14 DAY TRIAL // MarketWatch is running an analysis on why Apple can’t keep secrets anymore, putting the spotlight on Tim Cook, the company’s former chief operating officer who is seemingly still trying to get the handle of running the world’s most secretive company.
Therese Poletti, the author of the white paper, recalls how “the late Steve Jobs created a huge cult of secrecy at his company, starting in its early days.”
Jobs was known to handpick everyone who was going to come into contact with Apple, its products, as well as its fledging projects.
Talking about the original team that Jobs assembled to develop the first Macintosh computer, Poletti outlines that “Secrecy was so ingrained in the team that they were aghast when Jobs brought in folk singer Joan Baez to show her the still yet-to-be launched Macintosh.”
Fast forward to today, “Tim Cook also hews closely to the secrecy practice, and has broadcast plans to step it up,” writes Poletti, referring to a statement made by Cook at the D10 conference this year.
Cook specifically said his company would “double down on secrecy.” The reality turned out a lot different, with the media getting its hands on the most iPhone leaks ever this year.
An analyst with the Enderle Group remarked that Jobs’ cult of secrecy is now cracked.
Rob Enderle believes this is just one of the many things to change under Cook’s wing.
“They have recreated the old endemic Apple problem that Jobs fixed, in that virtually all of the news leaks ahead of the launch and they are increasingly focusing on the technology and not the experience,” Enderle told a MarketWatch reporter on Wednesday.
Still, Poletti believes that nothing will erase the public’s enthusiasm for the latest iPhone.
“Even if everyone saw exactly what they were expecting on Wednesday, Apple fans will still line up on Sept. 21, at stores around the world, to get one,” he estimates.
Going by how fast the initial batch has run out, we’d say Poletti’s estimates hold water.