Two perspectives on a designer who Steve Jobs could not hire

https://www.arun.is/blog/richard-sapper/

by conanxin • 5 years ago

170 152 5 years ago

arun.is

twobitshifter• 5 years ago

Another designer he couldn’t hire built the connection machine

http://www.tamikothiel.com/cm/index.html

How the Connection Machine inspired Steve Jobs:

My old friend Joanna Hoffman was marketing manager for the first Macintosh and the NeXT computer, and Steve Jobs' "right hand," as depicted by Kate Winslet in the film "Steve Jobs." In 1986, when the Connection Machine came out, Jobs asked her to get its designer to create his new NeXT computer as well. To which Joanna replied, "Too late, Tamiko has gone to Europe to become an artist!" But the machine made a lasting impression on him, and from that point on, Jobs' designs were not merely useful - they were visually sublime.

See "CM-1/CM-2 Design Legacy" >>

hinkley2• 5 years ago

I wonder if that really would have worked out.

They say you should never meet your heroes. Working with these people likely would have pushed them into his “shithead” category.

setpatchaddress• 5 years ago

Eh. He worked with frogdesign, Paul Rand, Avie T., and a host of software people with strong opinions at NeXT. He wasn’t incapable of working with other people.

wildpeaks• 5 years ago

Oh it's so nice to see a reference to Tamiko in the wild, she's a wonderful person.

drexlspivey• 5 years ago

Steve Jobs also tried to hire Linus Torvalds to work on their BSD kernel (lol)

samplatt• 5 years ago

Seriously? Wow. Talk about tone-deaf.

ineedasername• 5 years ago

What an amazing clash of personalities that would have been.

dfee• 5 years ago

Guido had 6.5 years at Dropbox. That always surprised me.

phendrenad22• 5 years ago

How so? Many engineers have given up on their ideals when a large enough paycheck is waved in front of them.

winter_blue• 5 years ago

macOS should have just used the Linux kernel. The fairly complex and difficult-to-duplicate Cocoa UI layer would have made the odds of a macOS-compatible open-source clone appearing anytime in the near future slim.

Even today, I hope Apple makes a switch to their own patched version of the Linux kernel. It would be a great breath of new air into macOS. In terms of sheer features and compatibility, the Linux kernel surpasses Darwin by massive measures.

cmrdporcupine• 5 years ago

NeXTStep was built around BSD, and so BSD followed through to MacOS, which is really frankly just re-skinned NeXTStep. I'm pretty sure it would have been a real PITA to rework it around Linux at that point. Lots of existing applications and tools would have had to have been reworked.

And at that time (late 90s) the Linux kernel was certainly awesome but not clearly that much more awesome than BSD. The amount of driver and architecture support in the kernel wasn't as expansive as now.

phendrenad22• 5 years ago

The problem is the difficulty in mixing in proprietary blobs. The only way to link proprietary drivers into the kernel is the way Nvidia does it, and it's a legal grey area to this day.

sangnoir2• 5 years ago

Apple has a visceral dislike/distrust of the GPL, and goes to great lengths to avoid it - like authoring an entirely new compiler (clang) to replace the GPL-licensed gcc. This is also the reason why the version of bash bundled with Apple OSes is ancient.

HWR_144• 5 years ago

If Steve Jobs had hired Linus, would OSX still be BSD based as opposed to Linux based?

speed_spread• 5 years ago

Those conversations would have been fun to hear.

smoldesu2• 5 years ago

Apple's love for Dieter Rams has gotten them very far, but their recent pivot towards 'making the computer disappear' is at stark contrast with the design elements that he employed. Personally, I think we've gone as far as we can with those design cues: our tablets have been reduced to black slabs, and our computers arranged into thin silver clamshells. Apple's (re)introduction of color in the recent iMacs is a step in the right direction, but there's still so much of the 'domestic computer' design space that hasn't been explored yet. I think of Teenage Engineering and their colorful (albeit expensive) synthesizers, game consoles, and the various Homepod/Echo/Nest/Etc. smart assistants that now litter our home: these are all experiments in making the computer disappear, yet nobody seems to be paying much attention the field.

hinkley2• 5 years ago

Vacillating between understated and overstated lets you sell more product. A product I still buy, mind you, but I’m aware what’s going on.

sangnoir2• 5 years ago

That makes it easy for people around you to see if you're using the latest device as well, or still stuck on some old device. I don't care for devices-as-fashion, but I feel bad for teenagers who can't afford to always have the latest iProduct.

dangus• 5 years ago

I personally disagree! The computer disappearing is one of the most pure expressions of form following function.

In the iPhone or iMac, what's on the screen is what is important. Nothing else is important, so it's not there. One of Rams' principles: "Good design is as little design as possible."

Contrast that to a competing product like the ASUS ROG Phone: RGB lights, not-strictly-necessary cosmetic vents, asymmetrical lines, printed design patterns. Now THAT is a product that would make Dieter Rams throw up in his mouth!

smoldesu2• 5 years ago

The computer disappearing is one of the most pure expressions of form following function.

I actually agree wholeheartedly. Apple's devices are the apex of form following function, which is why their form advances so rarely: the functionality of the iPhone changes so little from year-to-year, that Apple doesn't really need to re-engineer much. Hell, the iPhone 12 is just a redux of the iPhone 5 footprint, an anachronism that's yet another great example of form meandering while function stagnates. The deficiencies in our current devices are clear: they're centralized, non-extensible, and exceptionally difficult to fix when they break. Apple profits off all three of those markets, so I have little faith that they intend to change anything there soon.

Contrast that to a competing product like the ASUS ROG Phone

Don't make me (or Tim Cook, for that matter) laugh. The iPhone doesn't compete with the ROG Phone: they're ostentatiously different products. One is a gaming phone, the other is an iPhone. You're comparing a dune-buggy to a Ford Fiesta, which you're welcome to do, but will sway very few of their respective audiences.

gerdesj2• 5 years ago

The article sways around somewhat. For example, from the article, we have: "It’s a philosophy ... with HfG Ulm, a school that many consider the spiritual successor to the Bauhaus."

Bauhaus are famous for "Form follows function."

Richard creates:

"When the Thinkpad is closed, it looks like a simple black slab. When opened, a cam at the hinge theatrically rearranges two keyboard halves to extend out of the computer. There are numerous colorful accents, including an IBM logo in red, green, and blue, and of course, the red Trackpoint."

... theatrically ...

"The PowerBook, on the other hand, aims to be as simple as possible in whatever state."

... that's Bauhaus: simple.

I like the stinkies' keyboard, but it is quite daft. His engineer creds are a bit underwhelming. Exploding coffee pots are pretty silly in a world that has had the pressure cooker, kettles and the steam engine for centuries/millennia.

perl4ever2• 5 years ago

Have you heard of the musical group Bauhaus? I don't have a specific point, except that my impression is they were pretty theatrical.

Also, I'd observe that a "spiritual successor" to something might have some significant differences?

Anyway, I liked the folding Thinkpad keyboard. If it had been a flimsy malfunctioning attempt at getting attention, it would have been different. But it was very solid, wasn't it?

itronitron• 5 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus

gerdesj2• 5 years ago

Bauhaus was a German design house. The band was named after them. I remember seeing the band on Top of the Pops (UK) back in the day. Their videos etc were generally in b/w which echoes the design house which majored quite heavily in black, white and chrome. The music was pretty stylistic too.

Anyway, the Bauhaus in the article is the design house and not the band.

Waterluvian• 5 years ago

“ Richard Sapper isn’t a household name like Jony Ive, Dieter Rams, or Phillipe Stark.”

None of these are household names.

benrbray• 5 years ago

https://xkcd.com/2501/

jkmcf• 5 years ago

And that's why textbooks (generally) suck.

hamburgerwah• 5 years ago

I really don't know why people want to venerate anything to do with Steve Jobs. He was an absolute disgrace of a human being, treated people like garbage, a borderline psychopath. And yet some venerate him because he made some pretty things before other people would have inevitably made those same pretty things.

P.S. I somewhat agree with the commentator saying that hacker news is in many ways a sort of venture capital pornography, but I think the people comparing jobs to historical figures that confronted adolf hitler or changed the course of human history need some very long and deep self reflection.

alisonkisk2• 5 years ago

It's been 40 years and no one's made pretty things like them yet.

michaelmrose• 5 years ago

Can you give some examples? Certainly good ideas that nobody has replicated for decades would be valuable avenues worth pursuing.

robbiep5• 5 years ago

I’m honestly confused by the points of view that hold that unless a person was/is as pure as the driven snow they deserve to be scrubbed from the history books.

Jobs, Churchill, Gates, Musk - I don’t understand. It’s as if proponents of that view believe that the only people deserving of recognition are those that were completely internally consistent, including by the times in which they are being judged (ie present tense).

Humans are complex. None of us (or at least, very very few of us) are fully internally consistent. The personality flaws that cause the greatest consternation may also be those that lead to our greatest triumphs. If they are not criminal, why not recognise people for doing great things? And why is it so hard to say add the caveat that like all humans, they had their flaws?

p1necone• 5 years ago

I don't think parent is saying that Jobs should be "scrubbed from the history books", quite the opposite really.

They're saying that we shouldn't just talk about all the positive things that Jobs did as if he was some kind of paragon - the history books should also talk about the bad.

b112• 5 years ago

History books often contain contentious or unusual behaviour. The same for people reminiscing about others.

Jobs yelled at people, fired them, and apparently worse? I don't know all the specifics, but...

Of those he yelled at, how many conversations, without yelling, were had first? How many were had one on one first, but he was ignored?

How many pleasant, amicable conversations were had. What's the ratio?

To hear some talk, apparently Jobs was walking around Apple HQ, just randomly screaming at, and belittling others, all day long?!

This seems inaccurate.

And the 'style of the time' is critical, as parent says. You cannot judge a person's leadership style by today's standards, that's absurd, instead, how would Jobs be rated against the average manager/boss of the time?

In the 80s, I had many a manager/boss which would be know to yell and belittle people. People would also crack racist jokes, make fun of alternate life styles, and in many cases only doing it to fit in, not really even caring or thinking wrong of it.

History must be viewed as a contemporary would.

howaboutnope• 5 years ago

Humans are complex. None of us (or at least, very very few of us) are fully internally consistent.

More importantly, humans are different. Some are heads and shoulders above others morally or in other ways, and judge them accordingly.

There exists in our society a widespread fear of judging that has nothing whatever to do with the biblical "Judge not, that ye be not judged," and if this fear speaks in terms of "casting the first stone," it takes this word in vain. For behind the unwillingness to judge lurks the suspicion that no one is a free agent, and hence the doubt that anyone is responsible or could be expected to answer for what he has done. The moment moral issues are raised, even in passing, he who raises them will be confronted with this frightful lack of self-confidence and hence of pride, and also with a kind of mock-modesty that in saying, Who am I to judge? actually means We're all alike, equally bad, and those who try, or pretend that they try, to remain halfway decent are either saints or hypocrites, and in either case should leave us alone.

-- Hannah Arendt, "Personal Responsibility Under Dictatorship"

why not recognise people for doing great things?

In this case, because they can't be called "great things" without diminishing human greatness and actually greats -- they're just product, often in the service of selfish, banal, mediocre ends. Certainly with Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook. None of their luminaries can even tie the laces of people who can tie the laces of great people. So why can't the money be enough, why do we need to fawn over people, too?

lucideer• 5 years ago

There's nothing in the above comment about scrubbing from the history books. It's about veneration.

There's plenty of people who are remembered in history but just not lauded for their actions. All the commenter is advocating is for a better understanding of historical figures.

everdrive2• 5 years ago

I'm very uncomfortable putting Jobs in the same camp as Churchill, and even putting him in the same camp as Gates and Musk. (although admittedly, those do seem to at least be more fair comparison.)

The main problem with Jobs is that he developed a cult following that (at least in my opinion) was never deserved. Gates never developed this, and has rightly been criticized for his practices at Microsoft, while still being praised for his charity work in later years. Musk arguably has a similar cult following, and to add to that, I know very little about him, so maybe of three you listed, Musk is the most fair comparison.

908B64B197• 5 years ago

Jobs, Churchill, Gates, Musk - I don’t understand.

One of them was an asshole. The other one was... a white supremacist to say the least.

"Churchill was particularly keen on chemical weapons, suggesting they be used "against recalcitrant Arabs as an experiment". He dismissed objections as "unreasonable". "I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes _ [to] spread a lively terror _" In today's terms, "the Arab" needed to be shocked and awed. A good gassing might well do the job." [0]

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/apr/19/iraq.arts

austhrow7432• 5 years ago

This is the forum for a VC firm. You would be hard pressed to find a social media platform with a greater concentration of people wanting to make a shitload of money by growing a tech company outside of the one that's exclusively for people who have received YC funding.

Steve Jobs made a shitload of money growing a tech company. The broad overview of his career involving him being there when it went from nothing to something, leaving, succeeding while it floundered, then returning to have it then also succeed; gives him more credibility for having caused that success than many other potential role models have.

Austin_Conlon• 5 years ago

Grew Pixar too. Here’s how Alan Kay put it:

I was contacted by the people who became Pixar–I knew them well, and they wanted to get out of Lucasfilm. They called me up and asked me for advice, and so I said, I can talk to Steve. I explained very carefully to him who these people were, and you shouldn’t fuck around with them, like he did with his normal employees. He did a good job with them. [Pixar] was the most honest billion he ever made, because he put a lot of his own personal money into nurturing those guys. They got fabulous. That was Steve’s best hour.

kortilla2• 5 years ago

This is the forum for a VC firm.

It may be, but that’s not who posts on it and determines the content.

systemvoltage• 5 years ago

I think Steve Jobs was one of the most amazing people ever to be alive. He was an ass but he also loved many, respected many, made enormous number of friends and literally changed the world. He was a brilliant, charismatic leader that inspired so many to work towards his vision.

I get goosebumps thinking about his life and watching some of the old clips on YT.

NL807• 5 years ago

John Carmack paints an interesting picture on what kind of man Jobs was.

https://www.facebook.com/SteveJobsFeed/posts/john-carmack-re...

Sorry about the facebook link

divbzero• 5 years ago

I remember reading this before and great to re-read it again. John Carmack does a good job honoring the man without placing him on a pedestal.

WalterBright5• 5 years ago

Here ya go:

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/05/14/john-carmack-shares-ste...

elromulous2• 5 years ago

This. I cannot upvote this comment enough.

kortilla2• 5 years ago

He was an absolute disgrace of a human being, treated people like garbage, a borderline psychopath.

So what? Many celebrated people (artists, scientists, architects, leaders) were actually quite miserable people to be around and work with.

shusaku2• 5 years ago

I really don't know why people want to venerate anything to do with Steve Jobs.

Pretty ironic that your complaining about Steve Jobs in the comment section of an article that has almost nothing to do with him.

OJFord• 5 years ago

If it has almost nothing to do with him, then a headline about him - even Steve Jobs couldn't hire them - is the sort of veneration GP is talking about.

jasode• 5 years ago

I really don't know why people want to venerate anything to do with Steve Jobs. He was an absolute disgrace of a human being, treated people like garbage, a borderline psychopath.

Fyi... in case the gp's top-voted comment gives a misleading impression about this thread's article content...

This blog post is actually about designer Richard Sapper who did work for IBM. (E.g. the IBM ThinkPad black aesthetics.)

The "2 perspectives" of Richard Sapper are: (1) the 1983 video documentary on youtube, and (2) a recent 2016 book showing a portfolio of his work

I totally understand gp's advice to not celebrate Steve Job's human flaws but based on the text's actual content (Richard Sapper), the SJ complaint is really a non-sequitur in this thread. The author is just name-dropping SJ in the headline and in one sentence to hook the reader into reading more about Richard Sapper.

elisbce• 5 years ago

I'm not a Steve Jobs or Apple fan and I don't like some of his personalities, but to say someone is "an absolute disgrace of a human being", despite the fact that what he did inevitably revolutionized the entire computer/mobile world, sounds more like an absolute disgrace of a human being to me.

I don't know what gets you so mad at him, maybe you were the guy he fired from his meeting? Or is it just jealousy and denial of truth. He is not a moral saint, nor are you. He sometimes gets angry and attacks people, so did you in your post. Judging from how biased you were in your post, you are in no position to judge him to be honest, let alone belittling his massive contributions to mankind. Where were you when he introduced iPhone to the world?

1propionyl• 5 years ago

One small problem with this piece:

Richard Sapper, while responsible for the overall design of the ThinkPad line, did not invent or design that keyboard. The honor of the original idea goes to John Karidis, and credit is also due to other IBM designers who helped refine the design.

pcurve• 5 years ago

And original thinkpad project started in Japan. Fun story about the red pointer device

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2017/10/16/meet-th...

Jugurtha2• 5 years ago

Clockwise: Richard Sapper, Dieter Rams, Ingo Maurer, Gerhard Richter

I wonder how people went about this one with the 2x2 picture matrix.

lovich2• 5 years ago

I don’t understand what you mean

croes2• 5 years ago

Ingo Maurer is the guy at the bottom right not bottom left. Usually we read from left to right from top to bottom

1 2

3 4

But here it's clockwise

1 2

4 3

Jugurtha2• 5 years ago

In addition to what "croes" wrote, this also is a clockwise

  2 3
  1 4

One might be tempted to read it that way, starting at the bottom (closest to the figure label), and on the left, for a left-to-right document.

elromulous2• 5 years ago

Bill Burr so eloquently captures my feelings towards Steve Jobs and the Steve Jobs fandom.

https://youtu.be/E3s-qZsjK8I

bink• 5 years ago

I think Bill Burr himself would discourage people from forming their opinions about things based on his standup routine.

croes2• 5 years ago

But he still has a point.

Do we attribute the Mona Lisa to Da Vinci or his client?

zxienin• 5 years ago

Genuinely curious.

Are there any examples, where a worthy achievement was made by a nice, agreeable, likeable person?

Each achiever story I recall, is accompanied by how asshole the person is/was, to a set of folks.

jasonwatkinspdx• 5 years ago

There are tons, they just don't tend to generate controversy, so they aren't talked about as much, or in the same way. But a simple example would be Einstein. Or in the field of CS, Turing was well liked by his collaborators as well, despite having some idiosyncrasies.

AlanYx• 5 years ago

Einstein actually isn't a particularly good example. His treatment of both his wives is fairly controversial, and a lot has been written about his alleged refusal to co-credit Mileva Marić on any of the work they collaborated on.

robmusial• 5 years ago

Don Knuth comes to mind.

j7ake• 5 years ago

John Bardeen

scaryclam• 5 years ago

Steve Wozniak

tincholio• 5 years ago

Check out Richard Feynman, for example.

amelius• 5 years ago

I'm reading more about product designers than about the people who actually designed the hardware and software.

Two perspectives on a designer who Steve Jobs could not hire

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