The world is getting several times more ridiculous every day. The Register reports on Apple “ripping off” a well designed app by Greg Hughes called Wi-Fi Sync that allowed for syncing iOS devices over Wi-Fi. It turns out that the comparison starts and ends with “something that syncs over Wi-Fi, is named the same thing and has a logo with the same ingredients”.
Let’s make something perfectly clear. When people ask Apple over a period of ten years (since the iPod was introduced) for “syncing” over “Wi-Fi” and Apple chooses to do this and name this feature “Wi-Fi Sync”, that’s not copying. Apple didn’t ride into town calling their dry wipes “Kleenex” when it was already taken; it was Greg Hughes that called his product dry wipes, and is now portrayed by the article as being astonished that other people can also name their dry wipes “dry wipes”. Literally the only thing the icons have in common is that they combine the two symbols for “sync” and “Wi-Fi”, oddly enough, that Apple has been using for years, where one of the symbols fits into the other in a visually obvious way. (Greg’s icon uses more elliptical sync arrows, whereas Apple is sticking to the standard circle shape they’ve been using since iSync and likely before that.)
There’s no evidence either way that Apple has or hasn’t copied Greg’s app’s technical approach beyond “yes, it does syncing over Wi-Fi“, because Wi-Fi Syncing isn’t even enabled in the first build of iTunes 10.5. Just following the trail of common sense, isn’t it quite likely that, whether you involve Greg’s app or not, Apple has been working on it for some time, possibly years, because people have been asking for it for years? That’s why Greg’s app found an ecstatic audience. It was also technically impressive because Greg effectively changed the transport layer without needing to alter iTunes, which is an achievement. The article mentions Apple asked Greg for a CV and I don’t blame them: of course they’re going to want talent like that.
I’m sure The Register means well, but I’m hoping that they just called Greg up to talk about Wi-Fi syncing and asked him how it’s funny that they chose the same functional descriptors both in name and icon, and he said “boy, yeah, I guess that is a bit funny” and not “they stole my life’s work”. When you invent something that should have been there for years and that something suddenly is there, there’s just not enough ground for outrage on the basis of originality. Especially when the only grounds so far for “copying” includes visually and in writing calling a spade a spade.
I don’t get people. But maybe I am looking at this the wrong way.
Shouldn’t Apple asking him for his CV after commenting about how impressed they were at Hughes’s efforts been the obvious clue that they had acknowledged his hard work and were probably willing to offer something in return?
It’s funny how The Register article seems to dismiss any significance of being asked for the CV and that there is no other comment from either them or Hughes following up on that.
It leaves me wondering if there was an opportunity for Hughes to eventually have worked on the official Wi-Fi Sync capability, but The Register doesn’t seem to acknowledge that possibility at all- nor does it portray that Hughes might have thought that way.
Like I said, perhaps I’m Doing It Wrong™.
By Andrew Lim · 2011.06.10 07:45
I don’t think Apple invents anything that goes into the OS in less than one OS cycle. Wi-Fi syncing requires cooperation with iTunes and also field testing and robustness. If their implementation is to be any good, they had better had already started by the time Greg’s app was released. More likely, they had probably been prototyping it several times.
Based purely on the app and the engineering that went into it, Greg would probably have been a great addition to the team working on the official capability. But as you say, I have teased apart Apple’s interest in hiring him and their interest in providing a feature people have asked for. It doesn’t matter whether they offered to hire him or not, since they didn’t run him over.
By Jesper · 2011.06.10 19:58
I really doubt Apple’s implementation has anything to do with Hughes’ implementation. After all, Apple’s is almost certainly tied into the iCloud syncing architecture, which is pervasive, not something hacked on to iTunes.
To the extent they’d want to hire Hughes, I doubt it involves any particular need to have him on the team doing iTunes syncing. The mechanisms would be very different. It’s probably more about wanting to hire a generally bright spark based on potential shown by this one thing.
By Jon H · 2011.07.01 01:44
Jon H: You’re slightly off. Wi-Fi Sync is different from iCloud backup. You probably can only pick one of them, but Wi-Fi Sync is good old Auto-Sync to iTunes, same as before, just without the dock cable, while iCloud backup uploads to iCloud. The other iCloud sync-like features apply just to those things and aren’t a replacement for the entire iTunes syncing jig.
By Jesper · 2011.07.01 19:20