If you're referring to the Mac v. PC ads, I thought that every single one of those was brilliant. Uncompromisingly brilliant. Put Macs back on the map in an in-your-face way. I **loved** them.
People copy it to this day..... (the T-Mobile girl, for instance).
The campaign was brilliant but some of the ads weren't that great. I'm sure you were on this forum when we discussed them as they came up. I can't think of any specific examples but I do clearly recall thinking that certain ads weren't great (within this brilliant campaign).
Let's not forget this was a very long and extensive campaign. I count 66 TV ads for the US, 16 web ads, 15 UK ads, 12 Japanese ads, and 4 special ads for WWDC. That's a lot. I'll let Mitchell & Webb, a personal favourite of mine and the "Mac" and "PC for the UK ads, describe it in a skit.
[VIDEO]
Moving on, i think Apple has a great opportunity ahead of them with Win8 being so drastically different from the standard Windows UI, not to mention the confusion of what apps run on what OS based on what processor, plus having so many new Macs that are rumoured to be Retina Display and eschewing outmoded HW like the ODD that I think it would behoove them to have another Mac focused campaign to the next year or two to really help push the Mac even faster than it has been growing.
"Where great ideas go on to do great things" is clearly a reference to the Apple "Do Engine," Siri.
I think you're right on. That's the first thing I thought of when I read the banner. For the record, I think there's going to be a dedicated siri button on the new iPhone now that it's coming out of beta (another way for Apple to stretch it's lead over the fragmented android platform); we'll be able to do so much without even looking at the screen, it will be very cool!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Yeah. Hate to keep saying it but consider that shark fully jumped.
When Apple's banners start seeming like they hired Steve Balmer as their copywriter, you know they are in trouble.
"Where great ideas go on to do great things"? What, these ideas were doing shit before and now they can do "great things?" Ideas actually do stuff? Ideas are sentient now?
What utter nonsense. Even in the context of "ad speak" this is absolute meaningless drivel. It's embarrassingly bad copy. And this from the biggest company on the planet that can hire the best advertising talent on the planet if they wish to. Bleh.
Bleh to you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Except one of the number one rules in advertising (and art) is that you shouldn't have to explain what it means.
Even if your right (and actually I think you're explanation is a stretch), if you have to explain it to people it's a fail anyway.
The strange wording is what clues you in to what apple is getting at, and it's something that apple has done for a long time. For example, the strange punctuation or made up words often used to promote products on apple.com.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
I can't speak for the original poster, but for me the "celebrity" Siri ads are some of the worst Apple ads I've seen. Mainly because they aren't original and don't actually communicate anything.
First off, they are just exact copies of the original Siri ads, but with celebrities. How tacky and unoriginal is that? All they communicate to the audience is "celebrities like Apple products," and even that is a lie because of course they were paid to do them.
Furthermore, they are just full of errors. The timing is off on all of them, the "acting" is off on at least a few lines of most of them. It's just all wrong. There is a subtle something missing in the flow of the words. It's as if they should have done five or six more takes until they got it right, or worse, it's as if the director simply didn't know that they didn't get a good take. Glaringly obvious to me.
I find them very hard to watch. They are embarrassing.
You're embarrassing. I don't appreciate your seemingly constant negativity (in many different threads). I don't know if you are just a bitter person (you obviously like Apple), and I don't know why you were absent from the apple fan site forums for so long, but please, for all our sakes, lighten up.
FWIW: In my opinion, Tim is doing an amazing job. He is the perfect person to lead Apple into the future, and in many ways will be able to do things for Apple that Steve's personality would not let him do; I think Steve knew this, which is why he chose Mr. Cook. I think Tim's interview at allthingsd shows he's just as brilliant as Steve was (Apple already has the best product designers in the world, even without Steve; Apple needs someone to implement Apple's plan, for which Tim seems to be perfectly suited).
I can't speak for the original poster, but for me the "celebrity" Siri ads are some of the worst Apple ads I've seen. Mainly because they aren't original and don't actually communicate anything.
First off, they are just exact copies of the original Siri ads, but with celebrities. How tacky and unoriginal is that? All they communicate to the audience is "celebrities like Apple products," and even that is a lie because of course they were paid to do them.
I believe you've missed the subtext of these ads. It's not that they've hired a celebrity to endorse a product, they've hired archetypes to show what kind of person uses an iPhone. Samuel Jackson shows a non-traditional strong male, Zooey Dechanel is the penultimate quirky young female, and John Malkovich typifies a cerebral androgynous male. It's not actors or celebrities they've hired, but rather unique individual icons. In a sense it's still an extension of "Think Different" - "Live Different" if you please. On the other hand I believe these ads were intended to not convey this subtext on a totally conscious level, made to evoke a more emotional response - you get the meaning without being able to put a label on it. Still, I personally prefer the Mac and PC ads.
For the record, I think there's going to be a dedicated siri button on the new iPhone now that it's coming out of beta (another way for Apple to stretch it's lead over the fragmented android platform); we'll be able to do so much without even looking at the screen, it will be very cool!
I've all but given up on that happening but I sure hope it does. The current method is too slow to activate. I want something dedicated so it can be ready at an instant.
The Siri ads are brilliant for this reason: Siri isn't a feature, Siri is a personality... a celebrity even. I would be willing to wager that just about as many people know of Siri as Zooey Deschanel... Siri might even be more well known. When you hold down the home button, you're not talking to the iphone voice recognition feature on your phone, you're talking to the one and only Siri. When the ads are with anonymous actors, Siri becomes a bit commoditized... just an interface. But paired with an already well-known individual, Siri becomes seen as a well known "individual" in her own right.
Siri is the the smart, friendly, celebrity that everyone with an iphone has on speed-dial.
Except one of the number one rules in advertising (and art) is that you shouldn't have to explain what it means.
Even if your right (and actually I think you're explanation is a stretch), if you have to explain it to people it's a fail anyway.
This isn't an advertisment at all. It's a slogan... a TEASER.
They're not gonna cover the outside of Moscone Center with all of the upcoming keynote announcements... are they?
I can't speak for the original poster, but for me the "celebrity" Siri ads are some of the worst Apple ads I've seen. Mainly because they aren't original and don't actually communicate anything.
They show the product in use. I don't know a better way to communicate than that.
Sure the "sequences have been shortened" and all that jazz... but at least they show the product.
Looking at some competitors' commercials... will my Android tablet really turn into a spaceship? Will I turn into a robot?
FWIW: In my opinion, Tim is doing an amazing job. He is the perfect person to lead Apple into the future, and in many ways will be able to do things for Apple that Steve's personality would not let him do; I think Steve knew this, which is why he chose Mr. Cook. I think Tim's interview at allthingsd shows he's just as brilliant as Steve was (Apple already has the best product designers in the world, even without Steve; Apple needs someone to implement Apple's plan, for which Tim seems to be perfectly suited).
I'm with you on that, although his brilliance casts a different hue to Steve's. I wonder whether some of the senior executives will make product announcements during the keynote (other than just demonstrations), rather than Tim alone. Yes, I am a member of the Tim Cook fan club, unabashedly!
They show the product in use. I don't know a better way to communicate than that.
iPod silhouette commercials didn't show the product, which made it strong for me. They didn't even display the company name, just their logo. That was strong!
The theme tag might be a bit over-obvious by past standards, but not lame. It's about realising and developing capabilities already within Apple devices. Yes, we might expect Siri to get out of beta and be endowed with a rich set of hooks or tools to become far more usable by developers, same with iCloud, etc.. Ping integration with Facebook (?)
I believe you've missed the subtext of these ads. It's not that they've hired a celebrity to endorse a product, they've hired archetypes to show what kind of person uses an iPhone. Samuel Jackson shows a non-traditional strong male, Zooey Dechanel is the penultimate quirky young female, and John Malkovich typifies a cerebral androgynous male. It's not actors or celebrities they've hired, but rather unique individual icons. In a sense it's still an extension of "Think Different" - "Live Different" if you please. On the other hand I believe these ads were intended to not convey this subtext on a totally conscious level, made to evoke a more emotional response - you get the meaning without being able to put a label on it. Still, I personally prefer the Mac and PC ads.
Have to agree with you. They hit every 'wannabe/wannasleepwith' demographic using only three people.
Yeah. Hate to keep saying it but consider that shark fully jumped.
When Apple's banners start seeming like they hired Steve Balmer as their copywriter, you know they are in trouble.
"Where great ideas go on to do great things"? What, these ideas were doing shit before and now they can do "great things?" Ideas actually do stuff? Ideas are sentient now?
<p style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px;padding-top:0px;padding-right:0px;padding-bottom:0px;padding-left:0px;">What utter nonsense. Even in the context of "ad speak" this is absolute meaningless drivel. It's embarrassingly bad copy. And this from the biggest company on the planet that can hire the best advertising talent on the planet if they wish to. Bleh. </p>
Lets not forget when they were coming up with names for what would be the iMac Phil Schiller wanted to call it MacMan. So yeah I can see his shop coming up with this drivel.
iPod silhouette commercials didn't show the product, which made it strong for me. They didn't even display the company name, just their logo. That was strong!
i always thought those ads were a brilliant use of the white iPod and white headphones. Thankfully Steve was there to let Jony have his white headphones otherwise they probably would have been black.
Wouldn't LinkedIn integration make more sense to professionals than Facebook? LinkedIn has more than 160 million members worldwide, more than 60 million in the US (http://press.linkedin.com/about). While nowhere close to FB, it would appear to me that it would provide a better focus on quality rather than appeal to the masses.
Comments
Let's not forget this was a very long and extensive campaign. I count 66 TV ads for the US, 16 web ads, 15 UK ads, 12 Japanese ads, and 4 special ads for WWDC. That's a lot. I'll let Mitchell & Webb, a personal favourite of mine and the "Mac" and "PC for the UK ads, describe it in a skit.
[VIDEO]
Moving on, i think Apple has a great opportunity ahead of them with Win8 being so drastically different from the standard Windows UI, not to mention the confusion of what apps run on what OS based on what processor, plus having so many new Macs that are rumoured to be Retina Display and eschewing outmoded HW like the ODD that I think it would behoove them to have another Mac focused campaign to the next year or two to really help push the Mac even faster than it has been growing.
I question why I still go to the trouble to see these things when it's so much easier to let the experts record it for you in great detail.
Maybe the slogan should have been, "When copyeditors quit..."
Quote:
Originally Posted by MacBook Pro
"Where great ideas go on to do great things" is clearly a reference to the Apple "Do Engine," Siri.
I think you're right on. That's the first thing I thought of when I read the banner. For the record, I think there's going to be a dedicated siri button on the new iPhone now that it's coming out of beta (another way for Apple to stretch it's lead over the fragmented android platform); we'll be able to do so much without even looking at the screen, it will be very cool!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Yeah. Hate to keep saying it but consider that shark fully jumped.
When Apple's banners start seeming like they hired Steve Balmer as their copywriter, you know they are in trouble.
"Where great ideas go on to do great things"? What, these ideas were doing shit before and now they can do "great things?" Ideas actually do stuff? Ideas are sentient now?
What utter nonsense. Even in the context of "ad speak" this is absolute meaningless drivel. It's embarrassingly bad copy. And this from the biggest company on the planet that can hire the best advertising talent on the planet if they wish to. Bleh.
Bleh to you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Except one of the number one rules in advertising (and art) is that you shouldn't have to explain what it means.
Even if your right (and actually I think you're explanation is a stretch), if you have to explain it to people it's a fail anyway.
The strange wording is what clues you in to what apple is getting at, and it's something that apple has done for a long time. For example, the strange punctuation or made up words often used to promote products on apple.com.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
I can't speak for the original poster, but for me the "celebrity" Siri ads are some of the worst Apple ads I've seen. Mainly because they aren't original and don't actually communicate anything.
First off, they are just exact copies of the original Siri ads, but with celebrities. How tacky and unoriginal is that? All they communicate to the audience is "celebrities like Apple products," and even that is a lie because of course they were paid to do them.
Furthermore, they are just full of errors. The timing is off on all of them, the "acting" is off on at least a few lines of most of them. It's just all wrong. There is a subtle something missing in the flow of the words. It's as if they should have done five or six more takes until they got it right, or worse, it's as if the director simply didn't know that they didn't get a good take. Glaringly obvious to me.
I find them very hard to watch. They are embarrassing.
You're embarrassing. I don't appreciate your seemingly constant negativity (in many different threads). I don't know if you are just a bitter person (you obviously like Apple), and I don't know why you were absent from the apple fan site forums for so long, but please, for all our sakes, lighten up.
FWIW: In my opinion, Tim is doing an amazing job. He is the perfect person to lead Apple into the future, and in many ways will be able to do things for Apple that Steve's personality would not let him do; I think Steve knew this, which is why he chose Mr. Cook. I think Tim's interview at allthingsd shows he's just as brilliant as Steve was (Apple already has the best product designers in the world, even without Steve; Apple needs someone to implement Apple's plan, for which Tim seems to be perfectly suited).
This just Tim Cook doubling down on secrecy. No more subliminal messages for ya'll.
I believe you've missed the subtext of these ads. It's not that they've hired a celebrity to endorse a product, they've hired archetypes to show what kind of person uses an iPhone. Samuel Jackson shows a non-traditional strong male, Zooey Dechanel is the penultimate quirky young female, and John Malkovich typifies a cerebral androgynous male. It's not actors or celebrities they've hired, but rather unique individual icons. In a sense it's still an extension of "Think Different" - "Live Different" if you please. On the other hand I believe these ads were intended to not convey this subtext on a totally conscious level, made to evoke a more emotional response - you get the meaning without being able to put a label on it. Still, I personally prefer the Mac and PC ads.
I've all but given up on that happening but I sure hope it does. The current method is too slow to activate. I want something dedicated so it can be ready at an instant.
The Siri ads are brilliant for this reason: Siri isn't a feature, Siri is a personality... a celebrity even. I would be willing to wager that just about as many people know of Siri as Zooey Deschanel... Siri might even be more well known. When you hold down the home button, you're not talking to the iphone voice recognition feature on your phone, you're talking to the one and only Siri. When the ads are with anonymous actors, Siri becomes a bit commoditized... just an interface. But paired with an already well-known individual, Siri becomes seen as a well known "individual" in her own right.
Siri is the the smart, friendly, celebrity that everyone with an iphone has on speed-dial.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Panu
Maybe the slogan should have been, "When copyeditors quit..."
LOL, journalism died in the mid-Nineties, dude. You're twenty years late to the party.
This isn't an advertisment at all. It's a slogan... a TEASER.
They're not gonna cover the outside of Moscone Center with all of the upcoming keynote announcements... are they?
They show the product in use. I don't know a better way to communicate than that.
Sure the "sequences have been shortened" and all that jazz... but at least they show the product.
Looking at some competitors' commercials... will my Android tablet really turn into a spaceship? Will I turn into a robot?
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
No, this is a developer's conference. That was just a choice by the designer(s).
And possibly a hint to APIs leveraging HiRes options.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PatchyThePirate
FWIW: In my opinion, Tim is doing an amazing job. He is the perfect person to lead Apple into the future, and in many ways will be able to do things for Apple that Steve's personality would not let him do; I think Steve knew this, which is why he chose Mr. Cook. I think Tim's interview at allthingsd shows he's just as brilliant as Steve was (Apple already has the best product designers in the world, even without Steve; Apple needs someone to implement Apple's plan, for which Tim seems to be perfectly suited).
I'm with you on that, although his brilliance casts a different hue to Steve's. I wonder whether some of the senior executives will make product announcements during the keynote (other than just demonstrations), rather than Tim alone. Yes, I am a member of the Tim Cook fan club, unabashedly!
Not the catchiest slogan ever, but still looking forward to it. Not actually going, but always watch 10-20 of the developer videos after each WWDC.
iPod silhouette commercials didn't show the product, which made it strong for me. They didn't even display the company name, just their logo. That was strong!
The theme tag might be a bit over-obvious by past standards, but not lame. It's about realising and developing capabilities already within Apple devices. Yes, we might expect Siri to get out of beta and be endowed with a rich set of hooks or tools to become far more usable by developers, same with iCloud, etc.. Ping integration with Facebook (?)
Quote:
Originally Posted by diplication
I believe you've missed the subtext of these ads. It's not that they've hired a celebrity to endorse a product, they've hired archetypes to show what kind of person uses an iPhone. Samuel Jackson shows a non-traditional strong male, Zooey Dechanel is the penultimate quirky young female, and John Malkovich typifies a cerebral androgynous male. It's not actors or celebrities they've hired, but rather unique individual icons. In a sense it's still an extension of "Think Different" - "Live Different" if you please. On the other hand I believe these ads were intended to not convey this subtext on a totally conscious level, made to evoke a more emotional response - you get the meaning without being able to put a label on it. Still, I personally prefer the Mac and PC ads.
Have to agree with you. They hit every 'wannabe/wannasleepwith' demographic using only three people.
Genius.
But that banner slogan just doesn't read right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
Bleh. "Where great ideas go on to do great things"?
I think Steve would've made sure that would be much shorter and much more memorable.
How about, "Introducing what's next" instead?
Could be too close to Samsung's "Next is what?" tag line!
Quote:
Originally Posted by AppleInsider
...Apple is also expected to announce a new and improved maps application for iOS, new Camera and Photos apps and closer Facebook integration...
Wouldn't LinkedIn integration make more sense to professionals than Facebook? LinkedIn has more than 160 million members worldwide, more than 60 million in the US (http://press.linkedin.com/about). While nowhere close to FB, it would appear to me that it would provide a better focus on quality rather than appeal to the masses.