Pundit weighs in on widely-covered iOS concept video

May 10, 2013 22:16 GMT  ·  By

If you think Apple will “completely” change the look and feel of its mobile operating system with the release of iOS 7, think again.

That’s the key takeaway from a new blog entry signed John Gruber, a reputable pundit with connections at Apple.

His post talks about a widely reported new iOS 7 concept video by designer Philip Joyce of Simply Zesty. In case you’ve missed it, here it is.

Gruber admits “there are a lot of clever ideas and nice designs in this iOS 7 ‘concept.’” He then adds, “Nice and clever though they are, this would be a disaster as a new design for the actual iPhone.”

And his arguments are quick to follow. The strongest one? The rounded rectangle. Apple can’t change that. And it won’t.

“And certain of Joyce’s details are oddly tone-deaf branding-wise. The shape of app icons is not going to change from round-cornered squares to sharp-cornered ones (or any other shape for that matter).”

“Apple owns this shape," stresses Gruber, adding "this shape says ‘iOS app’ in everyone’s mind. It’s even printed right on the hardware home button of every iOS device,” he writes.

Apple does own a design patent on the rectangle with rounded corners, and for good reason too. It plans to keep using it.

In fact, this particular change in icon department would make iOS look like Google's Android. And that’s the last thing Jony Ive wants.

Another reason why Philip Joyce’s iOS concept won’t fully materialize is the danger of forcing users to adapt to radical changes, the pundit notes.

“Mac OS X 10.0 was just such a radical do-over, and it was successful in the long term. But the first few years were a slow and painful transition for existing Mac users. iOS doesn’t need that sort of jolt.” Gruber points out.