iPhone 3G ad: Apple finally succumbs to own hubris
At last, an opportunity to legitimately write about something Apple-y (outside of my other bloggy stuff). The worst-kept secret in recent tech history, the announcement of the iPhone 3G (it’s just like the old one, but a bit quicker), brought with it a brand new TV ad to celebrate/begin-the-brainwashing-of-gullible-idiots-like-me.
This one has a pair of burly security types basically hauling said Jesus-phone product into, well, a different room, to unveil the handset in all its glimmering just-like-the-old-one glory. Aaaaaaand that’s it.
Pretty much the only thing this ad shares in common with those for the original iPhone is a commitment to simplicity. But whereas those old ads took the form of only-slightly-patronising ‘tutorials’ on how the thing worked, this one goes for the kind of simplicity that just seems cocky – it’s trying way too hard, and probably overestimates the general populace’s interest in what is, after all, just a phone.
Which also kinda smacks of the same problem Apple had with their ‘Mac vs PC’ ads here in the UK. Whereas in the States the Mac guy is only borderline patronising, key to avoiding the all-too-credible stereotype of Mac users as smug, superior beings just waiting to beam about their beloved computers, here in the UK someone had the disastrous idea of employing comedians-of-the-moment Mitchell & Webb to enact almost the exact same scripts, with their own distinctive characters. The well-documented problem with this was Robert Webb’s take on Mac: smug, superior, and positively beaming patronising gumf about the Mac platform. The ads tanked and have since been pulled.
Full disclosure: I use Macs all the time and also own an iPhone. So, uh, it’s OK to criticise…
Sure. Is. Scary.
There are a bunch of ways an ad can try and get its message across in the mercifully short time it has to make you BUY! BUY! BUY! It can make you laugh, it can make you cry (my usual reaction to advertising), it might even make you feel something (I still want a VW Beetle after those ads with the Aqualung ‘Strange & Beautiful’ track – couldn’t find a vid, anyone help out?). But it’s rare that an ad tries to get you to buy something by SCARING the LIVING DAYLIGHTS out of you. (Unless it’s about road accidents or drink driving, in which case that’s the point I suppose).
With that in mind, this scared the bejeezus out of me when I saw it in the cinema – all settled in with my giant pick n mix and a bucket of Fanta:
Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to invoke the deep, dark insecurities felt by teenage girls ALL THE TIME by enacting said insecurities in a ghost train?!? Those things are scary anyway! Not so much the wobbly skeletons glowing in the dark type stuff, more scary in the ‘there’s an overweight bearded man touching my shoulder in the dark’ kind of way. Much worse.
So, good look Sure in trying to shift more canisters of anti-perspirant – we’re all gonna need some deodorant after sweating our way through this ad.
Plagiarism corner #1: Hillarys Blinds vs. iPod Nano
Special mention for the current Hillarys Blinds ads running on UK TV screens right now (sorry, for once they don’t have a link to watch online), which feature a pile of coasters seen from above, each with a pretty picture of said blinds in one of those idyllic, perfectly-decorated houses we all live in these days. As the music plays disembodied hands start removing coasters from the top of the pile, to reveal another blind in another lovely environment, each more utopian than the last.
Except, hang on, haven’t we seen the exact same hand-based idea already used somewhere before? Where else but Apple, that bastion of hit-and-miss hyper-simplistic ads (there’s bound to be a future post on these all to themselves in the near future), with their spots for the newly rejuvenated iPod nano, complete with extra video-y bits. Check them out on Apple’s official site and see for yourself.
adlands 