In case you hadn’t heard, there’s a new book out about Apple by ex-WSJ reporter Yukari Iwatani Kane called Haunted Empire. Kane covered the Apple beat at WSJ for years, and her book deals specifically with how the culture changed between Steve Jobs’ tenure and the succession of Tim Cook as CEO.
Cook has just issued the following statement about the book to CNBC’s Becky Quick:
This nonsense belongs with some of the other books I’ve read about Apple about Apple. It fails to capture Apple, Steve, or anyone else in the company. Apple has over 85,000 employees that come to work each day to do their best work, to create the world’s best products, to put their mark in the universe and leave it better than they found it. This has been the heart of Apple from day one and will remain at the heart for decades to come. I am very confident about our future. We’ve always had many doubters in our history. They only make us stronger.
As you can see, it’s a fairly bold condemnation of the work and its accuracy relative to how Apple operates. The book has been criticized by others, too, with reviewers around the web expressing negative opinions on its contents. I plan on reading the book, but only just downloaded it to my Kindle today and haven’t yet had a chance to dig in.