Thinking Different

http://bradgessler.com/thinking-different.html

by krat0sprakhar • 14 years ago

72 34 14 years ago

bradgessler.com

irrationalfab• 14 years ago

I love the recursion!

icode2• 14 years ago

> We believe that people with passion can change the world for the better

Like putting nets in front of their manufacturing buildings so workers don't resort to suicide:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1357833/Apple-respon...

raganwald3• 14 years ago

You may not mean to, but this is a perfect example of a trolling comment. It has high emotional leverage, but is not actually on-topic for this particular post about Apple. Think of it this way: Is there something about this comment that can only make sense to this post? Or could it really be made on practically any post abaout Apple?

I suspect you could say this whenever Apple comes up. iPad 3 retina display? "Amazing because you can clearly see the individual ropes in the nets on buildings..."

This comment could easily end up generating 50% of the comments here, while adding nothing new that hasn't been said before, just the same old accusations and defences. Would that really be signal? Or noise?

There could be something here, perhaps instead of trotting out a sound bite, you could present a theory of how ideals become corrupted by money, or how idealism is blind to consequences. I'm still waiting for someone to unify the way Google and Apple behave with a common narrative.

cbs• 14 years ago

And does this pompous letter from Jobs add anything new that hasn't been said before? This post is the same as any other Apple aggrandizing post here, of course the comments will fall into the same old tropes, but I hardly think icode is the one opening those floodgates.

Here's a thought: is that bad? I mean, isn't this exactly what HN does? If we actually wanted to hear something that hadn't been said time and time again, we sure wouldn't be looking for it on HN (unless we found HN in the last month or so).

Your remark on signal v noise really got me thinking. I think my time here has expired, there is no more new signal to be found, just the same old same old framed in whatever current event or blog post we're talking about. I came to HN this morning to kill time while my roommate is using the shower, but now I'm going for a bike ride instead and stop visiting this website anymore. Bye, Hacker News, it was fun while it lasted!

icode2• 14 years ago

The article refers to changing the world and is illustrated with a photo of Ghandi. I don't know about you, but I get a strange feeling when Ghandi is used to illustrate the values of a company that is exploiting poor people to make toys for rich people.

icebraining2• 14 years ago

Look, I don't have a single Apple device, and I'm closer to a GNU fundie than an Apple lover, but:

1. Foxconn is not Apple

2. The suicide rate at Foxconn is lower than both the average in China and the average in the US: http://articles.businessinsider.com/2010-05-26/tech/30097107...

aerique• 14 years ago

Wrt to point 2: was that before or after the nets?

rmc• 14 years ago

Just for the record, the Daily Mail is not a credible newspaper.

cinquemb2• 14 years ago

in a world where fox news is taken for face value by many people, credibility is losing its credibility. at least someone is looking for more information.

huxley• 14 years ago

Is it equally cynical when municipalities put safety nets on bridges?

http://www.aolnews.com/2010/07/29/iconic-golden-gate-bridge-...

That people might have been driven to choose suicide due to overwork or abuse is the problem, not the safety nets.

gmazzotti• 14 years ago

No it is not, municipalities are not related to why people suicide as companies are

dredmorbius• 14 years ago

NB: The Golden Gate Bridge is not municipally owned. It's owned and managed by a public agency associated with multiple counties in northern California.

Raphael• 14 years ago

That's a perfectly practical solution. Grim as it is, it's better to have nets than people splattered on the pavement.

davidw4• 14 years ago

> Now almost every digital device I own is made by Apple, not because its perfect or the best on the market, but because it represents the virtues of craftsmanship in a world of mediocre, mass-produced products.

Err... their products are mostly mass-produced (not crafted) in the same places most of the other products are mass-produced.

raganwald3• 14 years ago

"Production" refers to design as well as the assembly of atoms. In that context, a company that produces a few models of thngs is craftsmanlike when contrasted with companies that put out dozens of slight variations on the same thing, almost as if shipping twelve handsets is a/b testing...

davidw4• 14 years ago

I agree that Apple's stuff looks classy, has a nice aesthetic, and has a lot of design work that goes into it, but it's also important to see some of the marketing hype for what it is. It's not hand-crafted by gnomes steeped in the crafts of wafer etching, working from little cabins high in the Tirolean Alps.

skyfex• 14 years ago

Well, of course they are mass-produced. You, him, and everybode else here knows that.

But there's craftmanship in design: Read something about how Jobs/Apple goes about designing a product. There's an intense passion to get the look, feel and functionality about a product just right. Down to having several iterations of design on the packaging alone.

There's also craftmanship in production. There was an article about how Apple was buying up high powered lasers to puncture microscopic holes in the macbook casings, so you have lights that are invisible when they're not on.

I wish more companies would care as much about the whole experience of a product, rather than just getting more dots on the feature list.

davidw4• 14 years ago

Excellent points. I think if the original poster had written something more like this we would all agree, but writing "mass produced" in the pejorative sense when Apple is exactly that called for a bit of a rebuttal.

twelvechairs• 14 years ago

sorry for the grammar nitpick, but its a 'foreword' not a 'forward'

jonsen• 14 years ago

Maybe he's referring to the last line: We hope this book helps carry that spirit forward.

cinquemb2• 14 years ago

marketing at its best, last time i checked apple wasn't the first company to "think different" and soon another company will be disruptive and force apple to move in a new direction or new markets, thats just how the world works.

coob• 14 years ago

This is inevitable of course. However, Apple has a strong history of continually disrupting itself.

gducharme• 14 years ago

I was hoping at least one comment would point out how the message and the form of the web site are integrated.

trotsky• 14 years ago

It really is a testament to their marketing prowess when people un-ironically title their brand love letters with the brand's marketing slogan.

tdavis• 14 years ago

Especially when that slogan is grammatically incorrect.

SatvikBeri• 14 years ago

According to Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs it's not-"think different" is a command to think of something that is different, as opposed to thinking of things differently.

da5e• 14 years ago

Apple...Gandhi? Really? I thought the article was being ironic. The thing about a big fail like Mike Daisey's is that it shuts down valid debate. Apple ends, great. Means? Iffy.

farinasa• 14 years ago

I'm sorry, but apple hasn't done anything innovative since the creation of the iPhone. That was huge, don't get me wrong, but every one of their devices has simply been a rehash of their previous model. That is also fine, business as usual, safe, effective, and decent quality, but it isn't "thinking different."

Physical attractiveness is nice, but I want a tool that works for me, not that I sit and stare at because it's pretty. I'll take an ugly thinkpad over the sleek macs any day.

Thinking Different

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