We didn't use A/B tests to make the iPhone at Apple

Use of A/B tests does feel like an organization where the leadership is not there to either help make hard decisions or the culture doesn't allow people lower down the ranks to make these decisions. The excerpt mentions "good taste".. well plenty of people don't have good taste, so while saying we don't use A/B tests because we have good taste, I think its likely a combination of good taste and leadership in the company that allows the good taste to drive the decisions and some level of agreement among a group of leaders of what "good taste" is..

I understand why they didn't -- when it comes to new technologies, most end users can only imagine extensions of what they already have, not entirely new paradigms. (Just look at the technology predictions from the 1960s!)

A/B testing is best suited for determining user preference between existing designs, not new ones.

Didn't Apple argue in Apple v Samsung that Apple invested millions in focus groups?

There’s a lot of false equivalence in this post. The message seems to be “if you want to build amazing new things, don’t A/B test.” This is vacuously true. You certainly won’t discover fusion, or make the next iCar through rote testing.

What’s hidden though is that out of the thousands of companies that will try, only a few will succeed. The rest will burn through millions and have nothing to show for it. A/B tests are done because they work in the short term, providing runway for the long term. It’s true that many companies abuse these tests and heavily lean on incremental improvements. Management can become complacent, spineless and rudderless, thereby refusing to make hard choices that go against the data. But, it keeps volatility down and appeases the overlords holding shares and vested interest in the company.

It does make wonder though how, despite being so secretive, Apple got a lot of things right with the iPhone and iPod. So whatever their process was for internal focus groups is definitely worth exploring. We’ve all heard how Jobs was insanely attentive to details, but I still wonder where the overall cohesion of design came from. No one person could have possibly gotten all of that right.

this is maybe missing the point but how about the blue/green of iMessage? surely they went to great lengths to find the most displeasing shade of green for iPhone owners to talk to non-iPhone owners.

Design arrogance of Apple is misplaced and frankly, annoying. Sottsass, Dieter Rams, Bob Noorda, Paul Rand, etc would not invite Apple designers to their parties. I don't think Apple designers have good taste. They're just fashionable half baked designers with a sense of minimalism with no idea about pragmatism and functionalism. Using premium materials doesn't necessarily make good Design. In the Design circles, we call those things - luxury goods.