Via Daring Fireball, this shows a comparison between the designs of Dieter Rams and Apple/Jony Ive.
The comments sum it up nicely: these aren’t even the same class of product and are separated by decades. A radio from 1967 compared to a desktop computer from 2003 is a sensible, sane comparison to a sensible, sane person? You can’t figure out the difference between those two things, and a company making cell phones today that are essentially copies of another company that makes cell phones today?
Put another way: There’s a world of difference between being in the band Teenage Bottlerocket and playing a song whose lyrics start with, “Hey, Ho, Lets Go” and is mostly A and D barre chords.
The thing that pisses me off about Apple is that their design philosophy is (in Deiter Ram’s own words) “as little design as possible ” but they then have the cheek to claim patent infringement over something they themselves claim is essentially, nothing. You can’t have it both ways Apple!