“Last week, Apple unveiled a new (well, a smaller version) piece of hardware, the baby iPad Pro,” Matthew Hussey writes for TNW. “Ive would, from the inside of a perfect white cube, espouse the virtues of the product using phrases such as, ‘Good is the enemy of great,’ ‘The memory of how we work will endure beyond the products of our work,’ and, ‘I want to see a problem solved in a way that acknowledges its context.'”
“But last week, he was strangely absent. He wasn’t even in the auditorium. Long time Apple observer John Gruber said, ‘As far as I could see, Jony Ive did not attend today’s event. He never appears on stage, but I’ve always seen him in the audience, usually seated next to Laurene Powell Jobs.'”
Hussey writes, “Taking a quick look at Apple’s YouTube channel, there’s not even a hint of Ive’s face on white background. In fact, we have to go back six months to find his video on the Apple Pencil.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: A 9.7-inch iPad Pro or the iPhone SE simply doesn’t warrant Apple’s industrial design guru’s presence. He’s already introduced these designs. We imagine he’s working on next-gen products or taking a well-deserved break.
SEE ALSO:
Obviously, Jony Ive is preparing to retire from Apple – May 27, 2015
Jony Ive is Apple’s next Steve Jobs – May 27, 2015
What Jony Ive’s ‘promotion’ really means – May 26, 2015
Now Jony Ive will have an even bigger influence over Apple’s image – May 26, 2015
Stephen Fry meets Jony Ive, Apple’s newly-promoted chief design officer – May 26, 2015
Jony Ive gives up day-to-day managerial duties to focus on big picture – May 26, 2015
Jony Ive promoted to ‘Chief Design Officer’ – May 25, 2015
Jony Ive is the most powerful person at Apple – December 12, 2014
Jony Ive hasn’t been given too much power at Apple – because he’s always had it – February 5, 2013
Steve Jobs left design chief Jonathan Ive ‘more operational power’ than anyone else at Apple – October 21, 2011
Seriously MDN? There were no new products announced. A video narration by Ive for either the iPhone SE or 9.7″ iPad Pro would have been ridiculous.
Working!
Sorry folks – it’s strange Ive wasn’t there.
These Apple events are a big part theater – and not having you lead star there is very strange.
Ive had something better to do? LOL Watch the stock fall in his office?
Busy making every Apple product paper thin.
Exactly; it was by far not the first time when Ive has skipped an Apple presentation.
He may well be working on the new Apple Car and totally absorbed by it.
It will take a lot of work to transform a 1957 Fiat 600 Multipla into an Apfelwagen. But I think it will be worth the wait. Go, Jony.
There was an iCal/Notifications outage.
You know maybe he was travelling or on vacation.
A quick check on the website and he is still listed as a senior member of the team:
http://investor.apple.com/corporate-governance.cfm
Sitting infront of a mirror admiring himself
Jony is measuring the incredibly small gap between the doors and the doorframe… the seamless hood and latches with tolerances to tight, they’ve never yet been manufactured… he’s in an underground vault scraping clay off a model… he’s in space… in a balloon… on the jobs yacht at an undisclosed location… can you believe those seams… Merced are ____ ing bricks.
It’s fun to speculate on a slow news day.
Ive may be gradually withdrawing from his design czar job, planning an exit strategy, looking down the avenue of possibilities now that iPhone is commoditised and no longer all that special. Moore’s law is reaching a limit. Constraints like battery life and focal depth are thwarting his unrelenting pursuit of thinness. The thrill is gone.
Moreover, Cook’s DeLorean has brought back (gasp!) old designs for his engineers to pack with new goodies, snubbing Ive’s aesthetic input.
Maybe the man is hanging out with Marc Newson, who designed a shotgun for Beretta a couple of years ago. Talk amongst them might naturally drift to lightweight but powerful sidearms, or to elegant body armour (talk about disrupting wearables!)
Perhaps Sir Jony is so appalled at the prospect of an Apple-exclusive Dr Dre miniseries that he’s countering with one of his own, an art mystery involving the minimalist movement as secret child of rococo stylings, starring Leonardo Dicaprio.
Or, his absence could be the result of a stomach virus that’s been going around. Not exciting.
It’s bad enough when the CEO of the worlds richest company is on stage to announce a new make of watch band (woven Nylon) without Jony telling us how fine the ‘new’ nylon yarn has been made or how many litres of sweat it can evaporate per sq cm or how they’ve taken a Pro and made a mini Pro.
‘nuf said.
I believe what was introduced was a buisness decision strictly….. Nothing worthy of design prowess …. Not something ives would have been proud of…
Iphone SE.. Is an old design… With shiny dimond cut edges removed ( something ives so proudly presented years ago.) that missing element from otherwise an identical design was done for cost saving .. Not esthetics…
Ipad pro (pro in apples shallow definition of pro, they even put 2 gigs of ram less in 9.7 than from the the 12 inch pro tablet ) has nothing new in the design department… Nothing.
Why should Ive associate himself with such presentation.. What’s there for him to feel proud… The Straps( some ware realy nice though, but not enough)….. Nope i would not have shown up either… Specially if internally there has been a disagreement/fight about iphone SE design …..
He has a reputation as the top industrial designer in the world to maintain.. And has the power at appls to say (FU) to those who probably went agead against his wishs with the iphone SE decisions..
At least the above is one angle to look at it from…
Or maybe he had the flue or a headache.. Lol
So then the question becomes: Why hasn’t Jony Ive been designing anything over the last year (or more), that he would be proud to present September 2016? I have an idea that he is about to quit, or is ill, or had an accident. Could it be an in-house battle between Jony Ive and 2014-newbie (also design-y) Angela Ahrendts?
Am I the only one who thinks that this latest event was a low-key introduction? First, off, the announcement for it came barely two weeks in advance; they did it on campus, everything about it was very low-key (compared to WWDC or the Fall iPhone extravaganzas), it was barely a step above making the announcement only on the web site.
After being parodied for his product intros, perhaps he thought it was time to drop the practice.
Two words: Exit strategy.
Looking for a way out from the coming fall….
Good fuck off the pommy prick. This is the US not the fucking UK you gay pommy faggit!!!
Ive has been grossly overexposed in the past few years. What was once a novelty is now a parody of itself. Keep Ive doing the designing and get better faces for the company in front of the camera. Federighi is fine, Schiller is ok but getting boring, Cook is just terrible onstage, no presence.
I lasted about 4 minutes of the webcast – at which point I switched it off – to watch later – when I could use the fast forward to just pick up the key points.
I’m afraid gone are the days when the webcast or the running commentay from MDN would have me sitting at the Mac for the whole presentation.
I wonder if that is reflected in the streaming numbers.
Ive has done his time.
Ugly flat icons
Nice new but non-pro Mac Pro
Useless hyper-thinness
For such a tremendous salary, a boss could ask more from his employee…