Did anyone notice the mention of the “auteur model of innovation,” attributed to “John Kao, a consultant to corporations and governments on innovation” which sounds an awful lot like John Gruber's auteur theory of design: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xk3UcgbbmxQ
The article even used the same examples as Gruber, hm.
"Elitism is the belief or attitude that those individuals who are considered members of the elite — a select group of people with outstanding personal abilities, intellect, wealth, specialized training or experience, or other distinctive attributes — are those whose views on a matter are to be taken the most seriously or carry the most weight.."
Having specialist and extraordinary designers instead of letting programmers or "the crowd" design the product has arguably been the key to Apple's success.
Then why not call it "meritocracy" instead? The great thing about English is there's a word or phrase for every shade of meaning - if you don't like the connotation of one usage, pick another!
Elitism does have a negative connotation. I think "excellence" would have worked better in the title. For that matter, I don't really understand why the word "economics" is in the title. The title doesn't seem to fit the article all that well -- at least not to me. The article is about the culture and design process at Apple, not Steve Jobs per se. Yes, Steve Jobs is intrinsically part of that culture. He founded the company and he is an important leader within it. No, you can't really separate the two at this point. But he isn't actually a one man show.
I like the quote used within the article that "A defining quality of Apple has been design restraint." I think that basic idea should have somehow made it into the title, rather than the name Steve Jobs and this incomprehensible, seemingly irrelevant, phrase "Economics of Elitism". Perhaps they could have just said "At Apple, Less is More" and then explained why.
> Great products, according to Mr. Jobs, are triumphs of “taste.”
This is basically the same thing a high dollar fashion house is offering as well. Is a $2000 Louis Vuitton scarf warmer than a $10 Walmart scarf? Probably not. But you can guarantee it'll match this season's shoes out of Milan.
