OLED screens, 5G, etc., until they feel the technology is developed sufficiently and won’t impact battery life. There are other brands that compete by making a list of features rather than a coherent product. Of the examples you named, both the Touch Bar and the butterfly keyboard are gone now, and the latest Macs are the best Macs ever. That shows a willingness to try new things, while also showing that they have good judgement in the long term and a willingness to move away from what doesn’t work. Also, the iPad and Apple Watch haven’t been as important to Apple as the iPhone, but they are still original and category-defining products that I would call innovative. Not every new product needs to double your company’s market cap to be a big success in the category.

lumost 5y ago
I haven't worked at apple, but I suspect that this is the result of only having <20 core products (including services such as the app store). This generally implies that there are a very small number of internal employees who built those core products, and in most organizations this leads to a resistance to change. Some companies like to spam new products, others like to perfect what they have.
- nickelcitymario 5y ago
  I'm not sure if you're saying it's a bad thing that they have <20 core products? I've always considered that a strength and a remarkable show of discipline, especially when they're willing to kill perfectly good products in order to create imperfectly great ones.
- judge2020 5y ago
  Apple spent ~22B in R&D in 2021, but they definitely have large-scale decision makers expecting near-perfection on anything considered for released, probably before they even push it to DVT.
  - lumost 5y ago
    Resistance to change has an odd correlation with R&D spending. A company that refuses to change their products may spend more on R&D than one changing products all the time, as the cost of each change is much higher.
  - dekhn 5y ago
    R&D spending at FAAMG includes all software development work, regardless of whether it's research.
lisper 5y ago
> Can you name a company that has actually been doing this better? No. But that doesn't mean that Apple hasn't fallen prey to this phenomenon. It just means that they set the bar incredibly high to begin with. My first Apple was an Apple II, and I have never been without an Apple product since then. I currently own three Apple phones and eight Apple laptops. But for me the overall usability and quality of Apple products has been in decline over the last decade or so. I still run Mavericks on many of my machines because it was the last version of MacOS that Just Worked.

apozem 5y ago

That makes sense. Googlers keep dumping out technically interesting products with no go-to-market strategy because one time doing that, they made a perpetual money machine (search ads). The problem is it’s 20 years later, technology has changed and not all markets are like search. Throwing something out there is fine when it’s a magic website that answers your questions. When it’s, say, a half-baked messaging app none of your friends use, not so much.

bern4444 5y ago

I think Apple continues to innovate in new product categories. Apple Watch AirPods M1 Chip Services (Apple TV+, Apple Pay, Music, Fitness, iCloud etc). I include iCloud for services likeHide My Email and Private Relay. They do this all while maintaining a consistent release cycle of upgraded versions of their hardware (new iphones, macs etc). Also, everything in the list above has been developed under Tim Cook which is also impressive. He's been able to maintain Apple's ability to expand into new products and services.

jldugger 5y ago
You realize that's his point right? Each of those is trying to be the Cool New Thing, and part of what distracts the company while it ships butterfly keyboards, touchbars without escape keys, AntennaGate, whatever plagued HomePod so much they quietly discontinued it. Polish and Attention To Detail is outsourced to execs, who are increasingly spread thin.
- vlovich123 5y ago
  AirPods in their first year shipped more bluetooth headsets than the all bluetooth headsets from all other manufacturers combined ever (or something insane like that). AirPods by itself is a Fortune 500 company. Apple Watch is a Fortune 100. AirTags is a 1B revenue business. Their scale is so immense that "flops" means "not a breakout success that resulted in a massive instantaneous increase to their bottom line". It also means the pressure is on them to have everything right (from the HW side) from the initial launch in terms of volume, build quality, reliability, & value add or they will have a meaningful setback to an expensive proposition (no room for exploring with smaller-scale things which is where competitors should start - Oura for example).
- bern4444 5y ago
  But it hasn't distracted the company. Each of those things I listed are massive successes in their own right. Not everything Apple does is a success, but they have gotten it more right far more often than wrong. The M1 chip affects also their entire existing computer line. AirPods work beautifully across iphones, macs, and ipads. Apple watch integrates flawlessly with my iphone (answer calls, play pause etc). These are accessory products that reinforce the main ones which they continue to upgrade beautifully every year. They are able to balance both (Cool New Thing and upgrade cycles) and through it all, keep their product list to a relatively small number of items/skus. Compared to google who offers so many additional services and applications.

loudthing 5y ago

... the Lisa, the Apple III, firewire, calling wifi "Airport" for way too long, that home speaker boombox thing, the weird round mouse that came with the iMac, ... But seriously, I remember reading on here a comment from a previous Apple employee that all of their products are designed with the primary goal of looking good in a keynote presentation, which makes sense for their image, but results in underdeveloped products that "disappear" after a few years.

LegitShady 5y ago

google should work on some really hard problems they've ignored - customer service, privacy, etc. It's why the only business I do with google now is in places where they essentially don't have competition, and only when I absolutely have to.

nunez 5y ago

seven times if you include AirPods and the Apple Watch