"Mr. Cook sent an email around to everyone saying Apple wouldn’t change. That seems a little weird to me; I seem to remember that not too many years ago Apple was a computer company that didn’t do music. Isn’t change at the center of their success?"

I don't think he was saying that they will keep making the same products forever, it's that their core values aren't going to change, as they shouldn't. It's in the companies nature to experiment in new products, and that is what is not going to change.

"...in history’s rear-view, his biggest achievement will be having ripped music retailing out of the labels’ hands, and mobile software out of the telephone companies."

Those are great achievements, but Apple II? Lisa/Mac? Pixar? Rescuing a failing company and bringing it from oblivion to the most valuable company in the world in only 14 years?

Note that Pixar was Steve's investment - it was not related to Apple.

Also note that the investment was in Pixar's graphics computers(!) not animation art. In reality, Steve was fighting with Pixar to stop animations and sell their hi-tech computers only. He fails and that starts great animation studio which later abandoned computer manufacturing.

That's true but at some point he clicked and reversed his position when he saw the potential. Without him Pixar would have struggled to deal with the partnership with Disney. He did push a lot of buttons at Disney that got Pixar the deals they needed to grow and become what they are today.

Sounds like all his failures were about trying to ship hardware when it was the software that was most interesting for people.

But many of his greatest successes are almost pure hardware stories (Apple II, iMac, iBook, iPod, iPhone, MacBook Air, iPad), so you can't fault him for humming a catchy tune.

Are they really 'pure hardware'? I'm not so sure anymore. Admittedly I don't know much about the older stuff but some folks have argued that (most of) the hardware for things like the iPod/iPhone already existed but Apple had a fantastic knack for combining it in a compelling, design-driven way (inc. the interface/interaction). That's where the success lay. From that point of view it wasn't about the hardware but more the design and software.

I'm just thinking aloud here (not really trying to 'defend a point' as such).

You make a key point. When you think of the original iPod or the iPhone or several of the iMac designs, you most likely first think of the striking physical design of the device. The "Jony Ive" effect, if you will.

But each of these is and was utterly defined by the software they ran. Take the original iPod; without that great interface the device really would have boiled down to "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame." and gone nowhere in the market, like basically all of its competitors at the time. Same thing with the iPhone. The interface is the thing, but that interface happens to exist only inside a wonderful, plainly well built and beautifully designed device that you enjoy holding in your hand even when it's off. One without the other would utterly change the effect of the whole...and I'd say this has been the key to Apple's resurgence: More often than not over the last ~14 years, they've delivered the whole package.

Perfectly reasonable argument. But I suppose what I meant was, many of his projects had an undetachable hardware element. This differentiates it from a pure software approach.

I think the real take home point which seems to have been missed elsewhere the last couple of days is:

Jeepers, the essential point about business is that you never know how the story’s going to end.

I really don’t know how it’s going to play out. But then, neither does anyone else. I really hope they go on making great computers for me to use, and great mobile devices to compete against.

I really couldn't agree with this point more. I've actually got quite annoyed reading all the articles the last few days with various people looking into the crystal ball predicting the future. Not even Steve knows how the story is going to end.

The speculations stemming from people looking into the crystal ball explaining the past are also very annoying.

Nobody knows if Jobs' personality, his attention to detail, his business strategy, luck or something else entirely are the reason for Apples success. In most cases CEOs have limited influence on the company, so most analyses I've read seem to fall victim to the Narrative Fallacy[1].

[1] http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Narrative_fallacy

edit: removed scribd link to unauthorized copy The Drunkards Walk by Leonard Mlodinow which has a section on CEOs influence on a companies success.

When Tim Cook says "Apple won't change", I take that to mean that Apple will continue to stay ahead of the curve. Not changing means changing everything from time to time, since that's become Apple's SOP over the past years.

So Bray took Cook's we'll-be-the-same-Apple email to mean that Apple won't enter new markets? How is that even a reasonable interpretation?

It's not a reasonable interpretation. Bray is just very far outside of Apple to interpret it the correct way. That email wasn't from Tim Cook to the world, it was from Tim Cook, new CEO, to his employees.

"I work for Google, but the opinions expressed here are my own, and no other party necessarily agrees with them."

He tries very hard to be fair & balanced though, at least as much as you could expect from such context.

I think the post would be better if only account on encounter with Steve was there, no speculations. Hardly there is any bias involved, it seems to me that Tim is in the totally different universe than Apple and I doubt he will ever "get it". Not that he has to.