Lids that article is closely related to the topics in this recent thread
You will see there my opinion that northern and western climates are much easier to do no- or low-spray on apples. The NYT article is about northern NH and I don’t think those methods will work for me in Maryland.
It is somewhat random what will happen with no-spray apples, it depends on many factors. Most of the trees I have seen have really beat-up fruit, but a few were OK. Even here in Maryland I have seen perfectly OK apple trees that never got sprayed.