Chest Of Draws

Product design: What would Steve do?

By Jonny Evans

They say success inside the Apple [ AAPL ] campus comes from correctly answering the question, " What would Steve [Jobs] do? " As above, so below, Netscape co-founder now venture capitalist, Marc Andreessen , says, " The threshold for the release of the first product should be, 'What would Steve Jobs do?'" So, when it comes to new product design, what would he do? Here's some ideas.

[ ABOVE: Apple's flagship NYC store is all about the details .]

KISS

Keep it simple stupid. Look at the iPad, iPod, iPhone or even the Macintosh for examples of this. These things aren't really simple -- they comprise hardware and software elements that have taken decades to develop. These consumer electronic gadgets are devices of great complexity, developed to look and feel as if they're of great simplicity. Apple product designers sweat and suffer for their products. These things aren't just product designs. These things are their art, their creative expression, their legacies. Great focus and complexity shrouded in express simplicity. Keeping it simple is a whole heap harder than leaving it complicated. And this simplicity is essential to articulating a successful user experience.

" Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks, " Apple's Steve Jobs once told Wired . " But of course, if you dig deeper, it's really how it works. The design of the Mac wasn't what it looked like, although that was part of it. Primarily, it was how it worked. To design something really well, you have to get it. You have to really grok what it's all about. It takes a passionate commitment to really thoroughly understand something, chew it up, not just quickly swallow it. Most people don't take the time to do that. "

Lead, don't follow

The iPad didn't kill PC sales . Lack of imagination did that. Let's not be too fanboi about this, I'd agree that Dell has done much more than Apple in terms of bringing personal computing to the masses by offering PCs the rest of us can afford, but the fact remains the need to follow your own path is key to any form of disruptive philosophy. In Apple's case, the company doesn't listen to focus groups, but draws inspiration from its own imaginative take on what's happening in the world and the potential of emerging technologies.

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