Critics Blast Apple's Cheesy New Ad Campaign 244
theodp writes "BetaBeat reports that people are pretty much falling over themselves to mock Apple's cheesy new Genius ad campaign, using zingers like 'intellectually cheap,' 'cringe-inducing,' 'borderline smarmy,' and — perhaps the unkindest cut of all — Microsoft-worthy — to describe them. Apple's trilogy-of-terror ad lineup includes Mayday ('An Apple Genius shows a fellow passenger how easy it is to make great home movies with iMovie. All before the tray tables are returned to their upright position.'), Labor Day ('An Apple Genius shows a soon-to-be father all the amazing things he can make with iPhoto.'), and Basically ('An Apple Genius points out there are a lot of things that separate a Mac from an ordinary computer, like great apps that come built in.'). The Atlantic's Jordan Weissmann says Steve Jobs would be appalled by the new ads, which certainly don't fare well in a head-to-head comparison with Think Different."
Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:5, Insightful)
it's detailed well elsewhere too.
if views were a metric, then it's successful. but if apple had filmed a turd for 20 seconds and published that as an official advert it would have the highest viewcount on youtube - however I really doubt that would mean it's a successful advert for them in building of their brand image.
Basically they're Apple adverts, basically.
Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:5, Funny)
but if apple had filmed a turd for 20 seconds and published that as an official advert it would have the highest viewcount on youtube - however I really doubt that would mean it's a successful advert for them in building of their brand image.
People would have said they liked the new fully cornerless design and swirly textures. Brown is obviously the new white (or black) and you have to be impressed by the new smell feedback technology. It's soft and warm to the touch as well, making it comfortable to hold.
Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:5, Funny)
People would have said they liked the new fully cornerless design and swirly textures. Brown is obviously the new white (or black) and you have to be impressed by the new smell feedback technology. It's soft and warm to the touch as well, making it comfortable to hold.
But being Apple it wouldn't be compatible with a genetic anus, it'll be proprietary.
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Wait, so you don't think Slashdot editors should be held to higher standards than the average poster?
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Surely a generic anus is a genetic one?
(No, I can't believe I'm posting this either)
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but if apple had filmed a turd for 20 seconds and published that as an official advert it would have the highest viewcount on youtube - however I really doubt that would mean it's a successful advert for them in building of their brand image.
People would have said they liked the new fully cornerless design and swirly textures. Brown is obviously the new white (or black) and you have to be impressed by the new smell feedback technology. It's soft and warm to the touch as well, making it comfortable to hold.
Good thing I didn't step in it!
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Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:4, Funny)
Basically they're Apple adverts, basically.
Are you from the Department of Redundancy Department?
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See the Apple advert named "Basically", then you'll understand...
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Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:4, Interesting)
They even got their ad campaign freely detailed on Slashdot and by all those different critics. Can't be more successful than that.
If the ads were any good we'd see Samsung ads that look just like it.
I still haven't seen the ads... mythtv dvr with auto commercial detection and autoskipping, adblocker on the web browser, don't watch sports, haven't watched live TV in years, don't buy newspapers or magazines (although I get a couple "journal" type mags)... What's apple's plan to push their message to a guy like me who has buckets of cash and no ad viewing habit? Oh, I see, get their ads discussed on /. damn you apple damn you that worked pretty well.
The only ads I've seen a couple years are the ford sync / etc / ads inserted inline on twit and revision3. However, recently when I watch revision3 shows on my roku the first thing is womens herpes medications WTF is up with that. Are all ads that poorly targeted out in the real (aka unblocked/unskipped) world? Like are sporting event commercials all romance novel publicity spots, etc?
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Do you really think vlm is going to buy women's herpes medication?
LOL No thats not going to sell to me. Thats the weird part, that either they think I'm in the target market, or most of the people who own a roku streaming box and watch revision3 shows are in the target market. I don't know which is unspeakably weirder. Either the mighty GOOG (or someone) knows a lot more about my sex life than I apparently do, or "the ben heck show" despite superficially being for nerdy guys who never get laid is primarily watched by herpes infested groupies. Other than the herpes thi
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That's true, but it doesn't make them any less weird. They aren't funny like their Mac vs PC commercials were or impressive through subtlety like their iPod/iPhone/iPad commercials usually are. They seemed kind of pointless...almost like Microsoft commercials, except with more obviousness.
As I posted below, I don't think these ads are for Apple's current customers. They are designed to reassure users thinking about switching to the Mac that they will have support. If Apple wants to expand their market share (in Mac sales), it can only come from PC/Windows users.
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As I posted below, I don't think these ads are for Apple's current customers.
Did you figure that out all by yourself? Why would Apple advertise to people who are already buying their crap? They're trying to sell their crap to people who aren't buying it, like every other business ever.
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As I posted below, I don't think these ads are for Apple's current customers.
Did you figure that out all by yourself? Why would Apple advertise to people who are already buying their crap? They're trying to sell their crap to people who aren't buying it, like every other business ever.
Ignoring the condescension... Businesses often advertise focusing on existing customers as well as new ones. That's how they let them know there are new products/new versions/next-greatest-thing etc. These commercials don't appear to be like that.
Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:4, Interesting)
They are the first in a long time that don't lie. All the iPhone and iPad ads were sped up, the real devices not being as fast as they show them to be. The Mac vs. PC ads made ridiculous claims about Macs not getting viruses. Maybe if you strip away the bullshit this is what is left.
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Not really. "Any publicity is good publicity" is deeply stupid.
Consider two cases for advertisements.
1. Advertisements that want you to think product X is better than Y,Z,..
2. Advertisements that want you to simply know that product X exists.
Apple has no need for #2. With respect to #1 - Apple has historically been successful by the content of their advertisements. By that I mean the emotional reaction that average consumers have when they see an Apple product / marketing material is largely a function of t
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I hear about Microsoft a lot here too. Do you think that all helps Microsoft?
Anyway, David Mitchell [youtube.com] - who played PC in the British Mac vs PC ads - said it best. In Britain, we hate smugness and prefer the PC character. So this can only make things worse.
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"No such thing as bad publicity" is wrong. Bad publicity is bad.
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The problem with the "I'm a Mac" ads were that people identified more with the funny quirky "PC" character than the pretentious hip "Mac" character, and
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The myth that more the eyeball, more successful the ad is just that, a myth. Pushed ad nauseum by mindless bots like you.
It's not totally untrue. Brand awareness does help sales. If people are looking for a product of a certain type, they are more likely to buy one from a company that they have heard of than one that they haven't.
In the case of Apple, however, it's a pointless goal. Everyone who hasn't been living under a rock for the past decade has heard of Apple. They've also probably heard of Nokia, Samsung, and Dell. An advert for a company in this situation needs to say more than 'we exist and are in this marke
Re:Successful ad campaign is successful (Score:5, Interesting)
People say that there is no such thing as bad publicity. That isn't the case. Ask BP what it was like to be in the news constantly for the oil spill.
Microsoft is in the news for losing market share in just about every key segment since Ballmer took over. Apple is in the news for failing to meet sales expectations for the iPhone and a disappointing earnings statement.
These ads suggest that Apple may have lost their touch when Jobs died. Consumers and stockholders might have reason to question the future of the company under Tim Cook.
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People say that there is no such thing as bad publicity. That isn't the case. Ask BP what it was like to be in the news constantly for the oil spill.
The saying "there's no such thing as bad publicity" is true when you're not trying to manipulate public opinion/thoughts.
This is true for a lot of companies, just to get or stay in the public consciousness. Companies like Microsoft, McDonalds, Citibank and Walmart aren't really hurt by negative publicity and benefit by it by simply being mentioned. Even BP wasn't harmed by the negative publicity from the oil spill, they were harmed more by the loss of production (x barrels per day removed from the revenu
Why is this a subject of debate? (Score:2, Insightful)
Isn't an ad campaign basically a self-measuring practice? Either their sales will go up, or they wont. Why do we need pundits to weigh in on *everything* in the universe? Advertising these days is everywhere and constant, this is like someone criticizing Heinz for making lousy ketchup. Are people buying it? Yes? Then shut the f up and go find something worthwhile to debate.
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Re:Why is this a subject of debate? (Score:4, Insightful)
Isn't an ad campaign basically a self-measuring practice? Either their sales will go up, or they wont.
Half of the money spent on marketing is wasted. The problem is figuring out which half.
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What Jobs would think is immaterial. Watching this even made one of the fanboiz in my office start to look at my and
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It's very hard to determine the effects of an ad camoaign on sales, as the figures are constantly changing and depend on a lot of variables.
Re:Why is this a subject of debate? (Score:5, Funny)
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You big-ketchup shill. Everyone knows Rold Gold is the finest in tomato based confectionery condiments. NO BLOOD FOR KETCHUP!
You put ketchup on your confections? lol gross. I do NOT want to know what you do with mayonnaise.
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Except for the fact that Heinz makes the best ketchup out there, I agree.
That's the thing; anyone who says "well this marketing campaign is terrible" without numbers behind it (since numbers are easy to come by when it comes to how much of a thing got sold, and when) is basically just sharing their opinion. And who the f cares about what some guy who likes to complain about ads thinks? That would be like me expecting national press for protesting this shit. I know no one else cares about it, that's what slashdot is for.
Think Different (Score:4, Insightful)
From the Think Different Ad: "They push the human race forward."
By litigating so that their competitors can't sell what may end up being superior products! Yeaaaaaaahhhhhh! Keep pushing the human race forward Apple!
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remember: they're not about the money, they're about quality.
(sarcasm).
People are talking (Score:2)
Look at the stupid GEICO commercials. "weeeeeeeeeeee....." that's as annoying as having satan slowly shove rusty nails through your testicles, but people talk about it. Hell, my girlfriend uses the sound bite as a notification message on her phone. I want to throw it at a wall every time she gets a text or tweet.
That said, I think MS does own the patent on poor tech commercials (Where would you like to go today? Anywhere but here!
Re:People are talking (Score:5, Insightful)
GEICO and Progressive ad campaigns generate giggles, but they're being dumped because they actually don't generate any increase in revenue.
Personally I can't see how anyone thought it was a good move to label Apple technicians "Geniuses". If they were geniuses, they would be doing something useful.
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GEICO and Progressive ad campaigns generate giggles, but they're being dumped because they actually don't generate any increase in revenue.
Such ad campaigns are deliberately designed to be annoying. They know its a negative effect but they also know it gets in your head. You're more likely to remember something you dislike rather than so the theory goes you'll remember the name Progressive or GEICO because you dislike their ads. This unfortunately does work, but not all the time. Most people aren't smart enough to determine why they remember "progressive" let alone make a conscious decision to avoid them because of their annoying ad (more ofte
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Only geeks worry about nonsensical shit like this. Everyone else moves on with their lives.
So, it's geeks watching Jersey Shore?
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I think MS does own the patent on poor tech commercials
There's prior art.
Are you old enough to remember Intel's bollywood act done in an imaginary chip fab cleanroom, where suddenly they shut down the line and hundreds of people break out into a disco dance routine?
Are you old enough to remember the Coleco Adam computer ads from the home computing bubble? One line summary: "What a rainy day; its seems little johnny turned out to be a Fing idiot ... I know what'll fix it, we'll buy him a Adam computer!"
And, no, on my honor as a 5 digit /. UID holder I am not ma
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Re:People are talking (Score:5, Insightful)
It is generating buzz. Bad or good, that is the goal of an ad campaign.
You don't want to generate buzz by destroying your hard-earned brand identity. Let's compare:
1) Old campaign "You can intuitively and effortlessly do cool things with our products."
2) New campaign "You will find yourself in tech emergencies while using our products, from which only a trained professional can save you (even though we used to tell you this only happened to customers of our competitor)."
Re:People are talking (Score:5, Funny)
Also,
1) Old campaign "You will be cool and fashionable as an Apple user"
2) New campaign "Only annoying geeks are Apple genius"
No classy ads.... (Score:2)
the 'Steve Jobs would be appalled' hypothetical (Score:5, Interesting)
This inevitably pops up everywhere, but I think it's more symptomatic of a lack of confidence in post-Jobs Apple, producing a self-fulfilling prophecy, than necessarily an independent assessment. Perceptions of Apple have been so closely tied to Jobs for years that evaluation of how smart decision are are strongly influenced by that. There are things that Apple could do today that will get people kvetching about "ugh, if only Steve Jobs were still here he'd never do that", but if Steve Jobs himself had done the identical thing 5 years ago, people would raise an eyebrow, maybe think it's weird, but give him the benefit of the doubt, assuming he knows what he's doing. Basically, people don't trust Apple knows what they're doing the way they trusted jobs, so even things Jobs would've done get that "if only Jobs..." treatment!
Re:the 'Steve Jobs would be appalled' hypothetical (Score:5, Funny)
No, they say the portrait of Jobs in the Apple boardroom shed a tear when the ads were screened. Or maybe they had the AC turned up too high.
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No, they say the portrait of Jobs in the Apple boardroom shed a tear when the ads were screened. Or maybe they had the AC turned up too high.
I heard the Steve Jobs in that portrait can travel freely to the portrait in his house to get away it all, or send messages in emergencies.
Re:the 'Steve Jobs would be appalled' hypothetical (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, the funny thing is that if you substitute "Commander Taco" For Jobs and "Slashdot" for Apple, your paragraph still works pretty well.
Founder effect?
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Apple really only has itself to blame for this. Steve had his hand in so much, they basically built their entire public image around him. Now Steve is gone and the company needs to make all the big boy decisions that Steve would have a big hand in making, using their voice instead of Steve delivering it to eager crowds. It's like trying to make a late sequel to a really good movie. It's likely never going to live up to the predecessor even if it's just as good because nostalgia is just unbeatable.
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The issue being if they did try to de-emphasize Jobs nominally in Apple, they would have been forfeiting opportunity. Jobs' leadership was a large marketable facet of Apple. If they made effort to push it aside, it probably wouldn't have worked.
For all we know Jobs hasn't had such a siginficant role in decision-making for a while, but for the sake of marketing he continued to be the face of the decisions.
If without Jobs your company is going to decline, might as well delay the decline so long as possible
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But maybe Jobs' successes were what would affect people's opinion of a poor ad and make them think that *they* are the ones missing something; make them assume that everything was done in a certain because Jobs has such a better idea than the rest of us.
Here, it's more of a blank slate. Everyone's opinion can remain unbiased by someone's reputation. This ad is something Microsoft would come up. Way too much talking, way too self promoting, too long, etc. Apple ads and design have become known for simpli
Who cares? (Score:3)
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It matters because it could be a significant blow to Apple's business model, which depends upon being fashionable. People buy Apple products because they think the company and the products are cool, and that buying these products will make the consumer cool as well. It will be a complete disaster for Apple if people start to realize that Apple is not actually cool, and is instead a corporate behemoth engaging in rent-seeking behavior (just like Microsoft). People don't like being tricked.
I agree it's not very Steve Jobs. (Score:2)
But Steve Jobs is dead. And he requested people at Apple not spend their time asking "What Would Steve Jobs Do?".
Also, this advertising, cheesy as it may be, is getting attention. Isn't that what ads are for? To get attention.
Remember the Mentos ads? 20 years later? Yep. Cheesy? Yep.
Could'a been worse... (Score:2)
Or Jerry Seinfeld.
What's the problem? (Score:2)
I don't see the big deal. I just watched the "Basically" ad, and thought it was kinda cute.
What would these supposed critics prefer? Something like this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqkNPcUMffU [youtube.com]
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I only watched mayday, and the thing that struck me was the impression I thought likely was that 'you better hope there's an apple genius around to help use your macbook, or else you will be screwed'. Historically, Apple focused on everyday people being self-sufficient without a lot of complexity, no 'genius' needed.
That and the tone of the ad just seemed so frantic and unsophisticated somehow.
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Oh man, that PS3 ad was seriously creepy.
As an Apple user, I must say I think these new ads suck. They suck when examined from a stand-alone viewpoint; and they doubly suck when you realize they're so much like a couple recent Honda ads it's ridiculous.
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I'd say the failure is that it suggests you need to either be or have the help of a genious to understand and use the product. This is a departure from the previous messaging that was pretty consistently suggesting a self-sufficient experience for the common person. It wasn't saying everyone had to be geeks, it was saying no one had to be a geek or even needed a geek to help them.
the ad campaigns were insulting (Score:4, Interesting)
It's insulting, as a male, to see a husband portrayed as a complete ditz; if they'd done it with a woman, there would have been hell to pay, or people wouldn't have thought it was funny. Look at the idiot man, everyone!
As a techie, I found the way the Genius acts to show someone who is practically codependent. They're not people - they're apparently robots who spend their entire lives wherever they are, serving as customer service agents?
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It's insulting, as a male, to see a husband portrayed as a complete ditz; if they'd done it with a woman, there would have been hell to pay, or people wouldn't have thought it was funny. Look at the idiot man, everyone!
This has been a pattern in sit-coms for a while -- doofus husband, whip-smart wife.
I think that men who object to this will certainly get less attention than women who object to bimbo-esque female characters. That said, I also think that the ultimate arbiter is the audience, not political correctness. This content is directed at women, who represent a large consumer demographic which was ignored for a long time. There are still plenty of ditzy women characters in male-oriented entertainment.
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And to be more specific, it is an overweight, white guy that is the doofus.
You don't see this with Asians, Hispanics or Blacks....at least not with a mixed set of actors, if it is mixed the white guy is the dumb one. If an all Black show for instance, you will sometimes seen the doofus male...
It is political correctness in general, you can't make fun of anyone, besides straight white mails. Family Guy, while making fun of
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And to be more specific, it is an overweight, white guy that is the doofus.
You don't see this with Asians, Hispanics or Blacks....at least not with a mixed set of actors, if it is mixed the white guy is the dumb one. If an all Black show for instance, you will sometimes seen the doofus male...
Disagree. It is still not (or rather, no longer) open season on ethnic and racial stereotypes, but in most family oriented sit-coms, the husband is usually hapless and husky, regardless of skin color.
Again, this has to do with snaring eyeballs for advertisers by presenting images that appeal to the most potentially lucrative demographics. PC-types might make the loudest fuss, but I see no evidence that TV writers are listening. Which makes sense, because uptight liberals a) don't watch TV and b) don't by
Re: the idiot man (Score:2)
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With the notable, rare exception of Matthew Mcconaughey, a white male with a southern drawl is invariably portrayed in the movies as either a wife beater, a racist, a child abuser, a drunk, or as simply stupid. More often it's a combination of all five.
Except on CMT. Oh, and on Fox News.
Matthew Mcconaughey is frequently cast as a simpleton (albeit with a heart of gold).
On the other hand, how soon we forget the "two modern day Robin Hoods"
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Got it! :-)
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You just complained about southern while males being labeled racist and then YOU WENT AND SAID RACIST THINGS.
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I agree. I caught part of the "husband's wife is having a baby so he consults an Apple Genius at home" ad and all I could think was: How stupid is this dad-to-be if his first thought when his wife went into labor was "I need to consult my local Apple Genius on making a multimedia presentation or something."
Then again, husbands and fathers are often portrayed on TV as being idiots who don't know anything and with whom the beautiful and intelligent wives/mothers have to put up with. One time I caught part o
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One time I caught part of a sitcom where the dad was the smart one (having no income due to a strike, opted not to buy a new TV set) and the wife did the stupid move (bought the expensive new TV set after they agreed not to). I thought it was refreshing until a news program suddenly came on in the sitcom explaining that the strike was over and everyone had their job back. Suddenly, the wife was shown as the smart one (despite having made the wrong decision based on the information they had at the time) and the husband apologized to her. So even when the wives do stupid things and husbands do smart things in sitcoms, the wives are still right and the husbands are still wrong.
The ultimate message of this scenario is not men are dumb and women are smart, it is that that consumption is good and women can be suckered into consuming by presenting them with patronizing hat-tips to their innate wisdom. Given that, is it men or women who are getting the short shrift?
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Blame television sitcoms. It seems like for the last few decades, in any sitcom with a family, the husband is a complete ditz.
Go back and watch some of the Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet episodes from the 50s and 60s. It's the same situation - the husband is a ditz, and the wife spends most of her time sorting things out after his screw-ups.
"The Problem with Apple ... (Score:2)
... is that they have no taste."
(then again, I can think of some TV shows they could air this on where it would be over the heads of their audience. Perhaps they're expanding down-market to people who wouldn't recognize Cesar Chavez. People with no taste have money to spend on computers too.)
First Justin Long... (Score:2)
The take-away (Score:4, Interesting)
Apple customers need help for even the simplest thing on their Apple computer.
Apple customers lack common sense.
Apple customers don't even know what an Apple computer is.
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Apple customers need help for even the simplest thing on their Apple computer. Apple customers lack common sense. Apple customers don't even know what an Apple computer is.
The ads aren't for Apple's current customers. They are designed to reassure users thinking about switching to the Mac that they will have support. If Apple wants to expand their market share, it can only come from PC/Windows users.
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If Apple wants to expand their market share, it can only come from PC/Windows users.
Now do you mean to tell me, that Apple has no interest in one of the 6 Hurd users? The 3 Haiku users?
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Before the message was consistently 'you won't need support, our stuff is so effortless'. That's a much more compelling sort of message to send. The frantic tone of these ads actually evokes a message more like 'our experience is just like everyone else's'. Maybe you say that's a necessary midset to entertain to play in the same game as the other PC manufacturers, but if image-wise they are on equal footing, they will lose on pricing. Otherwise, they start being price competitive in which case their wid
Are they as deceptive as past iPhone ads? (Score:4, Informative)
At least it's accurate (Score:2)
In my country, most Apple users *are* ingratiating, smug and condescending. Out of the whole Unix lot of the self-righteous, they take the cake.
Those are eerily similar in tone (Score:2)
... to the windows launch party videos. We have the incompetent boomer with laptop, and the geeky guy... all we're lacking is the black guy and the mom.
Yeesh. Who vets these things?
An Apple Geniusly (Score:2)
If you take "Think Differently" and change the adverb to an adjective, it becomes "Think Different".
I'm not normally annoyed by small grammatical errors, but when it's a multi-million dollar ad campaign, it really drives me crazy. I figured that the campaign worked only because the grammatical error caused people to repeat the phrase in their head multiple times in an effort to reconcile the error (ie. "maybe it will sound okay if I stress the syllables differently"). Repetition builds recognition.
Now tha
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If you take "Think Differently" and change the adverb to an adjective, it becomes "Think Different".
I'm not normally annoyed by small grammatical errors, but when it's a multi-million dollar ad campaign, it really drives me crazy. I figured that the campaign worked only because the grammatical error caused people to repeat the phrase in their head multiple times in an effort to reconcile the error (ie. "maybe it will sound okay if I stress the syllables differently"). Repetition builds recognition.
Now that they've started the precedent of incorrect grammar, they should continue it. Genius could be changed from a noun to an adverb, for example.
You've got mail!
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Ah.... but "Think Different" reads perfectly fine if you take it as meaning that it is implying the existence of an unstated noun, and "different" is not intending to describe how the thinking is done, but rather describing whatever it is that is being thought about.
You don't say "Think largely" when telling somebody to envision something of potentially grand size or stature, for example. You say "Think big". While it's true that ordinarily the words may be gramatically incorrect, in context they are
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That makes zero sense.. and judging by the randomness of your rant I'm pretty sure that deep inside you know that, too.
Think Different (Score:3, Interesting)
Enough about that, let's examine Apple's most famous ad, "1984". Read the text, while thinking (differently) about the kind of company that Apple is in 2012.
How ironic, eh? Apple has become the very thing that they despised, back then. One True Way of doing things, and if you don't like it, hit the highway.
I'm a late adopter, for very good reasons I won't go into here. I recently saw my first iPad in the wild, my new roomie has one. I had some cool Cajun mp3s he wanted, so I gave him my USB stick to transfer the files. I even GAVE him the actual CD that I purchased from the hand of the artist himself, to keep, as I didn't particularly care for the music and he loved it. Oops! The iPad doesn't have a USB port. He explained he had to do everything by iTunes. Bummer, eh?
Next, he was going for a new job, and wanted me to look over his contract. He sent me the .DOC file by email, and I annotated it using Libre Office's "CTRL-ALT-C comment" function. I highlighted the parts of the contract I thought should be changed, made my comments, and resent the file to him. Oops! Turns out, there's no free .DOC reader that will show those comments. His brother ended up loading the files onto his PC and sending him JPG screenshots. I'm sure if he wanted to pay $19.99, there would be some sort of solution to his problem. Again, a garden of pure ideology, secure from the pests of contradictory and confusing truths.
Jeez, the entire Apple motto, "Think Different", is a riff on IBM's motto, "Think". Let's all think differently and ignore the obvious grammatical error. Oof, how outdated! It's like how Texas A&M defines themselves by the rivalry to UT, and has no personality without it...now they're in different conferences. Awkward.
#8 (Score:2)
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You think wrong.
Apple customer support is generally regarded as some of the best in the world, and most definitely the best in tech.
The ads are fantastic (Score:2)
- Within 2-3 seconds you know exactly what Apple is marketing with these ads (which is not the computers, but the software and support network surrounding computers).
- There are no god-awful sex appeal tactics
- They get the point across very clearly (when you buy an apple, you can count on a uniform and cultivated support network, and usability out of the box)
- They don't have actors/actresses with horribly annoying catch phrases or voices to try to "stand out".
This ad campaign is completely fantastic. They
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- There are no god-awful sex appeal tactics
At least I can get some low-brow entertainment out of such tactics. Apple's appeal to the preciousness and wisdom of consumer product purchasers (whoopty-friggin-do, its a computer/phone) do nothing for me.
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You make the self-righteous mistake of assuming they were talking to you.
Just (Score:3)
Why not? (Score:2)
The Right Way (TM) (Score:2)
Look at their old ads - Full screen shot of an iPad. "Here's what you can do on an iPad." with a simple piano jingle behind it. Fade to Apple logo. The End. The right way to do an ad.
The wrong way includes that Motorola ad where the guy pilots a mech/spaceship with an Android tablet, the ad with the spinning razor death phones slicing through a city, and pretty much anything else involving jumping off buildings, talking to aliens, shooting lasers, robots or cyborgs.
These latest ads veer into the latter cate
Oh, Slashdot (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Or their attempts to appeal to a broader, less hip demographic is annoying the traditional recipients of their cheesy appeals, who didn't mind it as long as it was stroking their different thinking egos.