Ken Segall | Ken Segall

Apple’s scary event: a B-team production

11/4/23

You never knew exactly how Steve Jobs would react when you presented a new idea. The only thing you could count on was his brutal honesty.

But, even if he rejected the work, all was not lost. It was simply part of the process. Steve knew that creative work is often iterative, so we’d keep at it until we arrived at a place we all loved. It was a process that actually deepened our relationship over time.

That said, one meeting is seared into my brain because Steve made a particularly biting comment. Not seeing anything he liked in a range of work, he said, “Oh, so you put the B-team on this one.”

Ouch.

In those few words, he questioned how seriously we took the assignment, not to mention our ability to see the difference between “great” and “good enough.” Message received loud and clear. An error in judgment never repeated.

This memory came to the fore because that’s exactly how Apple’s Halloween Eve event made me feel—like the assignment had been relegated to the B-team.

2023 iPhone event: Was that real or AI?

09/25/23

Okay, it took me forever, but I finally got around to watching the 2023 iPhone event.

Why so long? It’s all Apple’s fault. The more they announce new products in these prepackaged events, the less I feel like watching.

My viewing did not change my opinion of virtual presentations. Instead, in an odd way, it got me thinking about the power of AI. Not that Apple used AI. to generate the script—rather that AI could have written the script, and few would have noticed.

That’s because what Apple is doing is exactly what AI is so good at. They’re writing a script based on the show before. And the one before that. And the one before that. They’re stuck in a loop where a parade of presenters describe new products, minus any emotional connection.

ChatGBT wouldn’t break a sweat pulling that together.

Bill Gates’ fanciful memory

06/2/23

Love or loathe Bill Gates, one must admit—the man is a part of technology history. His lifetime accomplishments are many.

Which makes it all the more inexplicable that his inner Santos insists on some outlandish resume embellishment.

Weighing in on AI with his blog article, The Age of AI has begun, Bill puts AI in context. He sees it as one of two revolutionary demos he’s seen in his lifetime. This is how he describes the first.

“[It] was in 1980, when I was introduced to a graphical user interface—the forerunner of every modern operating system, including Windows. I sat with the person who had shown me the demo, a brilliant programmer named Charles Simonyi, and we immediately started brainstorming about all the things we could do with such a user-friendly approach to computing. Charles eventually joined Microsoft, Windows became the backbone of Microsoft, and the thinking we did after that demo helped set the company’s agenda for the next 15 years.”

Impressive! Who else but Bill Gates could spot the potential in this graphical interface thing and develop the software to help us do all that amazing future-y stuff?

Oh, right. That other guy. Steve something-or-other, was it?

This calls for some serious fact checking. So I now turn to our dependable old friend, Reality.

Apple & Jony: a make-believe ending

09/6/22

Everyone loves a good story. Some people need a good story.

Tim Cook, for example. When Jony Ive decided to leave Apple in June 2019, Tim’s job was to reassure Wall Street that the departure of Steve Jobs’ spiritual partner was only a superficial wound.

The goal was believability, not transparency. After all, this is business. Very, very big business.

And so a story was spun.

Let’s give Tim credit for manufacturing a credible and effective tale. Then let’s wonder why no one ever poked holes in it.

The 27-inch iMac conundrum

03/16/22

Allow me to speak on behalf of the world’s 27-inch iMac owners:

THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!

Ah. Good. Had to get that out of my system. Honestly, I have never been so appalled at an Apple strategy. Between the launch of Mac Studio and the simultaneous death of iMac 27, we who have so patiently waited for an Apple Silicon-powered 27-inch iMac are suddenly left with only two options.

We can hang onto our aging computers and simply hope that a new iMac 27 will one day appear. Or we can spend more than double the cost of a typical new iMac 27 for a Mac Studio + Studio Display.

There are only two ways to explain what Apple is doing. It is either failing the transparency test miserably, or it is blatantly committing an act of corporate greed. Sadly, “all of the above” is also a possibility.