back to article California clears way for Steve Jobs' 'private Apple spaceship'

Apple's giant glass doughnut with apricot groves will be fast-tracked through the planning system, Cupertino City Council announced, smoothing the approval process for its 3 million square foot (278,709m2) Campus 2 building. The move comes six weeks after Apple buried its neighbours in publicity material explaining how great …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Am sure they will find an issue post construction. I wonder how it will look with a huge rubber bumper all around it?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Will it shatter if they drop it? ;)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Bit like the old BBC studios.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Exactly like GCHQ's building. Her Majesty's Government are expecting the design patent infringement suit papers in the post any day now. Buildings with round corners now belong to Apple.

    3. LarsG
      Holmes

      Probably

      Probably influenced by the Great Patent Wars of the 21st Century, soon to be immortalised in the design of a building.

      'Going Round In Circles'

      Round and round and round and round and round forever.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'm just waiting for the Rowntree's polo mint copyright case!

  3. Turtle

    What's interesting to me...

    What's interesting to me, is that the projected building, in the shape of a giant zero, neatly and accurately sums up Jobs' value as a person, and precisely reflects the sum total of his generosity, both philanthropic and personal, not to mention, additionally, spiritually.

    Possibly it is not too late to have the shape altered, just a wee bit, so that it resembles, not a halo, but a toilet seat?

    Let's hope so!

    1. Chris 3
      FAIL

      Re: What's interesting to me...

      Make your mind up old chum, it's either perfect, or it needs changing, which is it? Steve wouldn't have tolerated that kind of woolly thinking.

    2. Sean Timarco Baggaley

      Re: What's interesting to me...

      @Turtle:

      Two problems with your pathetic joke:

      1. Bill Gates was no great philanthropist while running Microsoft either; it wasn't until he left the company he helped found that he suddenly found a convenient conscience and started giving away his billions. Steve Jobs never had that chance: he was only 55 when he died last year and had only stepped down as CEO two months earlier on health grounds. It's likely he was undergoing treatment for much of 2011, but it was too little too late.

      2. You appear to be fine with the faux-philanthropy of the CEOs at, say, Asus, Acer, HP, Toshiba, Samsung, Dell, etc. who donate a tiny fraction of their money, while giving thousands of jobs to China and India?

      At least Apple are employing 13000 Americans in non-menial, high-value jobs. Those jobs pay handsomely, so Cupertino and its community will very definitely benefit from the taxes all those employees (and Apple itself) will be paying. Whereas Apple's rivals remain happy to invest more and more of their money in China and India while keeping their "home" offices stripped of everything but accountants and lawyers.

      That's worth a damned sight more to the US' economy than any amount of cheesy giant-cheque press-releases and marketing bullshit costing a tiny fraction of a percent of a corporation's net profits and used to reduce corporate tax liabilities.

      (Besides, many charities are far from the goody-two-shoes people seem to think they are. How much of each donation goes on paying the six-figure salaries of their bosses?)

      Gates can afford to be philanthropic: he has the time and the money. Jobs never had the time, although we have no idea whether he donated money anonymously. Personally, I'm not sure I care what someone does with the money they worked their arses off to earn. Spend it, give it away, or commission a solid gold Ferrari. It's none of my—or your—fucking business.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What's interesting to me...

        @Sean Timarco Baggaley - Bill Gates is the Chairman of Microsoft, so still very much with the company. Maybe he didn't have as much time while CEO to dedicate to a charity, but it was still there.

      2. nsld
        FAIL

        Re: What's interesting to me...

        Sean

        I know your a defender of the faith and the Jobsian sun shines from your arse but rewriting geography is a first, even for someone of your devotion, what operating level have you reached?

        Asus, Acer, Toshiba and Samsung are not US companies, they might have US subsiduaries but they are clearly not US companies.

        As for tax status of Apple and the people of Cupertino, perhaps you want to read this:

        http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gadgets/apple-pioneered-tax-avoidance-tactics-report-claims-50007785/

        "Apple, for example, set up a small office in Reno -- just 200 miles from its Cupertino headquarters -- to collect and invest its profits. Why? Well it wasn't just because Tim Cook loved the biggest little city in the world. It's because Nevada's corporate tax rate is zero, compared to California's 8.84 per cent. "

        Apple are also fond of the Double Irish with a Dutch Sandwich when it comes to tax "management" in Europe.

        iTunes in EMEA is in Luxembourg for the discounted tax as well.

        Apple are no better and no worse than the other examples you have cited, after all, that ithingy you wrote your post on was probably made in China!

      3. SFC
        Thumb Down

        Re: What's interesting to me...

        Bill Gates started the foundation in 2000. 12 years ago. Nice troll though!

    3. toadwarrior
      FAIL

      Re: What's interesting to me...

      Some people take a more critical look at the Gate foundation and see that not everything is sunshine and lollipops.

      http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2012/07/the_gates_foundations_leverage.html

      http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,2533850.story

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: What's interesting to me...

        Oh look: Person with track record of slagging off Microsoft finds a couple of articles which aren't that hot about the B&MGF. Great.

        Clearly they're not perfect, but - and this is just off the top of my head - the company invests in a double blind manner, so they may invest in XYorX oil company, but it is done in a manner which makes the most money for the charity. Is it the way I'd do it? No. Is it "EVIL BILL REALLY TRYING TO KILL EVERYONE BUT HIM" probably not.

        1. Tim Parker

          Re: What's interesting to me...

          "but - and this is just off the top of my head - the company invests in a double blind manner, so they may invest in XYorX oil company, but it is done in a manner which makes the most money for the charity."

          There would seem to be quite a few arguments that indicate this would not appear to be true... perhaps you could read around and then make your point.

          "Is it the way I'd do it? No. Is it "EVIL BILL REALLY TRYING TO KILL EVERYONE BUT HIM" probably not."

          No, indeed, however I don't think that was necessarily what was being claimed and, despite much of the drivel spouted online when things are being debated, not everything in the real world has to be one extreme or the other.

  4. AceRimmer
    Meh

    Sir Norman Foster

    The ultimate in Form over Function

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Sir Norman Foster

      Why? Foster & Partners did a great job with Hong Kong airport. Always a pleasure going over there.

      1. Chris 3

        Re: Sir Norman Foster

        And wasn't Foster responsible for the excellent British Library courtyard rebuild?

      2. AceRimmer

        Re: Sir Norman Foster

        Having been shown round one Foster and Co building just after it was built with a view to buying one of the apartments and then working in another building from the final stages of construction to the first phases of it being put to use I can say that I was vastly underwhelmed on both occasions.

        From the outside and as a casual visitor both buildings looked stunning and had a facade of functionality. The real problems are in the smaller details which you have to deal with on a more day to day basis. Corners get cut to keep the aesthetics right. impracticable service rooms, odd corridor arrangements. Rooms which have an outside wall but no windows for no apparent reason apart from to keep the building looking pretty.

        And then there are other design fuck ups which had to be ripped out at the last minute and replaced with a more tried and tested method

    2. Blip

      Re: Sir Norman Foster

      The Millau Bridge is another example which disproves your form over function comment.

  5. johnwerneken
    Mushroom

    Horrid for the environment

    13,000 yuppies driving an hour each way to and fro work. What baloney, another environmental disaster. I suppose ultimately a Chinese province will be dug up for the rare earths needed for slave laborers to make the toys these yuppies will design. And the liberal yuppies claim capitalist exploiters are gone. Walt Kelly got it: "We have met the Enemy, and He is Us."

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Horrid for the environment

      What kind of argument is that? Those employees would be driving to work anyway.

      Unlike China and other Asian countries, employee dormitories aren't very popular in the west. Not that I'm complaining, after spending 3 months in one.

  6. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge
    Stop

    Apricot trees?

    What now, an attempt to take over all the world's fruit?

    1. TRT Silver badge

      Re: Apricot trees?

      I visited the Apricot factory once.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Apricot trees?

        but, but, you mean they *don't* grow on trees?

        1. TRT Silver badge

          Re: Apricot trees?

          No, they were made in a factory, sorry, manufacturing facility, just north of Edinburgh... Glen-something. Glenrothes, was it? We visited there as part of a computer course for kiddies run by Herriot-Watt university back in the 80s.

          1. Code Monkey

            Re: Apricot trees?

            It was Glenrothes, yes.

            I worked for an Apricot reseller in the 90s. Nice PCs, some very nice servers. Couldn't compete with Dell, though. Shame.

  7. Tom Maddox Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Cupertino

    "Cupertino locals had complained that the 13,000 employees who will work in the glowy doughnut office will bring traffic and noise into the area without adding any amenities for locals. "

    I'm forced to ask, who cares? It's *Cupertino*. There's nothing worthwhile there *now*; it's an endless sprawl of at-best modestly-wooded strip malls and suburbs. I believe the town motto is "Cupertino: At least we're not Sunnyvale."

  8. Alan Brown Silver badge
    Coat

    One ring to rule them all?

    IGMC

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Go

    And thus.....

    The Apple Donut was born!!

    Mmmmmm.....tastes like corporate.......(drools)

  10. Arachnoid
    Mushroom

    ,,,,,,,,,,,They are building a gigantic space ship based on Area 51 tech to escape the planet once the gigantic meteor is spotted entering Earths trajectory.

    1. Tel Starr

      Just to allow the iPhone sanitisers a route to safety?

      Completely B.arking!

      1. TRT Silver badge

        Was it also...

        programmed to crash?

        Pass the soap someone...

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    CORRUPTION IN A COUNCIL? NEVER!

    W O W, why are peole just so GAY for Apple?

  12. Big_Boomer Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    I'm no Fanboi

    but this looks like a sensible move to me.

    The new location is less than a mile from Infinite Loop, is right next to 280, and looks moderately well thought out to me with adequate onsite parking and access.

    Whatever you think of Jobs or Foster, it's more interesting than the Microsoft Campus.

    Full details can be seen here;

    http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=1107

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Oh you are too a fanboi

      All those factors you mentioned are of no value to a single person in the entire world except for Apple employees. You counted only the benefits to them, and did not even consider the remotest possibility that those benefits might imply costs to others in the local neighbourhood, or the rest of the world, or even anywhere at all. That utterly one-sided all-benefits-no-costs analysis can't be justified and could only arise from your own pre-existing cognitive bias. Fanboi.

  13. Morrie Wyatt
    Mushroom

    It represents Apple's corporate philosophy.

    Just like their iPad, iPhone and other hardware. Rounded corners enclosing a walled garden.

    (The mushroom cloud because Steve Jobs did declare thermonuclear war on Android.)

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