The iPhone 17 Pro: How Apple Makes Fools of Us All (A Post-Jobs Reality Check)
4 min read
Steve Jobs is rolling in his grave, and Tim Cook is counting the cash.
After getting hands-on with the iPhone 17 Pro series, one thing has become painfully clear: Apple has perfected the art of selling us the same phone with slightly different packaging year after year, all while convincing us we’re witnessing “revolutionary” innovation. The iPhone 17 Pro isn’t just disappointing—it’s insulting to anyone who remembers what Apple innovation actually looked like.
The Great Design “Revolution” That Isn’t
Let’s start with what Apple is calling their biggest design change in years: a two-toned color design that Apple has gone with, along with ditching the titanium frame for an aluminum one. Wait—let me get this straight. Apple spent years convincing us that titanium was the premium material worth paying for, and now they’re downgrading to aluminum and calling it a feature?
Since when are aluminum frames and rectangular camera bumps “features”? If anything, they should be called drawbacks… It’s an obvious cost cutting measure. Squeezing every last penny out of us all, as one frustrated user correctly pointed out.
The camera bump has grown into what can only be described as an eyesore—a much more sizable camera cutout that extends side-to-side and protrudes outward. Jobs would have fired the entire design team for creating something this aesthetically offensive. Remember when he delayed the original iPhone because he hated how the plastic screen felt in his pocket?
The Price Manipulation Game
Here’s where Apple’s manipulation gets truly brazen. Although the iPhone 17 Pro technically gets a price increase by $100, it now comes with 256GB of starting storage. Apple wants us to celebrate this as “value,” but let’s be honest: they eliminated the cheaper storage option to force everyone into paying more while pretending they’re doing us a favor.
This is psychological manipulation 101. Create artificial scarcity, then position the more expensive option as the “reasonable” choice. Jobs may have been a master of marketing, but at least his products justified their premium pricing through genuine innovation.
The AI Embarrassment Continues
Apple is well behind its rivals in deploying AI on its phones, and nowhere is that more evident than with its photo editing features. While Samsung and Google have been pushing the boundaries of computational photography and AI assistance, Apple’s Intelligence remains a joke—Apple Intelligence still behind Google and Samsung.
Remember when the iPhone was the phone that made everyone else look obsolete? Now Apple is playing catch-up in the most important technological shift since the smartphone itself. Jobs would have never allowed Apple to fall this far behind in a core technology area.
The Innovation Mirage
What we’re witnessing is a shift from groundbreaking innovation to more incremental improvements, focusing on refining existing products instead of introducing bold new concepts. The iPhone 17 Pro perfectly embodies this decline.
Critics argue that the company has been content with merely refining existing products rather than introducing groundbreaking new ideas… Apple’s recent product releases have lacked the “wow factor” that was characteristic of the Jobs era.
The iPhone 17 Pro is the perfect example: users have reported experiencing unexpected crashes in their apps, battery loss, internet connectivity issues, and unresponsive touch screens, yet Apple expects us to pay premium prices for what amounts to a beta test.
The Vapor Chamber Cooling “Innovation”
Apple is touting vapor chamber cooling as if they invented thermal management. This technology has been standard in Android flagships for years. The fact that they’re presenting it as innovation shows just how far behind they’ve fallen. The bigger question is how long will the performance last? – a question that shouldn’t need asking for a $1,100+ device.
What Jobs Would Think
Steve Jobs famously said, “People don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” Today’s Apple has perverted this philosophy into “People will buy whatever we tell them to want, even if it’s worse than last year.”
“The creative soul of Apple had been eclipsed by the machine,” Mickle writes. “Without Jobs, some thought, App[le lost its way]”. The iPhone 17 Pro is exhibit A in this trial of Apple’s creative bankruptcy.
Jobs revolutionized entire industries with the iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Tim Cook’s Apple gives us slightly different camera bumps and calls it revolutionary. Jobs eliminated ports when it made sense for the future; Cook’s Apple removes features to sell us dongles.
The Real Revolution We Need
The most revolutionary thing Apple could do right now would be to admit they’ve lost their way and fundamentally rethink their approach to product development. Instead of annual incremental updates designed to extract maximum profit, why not take two or three years to create something genuinely transformative?
But that won’t happen, because the current Apple has trained us to accept mediocrity wrapped in premium marketing. They’ve turned us into willing participants in our own technological stagnation.
The Bottom Line
There are legitimate reasons to skip the iPhone 17 Pro and wait for something better. The question is: will Apple ever give us something better, or have they discovered they don’t need to?
The iPhone 17 Pro represents everything wrong with post-Jobs Apple: manufactured scarcity, artificial innovation, premium pricing for incremental improvements, and the assumption that customers are too invested in the ecosystem to demand better.
Steve Jobs created products that changed the world. Tim Cook creates products that change your wallet’s balance. The iPhone 17 Pro is proof that Apple has mastered the art of making us pay more for less, all while smiling and thanking them for the privilege.
The revolution won’t be televised—because Apple killed it and buried it under a pile of dongles and subscription services.
What do you think? Has Apple lost its way since Jobs’ passing, or am I being too harsh on the iPhone 17 Pro? Share your thoughts in the comments below.