Sam Oliver, writing for AppleInsider:
Apple has placed a hiring freeze on the team responsible for the company’s nascent automotive ambitions after executives became unhappy with the project’s direction and progress, AppleInsider has learned.
The change was precipitated by a post-holiday progress review conducted by Apple design chief Jony Ive, according to a previously reliable source with knowledge of the team’s activities. Ive is said to have “expressed his displeasure” with the group’s headway.
If Apple is indeed building a car, it’s got to be the biggest learning curve they’ve ever tackled. No big surprise if there are a few wrong turns and false starts. What’s key is that they get their ducks in a row, find the right direction.
It was looking too much like the Helicar.
Why do I get the feeling there isn’t as much drama here as some would like to think? If there was some major shakeup here I have a feeling we’d be hearing more about it from people that have contacts and get good gossip.
The rumours are almost writing themselves at this point.
rumored shakeups about a rumored project. somehow, I’m not sweating it.
Seriously. So a project that never officially existed is now undergoing nonexistent shakeups.
At this point, the only reason I’m paying attention to Apple Car rumours at all is to mock them.
Even if some of them turn out to be true, they’re so far outside reality at this point that it won’t be worth bragging points then.
My intent at this point is to see the damn car revealed if/when it’s ever actually revealed.
The key thing is to stop trying to make cars and try to make a MacBook Pro that doesn’t suck. Or a version of iOS that doesn’t suck.
If you look at what Microsoft just did to Internet Explorer by replacing it with Edge browser, it is not hard to imagine that Windows gets replaced soon by Edge OS, or Surface OS, and immediately makes the entire Microsoft hardware and cloud services product lineup make sense. It’s a Windows 95 moment that is just hanging there in the air for Microsoft to grab onto.
Meanwhile, Apple products are getting steadily and dramatically worse. The new keyboard is worse, the new versions of every software are worse, the most popular MacBook Pro is the 2012 version of the 2009 model, and the most popular Mac by far — MacBook Air — is the one Apple product that doesn’t have Retina Display. And it is almost 10 years after iPhone and no touchscreen Mac at all. Amazing and embarrassing. I see people try to touch the screen of their Macs all the time! Today a screen without touch is broken. The trackpad is literally 25 years old.
Oh but they have an imaginary car! Imaginary future products are sooo Steve Ballmer.
Yep. Like anything else concerning Apple, I can wait until it’s a thing.
Just put the sharp object down, sir. We’ll take you to a place where you can rest.
Jony doesn’t want the sleek lines disturbed by distractions like doors or wheels 😉