Apple CEO Tim “Cook’s period in charge has seen Apple’s size and value grow enormously,” Glyn Williams writes for Quora. “So by any conventional business metrics, this has to be judged as a huge success.”
“Cook is criticized because of a perception that world-changing innovation has declined since Jobs. This is probably unfair,” Williams writes. “Whoever is running the show would struggle to deliver meaningful new products on an annual basis.”
“But Cook is not perfect,” Williams writes. “Most worrying is a slow decline in the focus and zeal of the company. This is very hard to quantify, but there are a handful of signs that long-time Apple enthusiasts regard as troubling. Apple has relinquished the high end workstation market. There is no Mac with a world class GPU. The iPad is evolving sluggishly for something that should be the future of personal computing. Siri had a giantic head-start which seems to have been lost.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Cook’s most notable “hit” was/is taking a bold stand to preserve and protect Apple product users’ privacy. His most notable miss is, collectively (and ironically for someone often referred to as an “operations genius”), the serial inability to have products on the shelves in a timely manner or at all (this includes being two years late with properly-sized iPhone displays, announcing and then not having new iMacs for Christmas 2012, Apple Watch (launch excitement was squandered with near total lack of product for months), no 4K Apple TV for Christmas 2016, no new iPads for Christmas 2016 (although this may be a intentional move to set the bar low enough to allow iPad to finally resume unit sales growth), AirPods basically missing Christmas 2016, no Mac Pro update for 3+ years, etcetera).
Execution matters. Pretty videos only go so far.
We expect a lot. So, deliver a lot. Not like 2015. Don’t deliver yet another thing that “holds great promise.” Certainly do not deliver important products with no stock at launch or for months afterwards (“Tim Cook, operations genius” – oh, really now?). Don’t deliver half-baked UIs, either. Pretend that Steve is staring/glaring over your shoulder.
Knock our socks off, Apple!
No pressure.Apple failed to deliver to our expectations in 2016 as well. Here’s hoping Apple delivers in 2017!
EPIC FAIL:
The “New” – now very old- Mac “Pro”.
Bring back the tower with modern internals.
People tend to forget that when you get a “blockbuster” like iPhone, you become hard pressed to expand fast enough and still keep quality and growth of features manageable. It is a bitch, to say the least.
Once a glitch is discovered in a design where you are selling maybe 40-50 million units a year, it is panic time to review all engineering, design, apps, security, interoperability with the external systems.
I truthfully would love a new expandable MacPro and a film I could put on my eye glasses for a heads up notification from Mac devices. But I realize how hard it is to manage all the existing successful products.
I can see why Apple decided to exit Airport Extreme/et al devices. It takes resources away from core critical work.
I can see why Apple would take people away from some of their devices to focus on core work … If they were the size of a startup.
But Apple isn’t a startup. It’s one of the largest companies in the world. They should have the ability to work on a product range at least double the size that it is now.
If they’re not able to execute on their product line at this size, then there are utterly catastrophic organisational failures at play in the company that need to be resolved as a matter of urgency.
dead on MDN take.
Steve Jobs’ talent was in marshalling resources to invent novel/innovative products that we didn’t know we needed until we saw them.
Tim Cook’s talent was in marshalling the resources needed to get them made in the billions, so we could buy them.
“Jack Sprat could eat no fat.
His wife could eat no lean.
And so between them both, you see,
They licked the platter clean.”
1. QA has sunk to Microsftian levels since Cook took over. Needs to be addressed immediately.
2. Get Jony Ive as far away from software design as possible.
3. The current iTunes is nothing but a klugie mess. How about offering a stripped down bare bones Classic version reminiscent of how it was in Snow Leopard or before. Let the users pick which one they prefer.
4. Offer Macs that are completely upgradable by the user.
Just my 2 cents.
Agreed. iTunes sucks the camel’s winkie.
I consider iTunes to be an excellent example of massive, tangled spaghetti code that is so poorly documented and so incredibly complicated that NO ONE understands it all. That is why it is constantly in FAIL mode regarding form, function and usability.
Apple managed to overhaul and simplify a variety of their professional software programs. It’s way time Apple focused on doing the same to iTunes. I cringe having to use the thing because I know it’s ALWAYS going to let me down and frustrate me.
I suppose most of us have our favorite products that we’d like to see happen. There are only two though that are addictive, thrilling and equally delightful. Only two that have consistently inspired ooh’s and aah’s since the day they were released. Only two that are truly the most important & useful for the masses. Those two being the iPhone and Apple Pay.
5 years in our (computer) industry, is like 50 in any other. In this regard, Tim has failed miserably.
Cook cashes the checks and rolls out incremental safe conservative products after the competition establishes a demonstrated advantage. A monkey could do that equally well. He clearly has no clue how to delight computer users, to release all new technology, or forge new markets–as proven by the last 5 years of mediocrity.
As you all know, I am finding the Cook list of hits a very short list. The number of misses continues to grow faster than anyone could have expected, especially given the resources Cook has at his disposal. On a scale of 1-10, Cook’s rating is a 3 at best.
This is all you need to know: not a single “Buy now” recommendation on MacRumors. Getting worse every year under Cook, too.
https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Mac
https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#Other
https://buyersguide.macrumors.com/#iOS