Is Apple Getting Too Sloppy?
Sure, it may be nitpicky, but paying attention to small things like this used to be Apple’s jam.
Pop open your iPhone, and head to any web page with an auto-detected phone number, and 3D Touch (peek, not pop) the number to get the “call this number” screen.
Notice anything? In the list of things you can do with that number is a spot that should say something like Call the number. Instead, it says, Open InCallService. This looks like a variable in the code that makes your iPhone work, not a nicely formatted iOS 10 software option.
I’ve always counted on Apple sweating the details on every screen and animation on their iPhones and Macs. How did something like this get past even a cursory pre-release look? Is this an example of how little Apple actually cares about the little things?
A loss of focus
It’s things like this that make me worried, frankly. Yes, this specific issue is simply an oversight and will get fixed in the next iOS update.
But I’m not the first to notice that Apple might be losing its way.
Owen Williams took to Medium to share his thoughts about the new MacBook Pro line with the innovative, yet somewhat anti-climactic Touch Bar.
For a company that prides itself on ecosystem, and thinking of the ‘end to end’ experience, Apple has utterly lost its way.
- Owen WilliamsDeveloper Michael Tsai worries about the state of the Mac, too, noting that you can’t even plug an iPhone into the new MacBook Pros.
It seems like Apple has either lost its way, that it has lost touch with what (some of) its customers want, or that it simply doesn’t care about those customers. Developers are a captive audience, and creative professionals can switch to Windows, I guess. Apple no longer considers them core.
- Michael TsaiWhether it’s a lack of current ports or the addition of a weird touch bar thing on the new MacbookPro or a seemingly sloppy coding reference in what should be a consumer-facing screen on iOS, Apple is definitely having its troubles.
Both are, in and of themselves, not that big of a deal. The iPhone screen will be fixed, and easily. The Touch Bar is just a new little thing added to a thinner, lighter MacBook Pro, which is, by all accounts, a pretty great laptop.
But what these two (and most likely other) things tell the Apple faithful is that the Cupertino tech company doesn’t care about the details as it might once have. Big new spaceship campuses and special iPhone coatings aren’t what made Apple great.
If the trend continues, surely Apple is headed for a fall.
