Ask HN: Has Apple lost its way?

9 Zufriedenheit 12 6/9/2025, 6:42:15 PM
I use a Mac and iPhone and appreciate the clean experience. But i just watched the WWDC and felt like the whole thing could be summed up in a 5 min video. They have so much talent and resources and all they come up with is slightly redesigning the icons every couple years. And now it seems they started to re-implement the mac UI on iPad again, i literally though that was a joke when i first saw it.

Comments (12)

msgodel · 18m ago
I'm shorting them after today. I wanted to do it in December and chickened out. They're still way overpriced for a company with no potential for growth.
treetalker · 22m ago
> They have so much talent and resources and all they come up with is slightly redesigning the icons every couple years.

You mean that, like me, you aren't excited about Apple's "new material" and jiggle physics?

Apple is dragging its feet on the incorporation of LLMs/ML in the OS. This is another facelift; my expensive iMac Pro will be phased out on OS updates and exposed to security issues; and Apple is blowing smoke up the wazoo with trite rhetoric about "new material" that boils down to translucent glass. Not the bold leadership and vision one might hope for, and I'm going to start looking around for other options to outfit my law firm. I can't stand M$, so it might be time to bite the bullet and look into Linux and a dumb phone.

kratom_sandwich · 3h ago
It certainly seems as if they are more focused on rent-seeking than on innovation nowadays (cf. the Epic Games lawsuit vs. Apple Intelligence). On top of that, the WWDC has shifted to adress the public rather than the actual technical audience that attends the conference. Previously, WWDC keynotes were a bit closer to what is now the Platforms State of the Union presentation.
PaulHoule · 7h ago
I see it the other way around. Freakin' Microsoft proved you could integrate a full desktop with a tablet interface and it worked just fine. Customers didn't care: most of them asked "who moved my cheese?" the other question was "do I have to stow my Surface when the plane is landing?"

For what the iPad Pro costs, Apple should have brought the Mac UI to it 5 years ago, but Apple wants you to travel with a Macbook and an iPad and a Phone whereas one sleek device could replace them all.

Spooky23 · 2h ago
Yeah, but windows tablet model isn’t exactly a hit, and they ruined windows in the process.

Personally, I think tablet is a loser form factor. It’s great for simple fixed app scenarios, and mediocre for everything else.

mystifyingpoi · 7h ago
> They have so much talent and resources

I believe this has little to do with the outcome we got. We are definitely at a local maxima of technology advancement, when it comes to laptops and mobile devices. You can't expect even the most talented people to innovate out of their butts in 2025 just like that.

msgodel · 15m ago
Apple's software isn't anywhere near optimal. I've seen what's possible and worked on some of it myself.
datadrivenangel · 6h ago
Many of Apple's local UI have gone backwards for reliability.

iOS 18 on the iPhone SE sometimes won't respond to tapping to share a photo... Spotlight on Mac has gotten worse and often won't find files...

duxup · 7h ago
I think the "has apple lost its way" is a meme now.

The fact that a PR video goes on long is ... normal?

throwaway889900 · 2h ago
Gotta wait for Apple VR 2, next year? maybe?
bdangubic · 2h ago
Cause VR 1 was smashing success?
leakycap · 6h ago
I'm surprised by how many missteps they made in a single release cycle. I was a Mac fan through the dark times, but I think I'm not a fan through the Liquid Glass era and will be navigating to Linux rather than staying on macOS for my development.