Gassée criticises Schiller for pre-Samsung comments, as well as offering some more opinions on the company!

   You might not have heard of the ex-Apple Exec Jean-Louis Gassée, he worked at Apple from 1981 to 1990 and since then he's been in and around the tech world at various different places. Two days ago though he came forward and offered some constructive criticism of Apple and in particular Phil Schiller and how he handled the Samsung Galaxy S4 launch in particular.

Gassée.

    Gassée commentary basically focuses on Phil Schiller's interview with Reuters, which we covered last week. The first thing which was called into contention was why Schiller speculated on which version of Android the Galaxy S4 would launch with. Schiller explained how he thought the Galaxy S4 would run a 'year old' version of Android, in fact Samsung announced the latest and greatest version of Android, 4.2.2, would be on board right from the off. Naturally this made Schiller look a little silly, but we can understand the point he was trying to make, because there is the whole 'Android updates take ages' idea which is true to some degree (read this and you'll see that Apple aren't quite as perfect as they appear to be!).

   Some people perceived Schiller's words as 'Apple going on the defensive', but Gassée suggested that because Apple is the person at the top, just as Microsoft were when Apple were poking fun at them, they should not trash their rivals something which he believes is especially true when the 'digs are humorless and further weakened by error'.

   Something which was compounded, in Gassée's mind, by the way in which Apple was:

"Attacking competitors, pointing to their weaknesses, and trumpeting one’s achievements is better done by hired media assassins. A company, directly or through a PR firm, engages oft-quoted consultants who provide the required third-party stats, barbs, and encomiums. This isn’t theorizing, I once was a director at a company, one of many, that used such an arrangement to good effect."

This is linked to Gassée's criticism of how Apple use far too much hyperbole in their announcements, something which he called 'language molestation'! The whole piece was wrapped up when Gassée said:

"In the two trading days bracketing the Samsung S4 launch Schiller clumsily attempted to trash, Apple shares respectively gained 1%, followed by a 2.58% jump the day after the intro. Schiller could have said nothing before the launch and, today, let others point to early criticism of the S4′s apparent featuritis."

   That's an excellent point, very well made and we find it hard to disagree with what Gassée said. If you want to read the full commentary head over to MondayNote here!
Via PhoneArena.

Posted in: apple,Gassée,Phil Schiller,Samsung Galaxy S4