... with a crummy user interface.

I'm posting this a lot, but I'm not just trolling. I'm trying to get people to grasp the fact that UI is the reason for Apple's success.

Everyone else treats the UI as an afterthought or for whatever reason is incapable of designing a good one. The UI should be of primary concern.

This is particularly true of mobile apps. As your device and its screen gets smaller, UI design becomes exponentially more important. A bad UI can be tolerated on a 1920x1080 desktop, but not on a phone or a small pad.

I completely agree; too many underestimate the importance of UI. In fact I once did too, and used to scorn Apple products as just being 'the same as everyone elses with a nice UI'. I was completely right, but I missed the point - UI is such a big deal that the majority of what users want is 'the same as what I've already got, but with a better UI'.

I haven't used Android (or Chrome OS) yet, but Google seem to have a pretty good grip on UI too, so I'm hoping it's similarly good. If not, it's an open system, we can build a better one.

I remember the first time I tried OSX and saw Expose. I realized then and there that that feature alone was worth the $500-$1000 premium that I would pay for a Macbook.

That's right. IMHO, Expose is worth $1000.

(Of course, now everyone has copied Expose... but you get the idea.)

My first thought was that old joke about NASA spending a million dollars to invent a pen that writes in space, and Russia using a pencil.

MS didn't think of expose because Windows' taskbar already let you select arbitrary windows.

I saw it and thought "wow, what a sad way to pull up window groups". In fact, I am still mad at apple for not allowing me to move windows around with my keyboard, not allowing me to group windows, and not allowing me to define where new windows go. Seriously, I am capable of understanding the implications of terminal windows being tiled (those implications being terminal is freaking uasable).

Edit: also, seriously, i like to group workspaces by task. This is very anoying when I launch say, mvim, and it opens a window in some workspace already containing mvim. Same with terms and browser windows.

really? I own neither an iPhone nor an Android phone, but I've used both in passing, and the iPhone was neither particularly intuitive nor particularly snappy.

To honest, I think the goodness of their UI is often overstated.

I own a N1. I thought I was finally up there with the big boys, but I used an iPhone for a few seconds and I could already tell the difference.

"I've used both in passing" is the key phrase here.

Agreed. I had used lots of cellphones and mobile devices BEFORE I tried iPhone. iPhone & iPod Touch were just light-years ahead of anything I experienced before. And it was all about UI/UX superiority.

Compared to what?

Yeah I cheer for the open things as well, but people got to get over this notion that people like Apple because it's cool and trendy. The UI seriously is a cut above, and they're driving the market. There's a reason why attack of the iPad clones is coming this summer.

I agree.

So, since Apple is still designing great UI but apparently is going insane, maybe it's time for a brand new Apple to be born. Younger, same UI greatness, not insane.

Why is C better for the UI then clojure?