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Steve Jobs Has
His Finger on It
Apple CEO Never Liked
The Physical Doodads,
Not Even on His Shirts
By NICK WINGFIELD
July 25, 2007; Page A1
The iPhone is Steve Jobs's attempt to crack a juicy new market for Apple Inc. But it's also part of a decades-long campaign by Mr. Jobs against a much broader target: buttons.
The new Apple cellphone famously does without the keypads that adorn its rivals. Instead, it offers a touch-sensing screen for making phone calls and tapping out emails. The resulting look is one of the sparest ever for Apple, a company known for minimalist gadgets. While many technology companies load their products up with buttons, Mr. Jobs treats them as blemishes that add complexity to electronics products and hinder their clean aesthetics. (Early iPhone sales figures from AT&T Inc. disappointed Wall Street. See related article.)
Buttons have long been a hot-button issue for Apple's CEO. Bruce Tognazzini, a former user-interface expert at Apple who joined the company in 1978, says Mr. Jobs was adamant that the keyboard for the original Macintosh not include "up," "down," "right" and "left" keys that allow users to move the cursor around their computer screens, giving it a sleeker appearance than other personal computers have. Mr. Jobs's reasoning, says Mr. Tognazzini: Omitting the cursor keys would force independent software developers to create programs that used the Mac's mouse -- a novel technology at the time.
"He wanted the thing to look nonintimidating," Mr. Tognazzini says.
Mr. Tognazzini says the strategy worked, but he adds that many users still craved cursor keys and other buttons missing from the original Mac. Just days after Mr. Jobs resigned from Apple in 1985, Mr. Tognazzini proposed a new keyboard that ended up nearly doubling the key count of the original Mac keyboard, earning it the code-name USS Enterprise for its girth. Customers snapped it up when it went on sale in 1987.
Spirit of Simplicity
The spirit of simplicity extends even to Apple retail stores. The elevator in Apple's popular Tokyo store, for instance, has no floor buttons. It stops on every floor of the four-story building. "I got used to this," said Hiroshi Kawano, 40-year-old employee of a printing firm, on a recent visit to the store. "It's simple, and I like it."
At an Apple event two years ago, Mr. Jobs mocked the complexity of traditional remote controls for consumer-electronics products, including "media center" computers designed by Microsoft Corp. and its partners. He showed an image comparing media center remotes that had more than 40 buttons each next to a new Apple remote control for playing movies and music on Macs. The Apple remote had just six buttons.
"I don't know that there's ever been a slide that captures what Apple's about as much as this one," he said. Mr. Jobs was wearing the button-free long-sleeve black shirt that has been his trademark at public appearances. A Microsoft spokeswoman said the company declines to comment on the button issue.
Roger Kay, a technology consultant who does work for Microsoft, says there's legitimacy to both the Microsoft and Apple camps' differing approaches to buttons. "If you're a wonk and you want lots of controls and features, Microsoft is right for you," Mr. Kay says. "If you want a simple experience and you're not tech-savvy, then you'll probably do better with Apple."
Sensitive Switch
In 2000, Apple introduced the Power Mac G4 Cube, a computer that replaced the traditional mechanical power buttons of most computers with a touch-sensitive on/off switch that blended inconspicuously with the machine's eye-catching plastic case.
Unfortunately, the switch proved too sensitive for many users, who found it easy to accidentally turn the computer off with a casual stroke of the hand. Apple discontinued the G4 Cube a year later.
In the '80s, Apple computer scientist Larry Tesler recommended that the company offer a computer mouse with a single button on it, reasoning that it would be less confusing for users. Years later, after Mr. Jobs returned to Apple and much of the personal-computing world was making the switch to more versatile multibutton mice, Mr. Jobs resisted the idea that computer mice should have more than one button, a former Apple executive says.
The executive says he suggested to Mr. Jobs about four years ago that it was time to finally offer a multibutton mouse. Mr. Jobs strongly rebuffed the idea, criticizing the multibutton mouse as "inelegant," the executive says.
New Mouse
Apple finally relented two years ago and it began selling a multibutton mouse. "When Steve hits on something important to him, for either a personal reason or a design reason, he sticks with it for pretty much his whole life...until someone can absolutely prove him wrong," says Steve Wozniak, a co-founder, with Mr. Jobs, of Apple.
An Apple spokesman declined to comment or to make Mr. Jobs available for this story.
When it comes to product design, Mr. Jobs functions like an exacting editor, challenging hardware engineers and industrial designers to trim unnecessary features that don't add value to a product, says one former Apple executive. Colleagues who share his sense of aesthetics -- like Jonathan Ive, Apple's senior vice president of industrial design -- tend to have the most successful careers at the company, several former executives say.
Apple's designers and engineers are often "more royalist than the king," says Jean-Louis Gassée, an Apple executive during the '80s. "They know the pain if they don't" fall in sync with Mr. Jobs, Mr. Gassée adds.
Users often seem to quickly adapt to quirks in Apple's designs. When the company introduced the iPod in late 2001, the most common calls to Apple's technical support lines for a time were about how to turn the device, which lacked a clearly defined power button, off and on, says a former Apple executive.
Eventually, the confusion ebbed as users become more fluent with the iPod, this executive says.
With the iPhone, Mr. Jobs is making a similar gamble that users will quickly familiarize themselves with typing text and phone numbers on the device's "virtual" keyboard -- a set of "buttons" simulated by software rather than etched in plastic keys on the front of the device. Mr. Jobs has said the decision to omit physical buttons from the front of the iPhone was driven by functional, not aesthetic, considerations since a virtual keyboard can be hidden when users want more screen space to view a map or watch a movie.
When asked on stage at a recent conference sponsored by The Wall Street Journal whether there was any debate internally about the decision to include a virtual keyboard with the iPhone instead of a physical one, Mr. Jobs had a suitably minimalist answer.
"None," he said.
Steve Jobs Has
His Finger on It
Apple CEO Never Liked
The Physical Doodads,
Not Even on His Shirts
By NICK WINGFIELD
July 25, 2007; Page A1
The iPhone is Steve Jobs's attempt to crack a juicy new market for Apple Inc. But it's also part of a decades-long campaign by Mr. Jobs against a much broader target: buttons.
The new Apple cellphone famously does without the keypads that adorn its rivals. Instead, it offers a touch-sensing screen for making phone calls and tapping out emails. The resulting look is one of the sparest ever for Apple, a company known for minimalist gadgets. While many technology companies load their products up with buttons, Mr. Jobs treats them as blemishes that add complexity to electronics products and hinder their clean aesthetics. (Early iPhone sales figures from AT&T Inc. disappointed Wall Street. See related article.)
Buttons have long been a hot-button issue for Apple's CEO. Bruce Tognazzini, a former user-interface expert at Apple who joined the company in 1978, says Mr. Jobs was adamant that the keyboard for the original Macintosh not include "up," "down," "right" and "left" keys that allow users to move the cursor around their computer screens, giving it a sleeker appearance than other personal computers have. Mr. Jobs's reasoning, says Mr. Tognazzini: Omitting the cursor keys would force independent software developers to create programs that used the Mac's mouse -- a novel technology at the time.
"He wanted the thing to look nonintimidating," Mr. Tognazzini says.
Mr. Tognazzini says the strategy worked, but he adds that many users still craved cursor keys and other buttons missing from the original Mac. Just days after Mr. Jobs resigned from Apple in 1985, Mr. Tognazzini proposed a new keyboard that ended up nearly doubling the key count of the original Mac keyboard, earning it the code-name USS Enterprise for its girth. Customers snapped it up when it went on sale in 1987.
Spirit of Simplicity
The spirit of simplicity extends even to Apple retail stores. The elevator in Apple's popular Tokyo store, for instance, has no floor buttons. It stops on every floor of the four-story building. "I got used to this," said Hiroshi Kawano, 40-year-old employee of a printing firm, on a recent visit to the store. "It's simple, and I like it."
At an Apple event two years ago, Mr. Jobs mocked the complexity of traditional remote controls for consumer-electronics products, including "media center" computers designed by Microsoft Corp. and its partners. He showed an image comparing media center remotes that had more than 40 buttons each next to a new Apple remote control for playing movies and music on Macs. The Apple remote had just six buttons.
"I don't know that there's ever been a slide that captures what Apple's about as much as this one," he said. Mr. Jobs was wearing the button-free long-sleeve black shirt that has been his trademark at public appearances. A Microsoft spokeswoman said the company declines to comment on the button issue.
Roger Kay, a technology consultant who does work for Microsoft, says there's legitimacy to both the Microsoft and Apple camps' differing approaches to buttons. "If you're a wonk and you want lots of controls and features, Microsoft is right for you," Mr. Kay says. "If you want a simple experience and you're not tech-savvy, then you'll probably do better with Apple."
Sensitive Switch
In 2000, Apple introduced the Power Mac G4 Cube, a computer that replaced the traditional mechanical power buttons of most computers with a touch-sensitive on/off switch that blended inconspicuously with the machine's eye-catching plastic case.
Unfortunately, the switch proved too sensitive for many users, who found it easy to accidentally turn the computer off with a casual stroke of the hand. Apple discontinued the G4 Cube a year later.
In the '80s, Apple computer scientist Larry Tesler recommended that the company offer a computer mouse with a single button on it, reasoning that it would be less confusing for users. Years later, after Mr. Jobs returned to Apple and much of the personal-computing world was making the switch to more versatile multibutton mice, Mr. Jobs resisted the idea that computer mice should have more than one button, a former Apple executive says.
The executive says he suggested to Mr. Jobs about four years ago that it was time to finally offer a multibutton mouse. Mr. Jobs strongly rebuffed the idea, criticizing the multibutton mouse as "inelegant," the executive says.
New Mouse
Apple finally relented two years ago and it began selling a multibutton mouse. "When Steve hits on something important to him, for either a personal reason or a design reason, he sticks with it for pretty much his whole life...until someone can absolutely prove him wrong," says Steve Wozniak, a co-founder, with Mr. Jobs, of Apple.
An Apple spokesman declined to comment or to make Mr. Jobs available for this story.
When it comes to product design, Mr. Jobs functions like an exacting editor, challenging hardware engineers and industrial designers to trim unnecessary features that don't add value to a product, says one former Apple executive. Colleagues who share his sense of aesthetics -- like Jonathan Ive, Apple's senior vice president of industrial design -- tend to have the most successful careers at the company, several former executives say.
Apple's designers and engineers are often "more royalist than the king," says Jean-Louis Gassée, an Apple executive during the '80s. "They know the pain if they don't" fall in sync with Mr. Jobs, Mr. Gassée adds.
Users often seem to quickly adapt to quirks in Apple's designs. When the company introduced the iPod in late 2001, the most common calls to Apple's technical support lines for a time were about how to turn the device, which lacked a clearly defined power button, off and on, says a former Apple executive.
Eventually, the confusion ebbed as users become more fluent with the iPod, this executive says.
With the iPhone, Mr. Jobs is making a similar gamble that users will quickly familiarize themselves with typing text and phone numbers on the device's "virtual" keyboard -- a set of "buttons" simulated by software rather than etched in plastic keys on the front of the device. Mr. Jobs has said the decision to omit physical buttons from the front of the iPhone was driven by functional, not aesthetic, considerations since a virtual keyboard can be hidden when users want more screen space to view a map or watch a movie.
When asked on stage at a recent conference sponsored by The Wall Street Journal whether there was any debate internally about the decision to include a virtual keyboard with the iPhone instead of a physical one, Mr. Jobs had a suitably minimalist answer.
"None," he said.
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