Kenny Hemphill
…except when your senior execs depart the company in a cloud of bad PR, face charges of bribery and sell their own apps on the App Store.
For a company so acutely aware of, and so desperate to control, its public image as Apple is, the past couple of weeks have been more than a little embarrassing for the Cupertino firm.
The departure of hardware engineering boss Mark Papermaster may have been by mutual consent, and may well have had a number of reasons behind it, but the perception among most Apple watchers was that Papermaster was the fall guy for the iPhone 4 antenna fiasco.
That Papermaster’s departure should take place so soon after Jobs’ sort-of apology for the problems with the antenna, however, adds to the confusion surrounding Apple’s position on the matter. You may remember that Apple’s initial explanation was that the problem wasn’t a hardware issue at all, but was caused by an error in the algorithm used to calculate and display signal strength. It wasn’t that the iPhone 4 was losing signal, we were told, it was just calculating it incorrectly. Then we had Jobs’ explanation that the problem did exist after all, but that it was common to all smartphone manufacturers. Despite that, Apple decided to give all iPhone 4 owners a free case to alleviate the symptoms, which primarily occur when human flesh covers the black band on the edge of the phone.
That was confusing enough, but Papermaster’s sharp exit shows that not only does Jobs hold him accountable, but that he is so frustrated by the issue that he was prepared to have Papermaster leave while the issue was still a hot topic, rather than wait a few months when it would have been less of a PR faux pas.
Skip forward a couple of weeks and Apple must be wishing that dodgy iPhone 4 antennae were all it had to concern itself with on the image front. The sight of a former senior executive standing in the dock to face charges of bribery and corruption isn’t one anybody at Apple will forget in a hurry. However, although the imagery is dramatic and potentially damaging to Apple’s public image, the issue itself is much less about Apple and more about the alleged greed of one man. If Paul Devine is guilty of the 27 charges, including money laundering and wire fraud, he faces, he’ll almost certainly have been acting alone, a rogue agent seduced by greed and the apparent ease with which he could pass on commercial secrets in return for cash. Apple’s civil lawsuit, which claims breach of contract, racketeering and breaching fiduciary duty, is as much about distancing itself from Devine and indicating how very seriously it takes the issue as it is about seeking legal redress.
Less easy to deal with for Apple is the most recent stain on its image, the revelation that its director of applications technology, Philip Shoemaker, the man ultimately responsible for minding the door to the App Store, is directly responsible for development of ‘novelty’ apps such as Animal Farts and iWiz, through his company Gray Noodle.
Apple’s explanation is that Gray Noodle published its apps before Shoemaker joined Apple and that he was hired, in part, for his experience as a developer. In fact, according to Wired, three of Gray Noodle’s seven apps were published after Shoemaker started working at Apple.
There are two issues here. The first is the question of whether Apple employees, especially those in senior positions in the apps approval team, should be allowed to publish apps at all. Apple’s official line is that it allows employees to publish apps if they’re developed and published prior to them joining Apple. This is clearly not the case with all of Gray Noodle’s apps. Even if it was, there must be a conflict of interest when someone who has significant input into whether or not to approve apps has his own apps on the Store.
The second issue is the nature of the apps themselves. These aren’t high-quality tools that enhance the experience of using an iPhone or iPad. They are at best novelties, the kind of software equivalent of a saucy postcard or a Kiss Me Quick hat; at worst, offensive. Indeed, they exhibit many of the characteristics of apps that have been rejected by Apple for what Phil Schiller described as being ‘degrading and objectionable’. This would be less of an issue if Apple had clear, consistent, published guidelines describing what it will allow on the App Store. It doesn’t, and the suspicion is that there is a lack of consistency in the approval process. That lack of consistency takes on a different hue in the light of Shoemaker’s ownership of Gray Noodle.
None of these difficulties will do Apple any serious harm, but they do add to a perception that has been building in recent months that where there was once a slick well-oiled PR machine, there now seems to be something more shambolic. Apple will be hoping that it can regain control of its public image soon.
