Has Apple Software Quality Has Taken a ‘Nosedive’?
Has Apple Software Quality Has Taken a ‘Nosedive’?
2 minute read
An Apple Inc. logo is displayed on the company's iPhone 6 Plus inside SoftBank Corp.'s Omotesando store during the sales launch of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in Tokyo on Sept. 19, 2014.Bloomberg/Getty Images
Marco Arment is the closest thing in Apple’s 300,000-strong developer community to a superstar. He co-founded Tumblr. He created Instapaper and Overcast. He’s co-host of Accidental Tech Podcast — a weekly gabfest with a big Apple following and a catchy theme song.
Arment has been complaining for some time about a problem I’d felt but hadn’t figured out how to put into words.
PHOTOS: The Rise of Mobile Phones from 1916 to Today
1916 A German field telephone station in the Aisne department of northern France during World War I.Paul Thompson—FPG/Getty Images1970
French singer and actor Johnny Hallyday in a scene from the film 'Point de Chute' (aka 'Falling Point').Keystone/Holton/Getty Images1980
An early mobile phone during the Iranian Embassy siege at Princes Gate in South Kensington, London.Kypros/Getty Images1983
Bob Maxwell, general manager of Englewood-based Mobile Telephone of Colorado, places a call on an FCC-approved radio frequency while driving to work.Lyn Alweis—Denver Post/Getty Images1986
THE A-TEAM "The Say U.N.C.L.E. Affair" Episode 5. (l-r) Eddie Velez as Frankie Santana, Robert Vaughn as General Hunt Stockwell, George Peppard as John 'Hannibal' Smith.Bill Dow—NBC/Getty Images1992
Democratic presidential nominee Bill Clinton talks on a cell phone while meeting with Boston Mayor Ray Flynn in a New York hotel on Sept. 25.Mark Lennihan—AP1993
Whoopi Goldberg during ShoWest in Las Vegas.Jeff Kravitz—FilmMagic/Getty Images1997
A farmer with his family sitting on a Bullock Cart and talking on a mobile Phone, in Delhi.India Today Group/Getty Images2001
A woman watches smoke pour out of the World Trade Center Towers in New York on September 11.Nicholas Goldberg—Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images2011
A rebel militiaman speaks on his mobile phone after capturing territory from government troops on March 25 in Ben Jawat, Libya. John Moore—Getty Images2011
A youth films the aftermath of tear gas police fired at protestors in Muhammed Mahmoud Street near Tahrir Square on November 23 in Cairo.Peter Macdiarmid—Getty Images2012
Audience members take pictures of President Barack Obama at Florida Atlantic University on April 10 in Boca Raton, Florida. Marc Serota—Getty Images2014
A teenager takes a selfie in front of Queen Elizabeth II during a walk around St. Georges Market in Belfast. The Queen has apparently voiced her dismay that when she carries out engagements she is greeted by a sea of mobile phones.Peter Macdiarmid—PA Wire/Press Association Images/AP
On Sunday, he did it, more harshly than I might have, on marco.org.
Apple’s hardware today is amazing,” he begins, “it has never been better. But the software quality has taken such a nosedive in the last few years that I’m deeply concerned for its future. I’m typing this on a computer whose existence I didn’t even think would be possible yet, but it runs an OS riddled with embarrassing bugs and fundamental regressions. Just a few years ago, we would have relentlessly made fun of Windows users for these same bugs on their inferior OS, but we can’t talk anymore.
“Apple has completely lost the functional high ground. ‘It just works’ was nevercompletely true, but I don’t think the list of qualifiers and asterisks has ever been longer. We now need to treat Apple’s OS and application releases with the same extreme skepticism and trepidation that conservative Windows IT departments employ.”
