Comment by gdubs
2 days ago
Long way from the "Think Different" era Apple. Been thinking about that campaign this week. Posters of people like MLK, which Jobs had to get permission for from each and every estate for the campaign. When Apple was solidly, unambiguously positioned as the computer for the rebels, the misfits, the crazy ones.
If nothing else, there was an opportunity to simply say that given the day's events, a movie screening didn't feel right. Or – "hey there's a gigantic winter storm covering half the country, and I have a lot of logistical stuff to take care of."
> Long way from the "Think Different" era Apple. Been thinking about that campaign this week. Posters of people like MLK, which Jobs had to get permission for from each and every estate for the campaign. When Apple was solidly, unambiguously positioned as the computer for the rebels, the misfits, the crazy ones.
"Think Different" was an advertising slogan that Apple Computers, a publicly-traded corporation with thousands of employees, paid an advertising company to create in the late 90s in order to promote a certain image of the company, because the leadership at the time thought it would help them sell more computers. And it clearly worked (or at least didn't abjectly fail) because Apple Computers is still around today and is an even larger corporate entity with a much larger market cap.
Whether a marketing campaign succeeds in appealing to you emotionally has nothing to do with whether rebels, misfits, crazy people, or any other category of person would be better off buying and using computer products made by Apple. I've personally never liked Apple products, I've always felt like they took a lot of practical control away from the end user in order to facilitate what Apple leadership thinks the end user _ought_ to want. So I avoid using their products, and I think other people should to, although I respect that the walled garden Apple provides is a computing product some people do find it useful to pay for.
Leadership at Apple computer was probably engaging in political activities some people at the time objected to when those ads were made, just as they are today.
I dunno. I also think about how Jobs swindled and mistreated Woz time after time, many of the nerds who cut their teeth on the Apple IIc were appalled by the road he took. By the time the Macintosh released, Apple had cemented themselves as a capricious OEM with no interest in serving every minority niche.
Actions like this feel fully contiguous with Jobs' personality, to me. He wasn't afraid to mistreat large swathes of customers, fans or employees if it meant that Apple could cosmetically pull ahead of it's competitors. He didn't feel obligated to fight fair or defend his moral righteousness, and neither does Cook. This is the exact same Apple you always knew, they've just quit virtue signalling.