I still haven't scroll down to the bottom, I don't want to spoil my impression. But it's great to see a positive reaction. Good way to mark the moment. Tim has been CEO for 15 years roughly, since Steve's passing. This guy seems much younger than Tim was when he ascended. I hope he really takes it to the next level.

Got a feeling that Apple has some Amazing new hardware category-making products coming out of the 'skunkworks' over the next 3 years.

Tech in general has changed quite a bit though. I don't know how Steve Jobs would have reacted to AI, and I don't know where tech itself would be if Jobs were still around. But I do think the next evolution is due and yet to be seen. It's not clear that Tim Cook would be the one to effectively see that through. And so I think his timing is impeccable and probably aligned with what is best for Apple. I have a lot of respect here: time has shown that a lot of leaders don't let go until its too late.

https://www.apple.com/community-letter-from-tim/

I understand Tim is a logistics genius and Ternus is a hardware genius, and that we all want better software and policy from Apple, but I'm glad that there seems to be good people at the head of one of the biggest and most consequential companies, and further that they seem to care about being good people.

As far as I can see, that's the only way to have a prayer of scaling without too much damage, which is the key issue humanity faces today.

I still hope they eventually sell server blades for macOS.

Marco has enough standing within our world that it's actually a clever idea to appeal to Ternus on these terms. He'll probably be aware that it was written and the appeal is somewhat generic in its call to reverse course on some Cook-era policies.

We're all very hopeful but there's not enough information available on the outside to predict with any certainty how he'll lead.

0. https://marco.org/2026/04/01/letter-to-john-ternus

But I cannot argue with the results the man achieved. Especially the transition to A-series and then M-series chips has been an incredible success. Perhaps the biggest flop was the Apple Vision Pro, but it is hard to really call him out on that since it wasn't that Apple lost a battle, it was that the product category just hasn't caught on (yet). Siri is another place where Apple has lagged but they could very easily catch up with the massive interest in local AI on the mac minis.

I think it will be difficult to look back on his legacy without giving him a large share of credit for Apple's continued success.

Quite successful.

Also think it's cool that John Ternus has only a bachelor's degree with a very down to earth presence. I completely dig his LI page being really bare bones.

I suspect Apple is about to experience another Renaissance era...

You see this most obviously in software and marketing - the kinds of decisions where only a few people sign off at the end, and where "good enough" is whatever those few people decide it is. You see it less in hardware and procurement where there's a powerful review cycle and scrutiny at every level of the stack. Work there is more immediately measurable: benchmarks for performance, dollars for cost.

The "vibe" of software, or of a PDF [^1], is much harder to catch that way. There's no benchmark that flags it and most conventional executives aren't drilling down in that level of detail to see it either.

You want distributed decision-making, of course. But that only works well if it's distributed to people who've cultivated their own taste and who will make good calls under pressure. I'm not sure how much of that gets fixed by leadership change at the top. Taste isn't really something a CEO can decree into a 60,000 person org. But I've only heard good things about Ternus, so I'm optimistic. Fingers crossed for a bright new chapter.

[^1]: https://www.apple.com/promo/pdf/US_FY26_Earth_Day_Promo_Tand...

[0] As Steve Jobs said in 2005: "OS X is the most advanced operating system on the planet and it has set Apple up for the next 20 years."

How incredibly prophetic that 21 years later, MacOS is suddenly showing its age.

Before we had many groundbreaking features that redefined how you use smarphone:

- gps

- flashlight (yes everybody with flashlight in the pocket!)

- front selfie camera + video calls

- compass + accelerometer + gyroscope

- good wide and ultrawide (video) camera

- nfc + apple pay

- fingerprint / faceid

- esim

- magsafe

Now you can have iphone 12 pro and don't miss much from iphone 17 pro.

Yeah, what's going on? I'm confused by this choice - I would have expected a marketer. Maybe they really are doubling down on hardware for the ai age?

You may also be interested in this video where Jon Rettinger predicted that John Ternus will be the next Apple CEO. Goodbye Tim! A new era for Apple (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbqLWZtdQTc)

https://youtu.be/IOs6hnTI4lw?is=2ZpwOgsBxfMkkloh

EDIT: I also want to say I really appreciate Tim Cook’s emphasis on user privacy and I hope John Ternus can continue this trend.

I don't think even Steve Jobs would've been able to imagine that Apple can get this big.

I'm interested to see what Ternus' first few moves are and how much he will avoid (or hopefully embrace) reversing some of the things Cook is responsible for.

He has a long row to hoe when it comes to things like developer relations but from what I've heard, he is one of the best options we had for the next CEO.

(actually I doubt this- Demis does not want to run a big company whose main business is Ads)

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/technology/apple-ceo-tim-...

Ternus will be the soldier in the trenches.

I feel excitement for the future of Apple.

There is no question many of Apple's business experienced significant, impressive growth during his tenure. Amazing capital efficiency.

There is also no question Apple lost product velocity. Few new products were launched, and those that were had mixed success.

Tim was, at the end of the day, an elite financial operator. Apple shareholders were lucky to have him. Customers like myself probably have mixed opinions, and it remains to be seen how he set the company up for the future.

So, the Tim Cook era lasted 15 years (2011 - 2026). He's 65yo, and he could have easily hung in there for a few more years. But I believe he's leaving at the peak -- both Apple's and his own -- and this might be the best time to leave, rather than being forced out (as many too-long-in-the-tooth CEOs have been) when the company inevitably grows slower, or has a crisis.

Ternus is 50-51 yo, roughly the age when Cook himself took over Apple. There the similarities disappear. Ternus is a HW guy through-and-through. I hope he has solid SW and Design team with him. He's gonna need it, given all the big/small design snafus in the recent past. [Not including Mac Neo in there, which looks stellar by any means]

Wishing him luck; he's gonna need it. (and me too, my $$$ are invested in AAPL, and I ain't selling anytime soon, so well ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ )

Also, going over his past statements as recent as during this year, it seems like he didn’t want to leave his CEO position, so he got forced out?

As the world undergoes increasing supply chain issues, wouldn’t it be in Apple’s best interest to keep Tim Cook as CEO for a while? Or is he the one who’s looking to transition to a less demanding position?

Is this a golden opportunity to take on the software side of Apple, native apps like photos and messages, notes app? So much good data we give to Apple apps sit their idling, there is a play here to turn them into an independent playable artifacts and shared digital human network company. My friend emma has her snack Game on! I would like to get a snack list derived from her snack data. Yes, texting works but there is no programmatic way of accessing each other’s data. I believe this data needs be freed from Apple.

Apple’s privacy approach is stellar, that quest though is a prison where our data goes and does a slow death.

1. Hardware: OLED touchscreen Macs, foldable iPhone (2026) & 20th anniversary iPhone (2027). The message here is about flexing his strength in hardware.

2. Software: Snow leopard-like iOS27/macOS27 fixing a lot of Liquid Glass' rough edges. The message here is he's returning Apple to form with quality software.

3. Ecosystem: Gemini-powered Siri. The message here is he's getting Apple finally on track to meet the promise of AI.

4. Political context: A clean slate. The message here is placating the president (or anyone) is in the past.

The timing is interesting because Apple needed Ternus announced before WWDC27 in June, because that's when Gemini-Siri and Snow Leopard-OS strategy are both being unveiled. But they needed to delay it as long as they could so that Tim Cook could soak up as much Trump-chaos as was necessary. Now that polls and vibes show Trump losing support across the board, politically it's the safest it's ever been to announce this change, and still enough time before WWDC to suggest that what's being announced are his initiatives.

Edit: 6 years old, not 4, and also Intel Macbook, so due an upgrade for sure

That focus on privacy pisses off a lot of devs (Yours Truly, included), but I sincerely believe in it. I write apps that Serve a demographic that values privacy.

Least understood yet most influential company in the history, present and future of the venture capital backed tech world.

do they predict problems of some sort - like lost of ability to small down transistors for a while or supply chain disruption(increased prices of components sourcing)?

Apple included.

One day that watch could be your only PC. And then some type of eyeglass for a screen. Can also do "terrain overlays" Terminator style. I suppose battery power is the bottleneck so maybe long-distance wireless power delivery is the key (as what Tesla originally created.) So no battery at all.

I was just thinking about what had been avoiding enshittification, and Apple's hardware was the only thing I came up. All other stuff, all products from Google, MS, Facebook, Twitter, and even Nvidia though the performance was improved has gone downhill. It's not only tech companies, but fast food, car manufacturers, real estate, and many others, if it wasn't shit from the start like consulting, healthcare, and marketing.

They have flaws, like not allowing users to repair the hardware, but well, at least it's consistent.

I really hope Apple (hardware at least) will remain free from enshittification.

https://x.com/tomieinlove/status/2046337143703007672

This period in Apple’s history will be the cold ice bath post Jobs.

There may be serious fanboy energy to this but Apple has so much dry powder going for it still, and to put that in the hands of someone who actually builds, along with what looks to be a strong rumor mill year with VR stuff and the foldable to create a big tailwind… it seems like a pretty intentional move.

Also if they dropped one more subscription on us before expanding categories they might’ve caused an avalanche in lack of confidence.

Cook did an excellent job of raking in cash for bet the company size bets that he wouldn’t be guaranteed to see through. The dude is clearly a salt of the earth, values guy, should enjoy a proper retirement era.

What are these titles? Why? Who does what? It feels like a linkedin tea party.

Why so soon?

Tim gifted Donald a trophy 8 months ago doing his legacy no favors. You wouldn't do this if you knew you were on your way out. Makes me wonder if something happened between August 2025 and now.

I'm just askin' questions.

EDIT: Also, can Apple take over the data center already? I am sick of HP and Dell.

he knows when to be conservative - and knows when to push hard.

qualities very few CEOs have shown to have in practice.

all his contemporary competitors have ridden on certain waves e.g A.I to increase company valuation - while he did sorely on just pure operations not hype.

Yes, I get that the iPad is supposed to be a "casual computing device" or whatever. Yes, I know Apple has delivered significant improvements to iPadOS's capabilities in those five years. But using it still feels like wearing a straitjacket a lot of the time.

Thanks for making all that money, Tim. Now please retire. Please.

Personally, I have lost all interest in Apple and been slowly switching off their hw/sw/saas for some time.

*John Ternus to become Apple CEO*

Talk about burying the lede, lmao.

They are all still there.

But here’s to hoping that change comes. Apple is already a rich company. But isn’t that boring?

It will redefine the way we watch TV and that's exactly your job, to make something truly unique. And I'll tell you the secret sauce, the remote. I know you'll come up with something totally different, a marvel of engineering that will drop jaws around the world. Different aluminum colors and extra flat? Check. But that's not what this new generation needs. They want to watch tiktok and instagram in their TV and nobody right now offers an out-of-this-world experience. Social media consumption on a big screen. Excel at that and you will sell millions at whatever price you set.

My credit card is ready...