Book about Ive and Apple

[SuperMatt]

I saw an excerpt from a new book about Apple and Jony Ive in The NY Times and thought it would be interesting. After all, the author claims to have interviewed 200 people!

Sadly, it seems to me to be a nonsensical take on Apple and the departure of Jony Ives. I cannot imagine how terrible the book must be if this excerpt is supposed to be the good part.

How Technocrats Triumphed at Apple (Published 2022)

The man who helped give the world candy-colored computers eventually walked out the door. What does that mean for the company’s next big thing?

www.nytimes.com

Here’s my favorite quote that shows how the author is pushing a narrative, regardless of the facts.

In Mr. Ive’s absence, Mr. Cook has accelerated a shift in strategy that has made the company better known for offering TV shows and a credit card than introducing the kind of revolutionary new devices that once defined it.

Hmm. Interview 10 random people off the street and ask them what Apple is best known for. Heck, make it 100. I will pay you $100 if even one says TV or a credit card.

If you don’t want to read the whole thing, the basic gist is that Apple lost its magic because Ives left. And he wrote an entire book based on that premise? God help me.

PS - How do you make a claim like this without sourcing it? (Maybe it’s sourced in the book?)

In Mr. Ive’s absence, Mr. Cook began reshaping the company in his image. He replaced the outgoing company director Mickey Drexler, the gifted marketer who built Gap and J. Crew, with James Bell, the former finance chief at Boeing. Mr. Ive was irate that a left-brained executive had supplanted one of the board’s few right-brained leaders. “He’s another one of those accountants,” he complained to a colleague.

Mr. Cook also emboldened the company’s finance department, which began auditing outside contractors. At one point, the department rejected a legitimate billing submitted by Foster + Partners, the architecture firm working closely with Mr. Ive to complete the company’s new $5 billion campus, Apple Park.

How do you know it was legitimate and that it was rejected? Surely there is documentation of this beyond a poorly worded paragraph? And why is it wrong to make sure outside contractors aren’t ripping you off?

 

[Colstan]

Unfortunately, it seems authors are more interested in creating drama than a factual telling of Apple's history. That's probably because what actually happened is more boring. From the outside it seems like Ive simply got tired of doing the day-to-day grind and went outside the company to work on other projects, while still keeping the option open to work with Apple. Supposedly, he had some influence on the fruity consumer M1 iMacs.

Regardless, I would say that Ive didn't completely fit with Apple after Steve Jobs died. Steve seemed to be a moderating influence, knowing when to tell Ive that he was going too far in making a tool into a piece of art. The eternal pursuit of thinness plagued Apple for years, along with vanity projects like the 2013 Mac Pro. Looking at the Mac line, today Apple offers reasonably sized laptops, with more than one port, and a decent keyboard. The Mac Studio wouldn't have fit Ive's vision either, since it's chunky, not sleek, not perfect enough. I respect Jony Ive for his tremendous achievements at Apple. However, like Wozniak before him, his time with the company couldn't be eternal, nor should it have been.

 

[Cmaier]

I saw an excerpt from a new book about Apple and Jony Ive in The NY Times and thought it would be interesting. After all, the author claims to have interviewed 200 people!

Sadly, it seems to me to be a nonsensical take on Apple and the departure of Jony Ives. I cannot imagine how terrible the book must be if this excerpt is supposed to be the good part.

How Technocrats Triumphed at Apple (Published 2022)

The man who helped give the world candy-colored computers eventually walked out the door. What does that mean for the company’s next big thing?

www.nytimes.com

Here’s my favorite quote that shows how the author is pushing a narrative, regardless of the facts.


Hmm. Interview 10 random people off the street and ask them what Apple is best known for. Heck, make it 100. I will pay you $100 if even one says TV or a credit card.

If you don’t want to read the whole thing, the basic gist is that Apple lost its magic because Ives left. And he wrote an entire book based on that premise? God help me.

PS - How do you make a claim like this without sourcing it? (Maybe it’s sourced in the book?)


How do you know it was legitimate and that it was rejected? Surely there is documentation of this beyond a poorly worded paragraph? And why is it wrong to make sure outside contractors aren’t ripping you off?

I tweeted exactly this. It’s all nonsensical. “Apple lost its soul because it…decided to do what Ive wanted and spend 25 million to move some trees, but it took Tim Cook a few minutes to decide, so Ive got pissed and quit…. five years later!”

 

[Citysnaps]

It's a hoot reading all the comments and conjecture about the book at the other site.

 

[SuperMatt]

The Macalope takes a swing at this author too:

We finally know why Apple is so doomed: It's all Jony Ive's fault

Jony Ive is a talented guy, but he was not Apple's sole innovator.

www.macworld.com

 

[lizkat]

The Macalope takes a swing at this author too:

We finally know why Apple is so doomed: It's all Jony Ive's fault

Jony Ive is a talented guy, but he was not Apple's sole innovator.

www.macworld.com

At the bottom of the NYT piece, which is an excerpt of the book, it's noted that its author (who at least for now works covering tech at the Times) "previously spent eight years at The Wall Street Journal reporting on Apple, Google, bourbon and beer."

Where oh where is my System 7 sound clip of George H W Bush saying

"It's clearer to me now..."​

What's not very clear to me is how the Times chose to print an essentially unannotated, unintroduced excerpt from a book written by a current staff member, rather than print a review or at least an introduction of it by some other party, preferably a guest reviewer.

The NYT has appointed a new executive editor (EDIT: Joe [not James} Kahn, currently managing editor), with Dean Baquet stepping aside at the traditional age of 65 in June but remaining at the paper to run a new journalistic venture for the Times. Meanwhile, maybe no one's really minding the store at the moment, and so some NYT editors have a little, or a lot, more free rein than might otherwise be the case.

Joe Kahn Is Named Next Executive Editor of The New York Times (Published 2022)

Mr. Kahn, 57, will take over a newsroom undergoing enormous change.

www.nytimes.com

Mr. Kahn, who was promoted to managing editor in 2016, is among Mr. Baquet’s closest confidants. But while Mr. Baquet is known for an outgoing and casual style, Mr. Kahn is more reserved. Part of his challenge will be engaging with a news operation of about 1,700 employees — the largest in The Times’s 171-year history — some of whom have never worked in the office because of the pandemic.

I realize my post is something of a digression. No intention here to derail the thread from original focus.

 

[SuperMatt]

At the bottom of the NYT piece, which is an excerpt of the book, it's noted that its author (who at least for now works covering tech at the Times) "previously spent eight years at The Wall Street Journal reporting on Apple, Google, bourbon and beer."

Where oh where is my System 7 sound clip of George H W Bush saying

"It's clearer to me now..."​

What's not very clear to me is how the Times chose to print an essentially unannotated, unintroduced excerpt from a book written by a current staff member, rather than print a review or at least an introduction of it by some other party, preferably a guest reviewer.

The NYT has appointed a new executive editor (James Kahn, currently managing editor), with Dean Baquet stepping aside at the traditional age of 65 in June but remaining at the paper to run a new journalistic venture for the Times. Meanwhile, maybe no one's really minding the store at the moment, and so some NYT editors have a little, or a lot, more free rein than might otherwise be the case.

Joe Kahn Is Named Next Executive Editor of The New York Times (Published 2022)

Mr. Kahn, 57, will take over a newsroom undergoing enormous change.

www.nytimes.com

I realize my post is something of a digression. No intention here to derail the thread from original focus.

Yes, it seemed to be a free advertisement of the book. Perhaps it was part of a deal they had to attract him to the paper? “We want you to work here, and to sweeten the deal, we will publish part of your book"

I found that they did post a separate review of the book.

Apple Inc., ‘After Steve’ (Published 2022)

A new history of the trillion-dollar company in the wake of Steve Jobs.

www.nytimes.com

A quote from the review:

In the epilogue, Mickle drops his reporter’s detachment to apportion responsibility for the firm’s failure to launch another transformative product. Cook is blamed for being aloof and unknowable, a bad partner for Ive, “an artist who wanted to bring empathy to every product.” Ive is also dinged for taking on “responsibility for software design and the management burdens that he soon came to disdain.” By the end, the sense that the two missed a chance to create a worthy successor to the iPhone is palpable.

It’s also hooey, and the best evidence for that is the previous 400 pages. It’s true that after Jobs died, Apple didn’t produce another device as important as the iPhone, but Apple didn’t produce another device that important before he died either. It’s also true that Cook did not play the role of C.E.O. as Jobs had, but no one ever thought he could, including Jobs, who on his deathbed advised Cook never to ask what Steve would do: “Just do what’s right.”

Calling the book’s conclusion “hooey” is not a glowing review.

 

[Cmaier]

Yes, it seemed to be a free advertisement of the book. Perhaps it was part of a deal they had to attract him to the paper? “We want you to work here, and to sweeten the deal, we will publish part of your book"

I found that they did post a separate review of the book.

Apple Inc., ‘After Steve’ (Published 2022)

A new history of the trillion-dollar company in the wake of Steve Jobs.

www.nytimes.com

A quote from the review:



Calling the book’s conclusion “hooey” is not a glowing review.

Yep. Book is garbage. But I see a lot of my developer friends (who are all pissed at Apple not allowing them to do whatever they want re: iphone apps) are loving it.

 

[lizkat]

I found that they did post a separate review of the book.

Thanks for posting that link.

Just noticed that in my earlier post, I had inadvertently renamed the NYT's new exec editor. He is Joe Kahn, not James Kahn. Fixed the original, can't do anything about the quotes, which is how I came to notice my error. James Kahn is a writer whose credits include among other things the novelization of the film Return of the Jedi. My spologies to both of these gentlemen.

 

[Colstan]

Looks like Jony Ive was so disillusioned, so angry, so sick of Tim Cook's overbearing style, and felt so dejected by the experience with the Apple Watch after Jobs Steve Jobs died, that he continues to actively work with Apple on the AR/VR headset with the company, and has hands-on involvement with other Apple projects.

One person familiar with the matter said Ive's consulting work for Apple since he left includes the headset, adding that he is often brought in to help his former team push through their preferences in areas such as battery, camera placement and ergonomics over those of engineers. Two people said even after Ive left Apple, some employees on the headset project were still required to make the trek from Cupertino to San Francisco, where Ive has a home, to get his approval on changes.

Ive has continued to tweak the headset's design. While earlier prototypes had the battery in the headband, he prefers a design that would tether the headset to a battery the user wears, similar to Magic Leap’s headset design. It couldn't be learned if this approach will make it into the final design.

Has there been a single book released that has accurately portrayed Apple since Steve Jobs passed away? None that I can think of, at least those that got a lot of press attention. If Ive left Apple with bad feelings then he wouldn't have worked on the fruity colored M1 iMac and wouldn't be consulting on the design of this project. A narrative of conflict sells print far better than the boring reality that Jony Ive simply wanted to do outside projects while still being able to work with Apple.

 

[Cmaier]

Looks like Jony Ive was so disillusioned, so angry, so sick of Tim Cook's overbearing style, and felt so dejected by the experience with the Apple Watch after Jobs Steve Jobs died, that he continues to actively work with Apple on the AR/VR headset with the company, and has hands-on involvement with other Apple projects.



Has there been a single book released that has accurately portrayed Apple since Steve Jobs passed away? None that I can think of, at least those that got a lot of press attention. If Ive left Apple with bad feelings then he wouldn't have worked on the fruity colored M1 iMac and wouldn't be consulting on the design of this project. A narrative of conflict sells print far better than the boring reality that Jony Ive simply wanted to do outside projects while still being able to work with Apple.

Wouldn’t be all that interesting to read a book about a company that has successfully navigated the loss of its genius founder to become even more innovative and successful, I suppose.