Its most likely not a disaster for Apple in that Im sure it was purposeful. Id assume their thinking is that for every "unproven" app that gets surfaced to the user could be lost revenue in place of giving more focus to an established app with a higher likelihood of a buy. To me it seems like one of those short sighted how do we grow our revenue in the app store by 12% business maneuvers.
The long term and bigger picture impact of those decisions on Apple I guess we will have to wait and see.
iOS devices are successful because of the developers, just ask Microsoft. Now they are killing the hen that laid golden apps. I am surprised how quickly Apple lost its way after Steve.
What makes you think Steve Jobs, wouldn't approve of it? I mean maps probably wouldn't get out of the door, but this seems fine albeit different.
I kinda feel sad about all the "What would Steve do. He'd do exactly as I want" I constantly see. If memory doesn't fool me, Final Cut Pro X was panned by users, while Steve Jobs was at the helm. The only difference now it seems there is no RDF deployed.
The long term and bigger picture impact of those decisions on Apple I guess we will have to wait and see.