How Apple Got Everything Right By Doing Everything Wrong

An anonymous reader writes "Wired has a look at how the good and bad of Apple, their Yin and Yang, have come together to form a company that actually works. The piece looks at Steve Jobs' unusual and abrasive management style, otherwise known as 'Management Techniques From the Dark Side'. It's essentially a list of counterintuitive, suspicious-seeming and downright evil management techniques that work - for them."

Comments

They don't understand because they are wrong.

[gnutoo]

It's hard to see the Mac OS and the iPhone coming out of the same design-by-committee process that produced Microsoft Vista or Dell's Pocket DJ music player. Likewise, had Apple opened its iTunes-iPod juggernaut to outside developers, the company would have risked turning its uniquely integrated service into a hodgepodge of independent applications kind of like the rest of the Internet, come to think of it.

They don't understand the problems because they are completely wrong. Microsoft Vista and Dell's Pocket DJ and the Zune may have been designed by comittee but the parts that suck were pushed from on high. Apple is only the king of cool because the commercial alternatives suck so badly.

Free software designs consistently trounce commercial offerings. Package management on free systems is nearly flawless and free systems come with everything needed. People on Mac are insulted with popups that ask for money when they run into what should be common features. Windows victims walk on eggshells around their OS, backing up binary files and terrified of installing or removing programs. Then there are things like Amarok and MythTV which simply kill iTunes and Tivo respectively. Where free software developers successfully reverse engineer hardware drivers, the result is rock solid stability that commercial makers can only achieve with drastic hardware choice limitations.

In a less evil world every hardware company would join the free software community and leave both Microsoft and Apple chains in the trash.

Re:They don't understand because they are wrong.

[elrous0]

No Apple is only the "king of cool" because they've *convinced* a bunch of people that they're the "king of cool." They're masters of style, flash, and smug hipness. But to the uninitiated (i.e., us Windows and Linux-using non-hipster heathens); their computers and devices are just proprietary, difficult to repair and upgrade, significantly overpriced for their specs, a pain-in-the-ass to develop for, and locked-down tighter than a ugly nun in Salt Lake City.

Re:What a silly article

[Brian Gordon]

by Google's definition, Apple is irredeemably evil, behaving more like an old-fashioned industrial titan than a different-thinking business of the future. Apple operates with a level of secrecy that makes Thomas Pynchon look like Paris Hilton. It locks consumers into a proprietary ecosystem. ... But by deliberately flouting the Google mantra, Apple has thrived.

Only because consumers are stupid. I completely agree- Apple is irredeemably evil, more obsessed with proprietary secrets than even Microsoft. And I would never put a single dollar in Apple's pocket.

Re:He needs to get towed a few times.

[TheRaven64]

To Steve Jobs, the hundred dollar fine he'd pay here for parking in a handicapped spot is akin to my putting a quarter in a parking meter For this to be true, your net worth would be $11,250,000.

Of course, since the parking space at Apple are private property, the only rules that apply to parking restrictions are corporate one and they are unlikely to tow the CEO's car. If he tried that elsewhere, I suspect the results would be different.