Re: vaporware

Alan <nuh-uh@nope.com> wrote:

On 2025-03-13 08:21, badgolferman wrote:

John Gruber is one of the more high-profile Apple commenters, and
generally takes a pretty upbeat view of the company, so it was a big
surprise to see him launch a blistering attack on the iPhone maker.
 
Referring to Apple advertising Siri features which don’t yet exist, he
argues that the company is “in disarray if not crisis,” is making
“bullshit” claims, and has “squandered” its reputation with “a fiasco” …
 
On Daring Fireball, Gruber says the reality of any product claims can
be judged on a four-point scale:
 
- Demonstrated, but nobody allowed to try it for themselves
- Hands-on demos for media in very controlled conditions
- Beta versions anyone can try for themselves
- Shipped features
 
He says the level below this – concept videos of features which cannot
even be carefully demonstrated – is just BS. And that’s where Apple is
with the above Siri features.
 
There were no demonstrations of any of that. Those features were all at
level 0 on my hierarchy. That level is called vaporware. They were
features Apple said existed, which they claimed would be shipping in
the next year, and which they portrayed, to great effect, in the
signature “Siri, when is my mom’s flight landing?” segment of the WWDC
keynote itself, starting around the 1h:22m mark. Apple was either
unwilling or unable to demonstrate those features in action back in
June, even with Apple product marketing reps performing the demos from
a prepared script using prepared devices […]
 
What Apple showed regarding the upcoming “personalized Siri” at WWDC
was not a demo. It was a concept video. Concept videos are bullshit,
and a sign of a company in disarray, if not crisis.
 
Gruber argues that if there was any level of reality at all to these
features then the delay announcement would have been the perfect time
to demo the current state of play to some tech writers, to show what is
currently working and what isn’t yet.
 
That didn’t happen. If these features exist in any sort of working
state at all, no one outside Apple has vouched for their existence, let
alone for their quality […]
 
The fiasco is that Apple pitched a story that wasn’t true, one that
some people within the company surely understood wasn’t true, and they
set a course based on that.
 
There are a lot of companies who make obviously BS claims about AI
products, and Gruber said he never expected Apple to be one of them.
While there have been occasional disasters like AirPower, you could
normally trust the company’s claims, he says. But no more.
 
But their credibility is now damaged […] Damaged is arguably too
passive. It was squandered.
 
https://9to5mac.com/2025/03/13/apple-commenter-john-gruber-launches-blistering-attack-on-rotten-apple-over-siri-vaporware/

 
I normally like what Mr. Gruber writes very much...
 
...but this is more than a little bit hyperbolic.
 
Apple screwed up, sure.
 
He's reading far too much into it.
 

If he’s right when you agree with him, why do you think he’s not right when
you don’t agree with him? Maybe you’re the one who should reexamine your
position.