cincytee

Xed said:

I find the killing of puppies and murder wrong, but I didn't get upset when watching John Wick.

While I don't think violent films or video games directly cause violence in the real world, I'm sure the simultaneous glorification and normalization of gruesome imagary in them numbs people to others' pain for entertainment purposes. It's not healthy. Not a big John Wick fan.

mattinoz said:

Everything other than the PacMac machine could have been sourced from good will organisations having to reject donations due oversupply. 

That doesn't make it any less sad.

Xed said:

Personally, I thought the ad was great and even after reading about several explanations as to why it's upsetting to some people, I don't get it.

Here's my take: Working musicians like me are so careful to protect and respect our instruments. They're connected to us and fairly fragile (my century-old violin is at its root a wooden box that could be easily destroyed). Seeing those instruments crushed in this ad was upsetting – not traumatizing – and, more important, did not make me want to buy one of these iPads. There are other ways to get the same point across, like having these objects CGI-sucked into a circuit board. Good for Apple simply to admit this ad misfired and move on.

Don't need them in every Apple product box, I suppose, since I have ... a lot. Would be nice to keep some at Apple stores, though, to offer customers that might want them.

I of course immediately understood the ad's symbolic message: all this creative potential has been packed into this new iPad. I was still very upset to see the guitar and piano – and all the dedication and craftsmanship that making them required – destroyed for a gimmick message that could have been expressed without the destruction. As a music performer, seeing those instruments crushed was kind of horrifying. Kind of a tone-deaf concept, especially for a company that prides itself on dedication and craftsmanship.