Slashdot Mirror
Apple's Tim Cook Shares What He Learned From Steve Jobs (businessinsider.com)
Speaking at Oxford, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared a lesson learned from the "spectacular" commercial failure of the Power Mac G4 Cube in 2000 -- and from his mentor Steve Jobs. An anonymous reader quotes Business Insider:
"It was a very important product for us, we put a lot of love into it, we put enormous engineering into it," Cook said of the G4 Cube on stage. He calls it an "engineering marvel." At the time, Cook was Apple Senior VP of Worldwide Operations, recruited personally by then-CEO Steve Jobs... While the design was a hit, it was $200 more expensive than the regular Power Mac G4, a more traditional-looking PC with very similar specs. And some Cubes would develop cosmetic cracks in the acrylic cube casing due to a manufacturing flaw. In his talk, Cook says that Apple knew the Cube was flopping "from the very first day, almost..."
Ultimately, Cook says, it was a lesson in humility and pride. Apple had told both employees and customers that the G4 Cube was the future. And yet, despite Apple's massive hype, demand just wasn't there, and the company had to walk away. "This was another thing that Steve [Jobs] taught me, actually," says Cook. "You've got to be willing to look yourself in the mirror and say I was wrong, it's not right." In a broader sense, Cook says that Jobs taught him the value of intellectual honesty -- that, no matter how much you care about something, you have to be willing to take new data and apply it to the situation.
He advised his audience to "be intellectually honest -- and have the courage to change."
And the article points out that today there's a small but enthusiastic community who are still hacking their Power Mac G4 Cubes.
Ultimately, Cook says, it was a lesson in humility and pride. Apple had told both employees and customers that the G4 Cube was the future. And yet, despite Apple's massive hype, demand just wasn't there, and the company had to walk away. "This was another thing that Steve [Jobs] taught me, actually," says Cook. "You've got to be willing to look yourself in the mirror and say I was wrong, it's not right." In a broader sense, Cook says that Jobs taught him the value of intellectual honesty -- that, no matter how much you care about something, you have to be willing to take new data and apply it to the situation.
He advised his audience to "be intellectually honest -- and have the courage to change."
And the article points out that today there's a small but enthusiastic community who are still hacking their Power Mac G4 Cubes.
So... do we get a proper tower mac pro back now?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
iPods and iTunes saved the Mac Book lines and iMacs yet Timmy killed the iPods save the Touch and will soon kill iTunes because of all the free stuff like internet radio in preference for his subscriptions model.
Selective honesty is Mr. Timmy Cook's name.
"I'll keep it short and sweet. Family, religion, friendship. These are the three demons you must slay if you wish to succeed in business. When opportunity knocks, you don't want to be driving to a maternity hospital or sitting in some phony-baloney church. Or synagogue."
Wait, now I actually read it.
""This was another thing that Steve [Jobs] taught me, actually," says Cook. "You've got to be willing to look yourself in the mirror and say I was wrong, it's not right.""
Steve Jobs, the archetypical narcissist, taught him that? Did he teach him that by providing an example of what not to do?
The Cube and Can are my two favorite machines becasue they fit into my desktop, esthetically. Differentiation in the electronics, NSM.
The processing power of each meant that the cube didn't last that long there, and the Can will eventually go. The cube CPU upgrade make it noisy (had a fan), and that constant annoyance was that about that. The Can is still sitting on my desk, and is perfect for what it is. But it's now 3yrs old, and simulations are taking hours to run again...
Both are Geek toys. Nothing wrong with that. But if Tim learned anything, perhaps it was that the Can would sell a certain number, and that is a 'success' in it's own right. But not a break away financial one.
Oh. And thanks, BTW, for both machines.
Here's exactly what Cook learned from Jobs: "not enough".
I'm simply disgusted with the changes to the latest macbook pros. I'm using a mid-2015 right now and I would have upgraded already if there were any actual "upgrades" available. Each model newer than mine is a downgrade in various ways - fewer ports, stupid touch bar thing replacing the function keys and escape key (I'm a vi user - ugh!), different power adapter (WTF?!?!?), etc. In addition to these literal downgrades there are no real upgrades to be had. I have 16GB of memory, I think they might have 32 now but, geeze, come on. Drive space? Not only do I have to pay out the ass for a flash drive, I can't easily connect external hard drives now since the ports are screwed up.
Just, stupid.
Apple led the way back when it made sense - getting rid of floppies (the time was right), getting rid of DVD drive (the time was right). But this is no longer leadership, it's just stupidity. People are still going to use external drives for some time - people like will likely use them indefinitely. I use a laptop with an external monitor (in my case a 49" UHD TV) - I need extra ports.
I've invested a ton in Apple hardware over the last 10 years, but when I have to buy another computer it's probably going to be running Linux. I have to keep a Mac or Windows machine around for Photoshop and such.
Do you have ESP?
Our current society rewards the selfish and conceited but the laws of physics don't give a shit about that.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Steve Jobs valued humility and admitting it when wrong? He literally told everyone experiencing a real, flawed antenna design in their phones that *they* were holding it wrong.
First link for "you're holding it wrong": http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/mobile/06/25/iphone.problems.response/
This is a bullcrap attempt to further deify Jobs, reality be damned. Thank heavens some of us have and always will be immune to the supposed distortion field.
Captcha: conjure
I think you need to look yourself in the mirror again, Mr. Cook, on the matter of those pesky 3.5mm headphone jacks.
-- Look to the Rose that blows about us--"Lo, Laughing," she says, "into the World I blow..."
Had one -- and for me, it was worth the $200.
I was buying into the form factor myself. Loved it.
And compared to "normal" computers -- it was silent.
Of course I beat the hell out of it. And heat WAS a issue. Ended up putting two blower fans on the back of it to force a ton of air through it to keep it cool. A SSD today would go a long way, but CPU heat was a issue too. It wasn't so silent any more...
I'll pay extra for the form factor -- love my stealth.com system I use today for my Linux box. I could have gotten about the same thing for a 1/3rd of the cost, but it would be your normal big computer box. I can stick the stealth in the ceiling and just use it...
The Cube's motherboard finally gave out altogether. Gutted it and stuck a light in it for the stairwell...
You've got to be willing to look yourself in the mirror and say I was wrong...
So can we get the headphone jack on our iPhones back?
Don't let Jony Ive run amok with your "Pro" laptops.
#DeleteChrome
Yes, this. Also, how about a real MBP that has a 17' display?
A laptop with an integrated projector? Interesting idea...
You could make the desktop wallpaper Stonehenge! That would be awesome.
Apple is always going to say whatever their new thing is is the way of the future, they are pretty much obligated to say that. Whether that is the G4 Cube, the Trashcan Mac, Magsafe, Firewire, styluses (styli?), the port-variationless Macbooks or iPhone face unlock but ultimately it is up to the customers to make the distinction whether that is true or not. The rabid fanboys will defend whatever they do and whatever they say anyway but ultimately they are a for-profit corporation and the market decides when they backpeddle and when they don't.
Some things have turned out to indeed be the way of the future, some haven't and some we don't yet know. It's obviously ridiculous to defend and parrot that XYZ is the way of the future just because Apple (or any company or person for that matter) says it is when they are trying to sell it to you.
Back in my management days, I used to regularly regurgitate some variation of the following to all my employees: "I expect you to make mistakes. I'll be happy to share a few of the many mistakes that I've made throughout my career, if you like. The one unpardonable sin that I will not tolerate is to not openly and honestly acknowledge any mistake that you make, because that shows me that you cannot/will not learn. We learn 10X++ more from our mistakes than from banging out a standard project spec. Just tell me what you learned."
The manufacturing flaw he was referring to was the complete absence of any cooling fans. The cracks were the result of the high heat. As far as learning from his mistakes Jobs wasn't very good at that as he made the same mistake years earlier with the Apple ///. His stubborn opposition to cooling fans doomed both.
Oh, okay. So instead of doing what Steve Jobs taught you, i.e. "You've got to be willing to look yourself in the mirror and say I was wrong, it's not right." you're telling us we're the ones who need to change?
Update the Mac mini, really update the MacBook Air and hurry up with the new Mac Pro already. Releasing hardware without headphone jacks and making all the UIs flat as shit isn't innovating, it's moving stuff around to give us the impression that you're doing anything at all.
#DeleteFacebook
If you want proof that they still haven't learned, look at the upcoming iMac Pro. Yes it has incredible specifications on paper, but cramming all that powerful hardware in a thin-for-no-reason all-in-one computer? Disaster waiting to happen and an insane sticker price to go with it.
#DeleteFacebook
"It just works." -> "It just doesn't really work _for_me_ any more."
I suspect you've been around the computer industry at least as long as I have. If so, that makes you a power user who has a very well-established set of tastes for the way things should behave.
You and I have not been the target market for Apple for about ten years now. Basically ever since the iPhone came out and Apple realized that it was a digital appliance company and Steve dropped the " Computer" off the name "Apple Computer". It wasn't a subtle move; he did it in front of the largest press event Apple hosted, directly following major product announcements.
For ten years Apple has been veering away from the customer base it always had. You and I have taken a journey, from VIP seats at the restaurant, with the ear of the maître d' ... to a bench in the back alley next to the dumpster, waiting for scraps.
Or hey, let me put it in even stronger terms. We're the engineers working at the local mill. Apple used to love living in our modest home and folding our laundry exactly the way we like it. But then, on a whim, she took part in a variety show, and Ed Sullivan happened to be in town, and he put her on live TV for five minutes and she wore a killer dress and sang with an incredible voice and now, ten years later, we are a long distant memory, still punching the clock at the local mill, while Apple lives in Beverly Hills behind a very tall fence designed to keep her millions of ravenous fans at bay.
That is our situation.
You can call the current range of Apple products "disappointing in terms of actual usability", but that strikes me as the perspective of someone who is used to interacting with their machines a certain way to do certain things, and doesn't actually care about all the other zillion things people use their machines to do.
The Apple restaurant no longer cares about our tastes in food. The Apple girlfriend no longer cares about what we do at the steel mill. She's gone, man. We can watch her sing on TV and hopefully enjoy that and wish her well, and recognize that it doesn't matter that she can't fold laundry worth a damn any more, because her laundry days are done. But that's the extent of our involvement here.
Even a MILLION geeks, all screaming in unison about the headphone jack, ... is irrelevant now. Last year Apple passed the one BILLION mark for iPhones sold, before introducing the iPhone 7. Then, in the ensuing year, they sold A QUARTER BILLION MORE. Those devices are "working", for many people. It's senseless to even try arguing the other way. But are they working for us? For you and me?
Well, perhaps if we get docking stations. And if bluetooth audio quality stops sucking...
Since that headphone jack was removed, the iPhone 7 has sold well over 200 million units.
The iPhone 8 and X together will sell not even God knows how many more before the end of this year alone, and lo and behold, the Google Pixel 2 doesn't have a headphone jack either. (And whereas Apple has included a jack adapter for free in every box, just in case you want to use it, Google has the brass balls to charge you 20 fucking dollars for one.)
If you don't want to give up your headphone jack, then don't ditch your 6s. It's only about one year old. Personally, I just snapped the dongle that came with the 7 onto my headphones, and have stopped worrying about it. (Frankly I'm surprised the little thing hasn't broken, after a year of very heavy use.) The water resistance is worth the very minor hassle.
Is that stubbornness in a bad way, or a good way?
Because I dunno about you, but I am really grooving on the fact that I am typing this on a two pound MacBook that will remain absolutely silent, even while it's still fast enough to edit HD video in Final Cut Pro...
I think his real mistake back then was to attempt to please CPU-hungry users and quiet-hungry users with the same machine. A "MacBook Pro" without any fans would be repeating the same mistake for sure.
I thought the holder of that title was the Lisa.