> This is a disturbing, shocking ad, not just because of what it shows but because of its seeming obliviousness to the subtext that it turns into text, as well as the message it sends to every artist alive: the tech industry will crush you, destroy you; suddenly, violently, all at once.
It surprises me how upset people get about stuff these days
Absolutely. I still say the ad was fine and people overreacted. We'll never know, but if this ad had come out when the iPad launched, I suspect the reactions would have been completely different.
IMO, people want corporations like Apple to facilitate art by humans, not crush it with AI and effectively replace humans. It appears this is just an outlet for the legitimate frustration and fear creatives are feeling with respect to Gen-AI. There's no safety net. The ad seems to strike that exact chord, and people react. It's perhaps a little dystopian that Apple still needs people to buy their devices (ya know, the offended creatives).
That said, I don't think the ad should be taken down.
Maybe it’s me that’s numb, but holy crap people are jumpy and making such a big deal, reading into an ad as if the whole of society’s problems could be decomposed from it. Shitty ad? Probably? Move on.
Seems a lot of comments here are basically saying "calm down, it's just an ad."
If these are "just" ads (meaning they aren't a big deal) then why are millions spent on them? Why are Super Bowls ads an event all their own?
Maybe read up on some early figures in effective propaganda and advertising such as Edward Bernays. Watch The Century of the Self. Put your ego aside and accept that advertising might have a significant influence on a person's perception, reasoning, and judgment...and accomplish it in subtle ways you may not be fully cognizant of. That can also lead to more vast cultural conditioning. The boiling frog...
It's not "just" an ad and thankfully some people are applying critical thought and criticism against it. Why that bothers so many here might also be telling. Why are you being triggered?
> Put your ego aside and accept that advertising might have a significant influence on a person's perception, reasoning, and judgment...and accomplish it in subtle ways you may not be fully cognizant of. That can also lead to more vast cultural conditioning.
Can you please expand a bit on what you feel should be the outcome here? To me it kind of feels like that the logical progression of your argument is that “any creative work with an influential impact is problematic”. That is a scary attitude that is used all to often to oppress more than provide freedom of thought. Music, literature, art, etc… all are used by their creators to illicit a response of some sort, and most rely on that response as a trigger to invoke a product purchase. Every creative is in the business of sales.
I want art to trigger an emotional response. That’s the point.
> "any creative work with an influential impact is problematic"
No? Any creative work with an influential impact may be subject to critical analysis. You can disagree with the conclusions, but it's hard to disagree with the act of analysis.
Never said anything to the contrary. There is lots of artwork I don’t like and I am happy to express an opinion or critique when asked. I am not morally outraged about it though.
> Why that bothers so many here might also be telling. Why are you being triggered?
Maybe because we are exhausted by this woke bullshit telling us that everything is meant to offend and we should be offended by everything. Maybe because the level of outrage at an ad seems to dwarf the outrage we (don’t) see at things that actually deserve outrage. That our little snowflake society should turn its attention to bigger, real issues rather than let its ego get offended by everything that crosses its path.
I agree with your point about outrage culture these days. But your language indicates you think it’s a political issue for the left (“woke,” “snowflake”). The fact is that both ends of the political spectrum get way too outraged over things these days (they crushed art! He didn’t wear a flag pin!).
It’s not a political issue, it’s a problem with our culture right now, probably driven in part by social media algorithms and systems (upvotes) that reward outrage.
This article is so histrionic that it's a parody of itself.
>and most disturbingly (because they suggest destructive violence against children's toys, and against the child in all of us) a ceramic Angry Birds figure and a stack of rubber emoji ball.
I can only speak for myself, but my guess is the vast majority didn't think twice about the ad. Beyond, it's mimicking a very popular trend on FB/TikTok/Instagram, of things getting crushed, that so many of us can't seem to get enough of since constantly shows in our feeds. And that it's implying all of these wonderful (physically large) tools and experiences are available on a very small portable device I can take with my anywhere. There are countless different ways they could have shown that, and imagine most all would have caused backlash by small vocal few. Is Technology (especially AI), etc destroying the arts and humanity, who knows, maybe? But I certainly don't think this video showcases that.
Whenever I see ads, I ask myself why companies would spend so much money if it barely has any effect (given that ads have essentially no impact on me).
And then there's posts like this which remind me that there is a whole group of people out there who are so deeply affected they read entire stories and write entire novels after a few seconds.
It's a solid reminder how differently worldviews are shaped.
I'm with you. I go out of my way to avoid advertising whenever possible, I'm critical of marketing and advertising, and I pride myself on my rationality, thinking that I'm relatively immune to advertising. But yeah, people like you and me are just one speck in a constellation of human emotion and ration.
Disclaimer: I have an iphone, apple watch, ipad, airpods, and personal MacBook. I use a MacBook for work as well. Judge me as you will.
I was also disappointed by this ad when I first saw it, but I wasn’t shocked. In fact I think it’s symbolic of the direction Apple took since the passing of Steve Jobs. Apple, even during its “beleaguered” mid-1990s era, was a champion of personal computing and was embraced by creative professionals. Heck, the original Macintosh and the LaserWriter helped kickstart the desktop publishing industry, especially once PageMaker and Photoshop were released. But Apple products were complementary to other creative tools, such as musical instruments and cameras. Remember the digital hub strategy Steve Jobs announced in the early 2000s?
Unfortunately, this ad, with its destruction of artists’ tools, is completely tone-deaf to the sentiments of the creative professionals who loyally used Apple products. However, I argue that Apple has largely stopped relying on this market once revenues from the iPhone and services started overtaking Mac revenues. Apple used to be a champion of personal computing, not only emphasizing ease-of-use over its competitors, but also investing in technologies that made it easier for regular users to get more out of their computers (e.g., HyperCard, AppleScript). Today Apple is a vendor of luxury-brand electronics. It’s coasting on two things: (1) the goodwill the brand built from the 1980s through the 2000s as “the computer for the rest of us,” and (2) offering a platform that is alternative to Microsoft Windows and all of its shenanigans, as well as some PC clone vendors who load their PCs with preinstalled crapware. Even with point #2, I find pro and education versions of Windows less annoying than their home counterparts, and vendors like Framework and even Microsoft don’t load their PCs with crapware.
I hold the opinion that Apple lost its soul in the 2010s when Apple became the iPhone company instead of the Mac company. This commercial would’ve never been produced under the watch of Steve Jobs (“Think different”) or even John Sculley (look up “The Power to Be Your Best.”).
Creatives, a core Apple market, are reacting negatively to this ad. As I said in another comment on the matter, Apple should have shown some kind of "Apple Beam" or something similar shrink the items down to fit into an iPad. Then a voiceover could announce all that creative power is now in your hands.
I make my money by creating software, but I'm a musician and photographer outside of the office. Even I was wondering why Apple was showing all these things being destroyed. It looked like the crushing of the human spirit - which is not what you want to be selling. Yeah, I "got it" at the end, but why start the ad with such viscerally negative destruction? Those viewers are going to associate that disgust with Apple.
That Apple ad feels more like an Advernado ad -- "We can solve any problem that you think up,
and find any purchase that you require, the... iPad... is a full solution..." crushing everything.
am i literally shaking with anger, pacing around my room, crying, cuddling my emotional support dog, because i'm so upset at this advertisement?
no.
is it a terrible, possibly even insulting ad? yeah, I think so.
pretty clearly the original concept was "the new iPad is so thin, let's make an ad that shows all types of art compressed into a small size". And somehow that got lost in translation during production to "let's destroy objects of artistic expression, and show them all obliterated, only to be replaced by our mass-market product".
if the goal was to generate controversy, it worked. but if they actually thought this ad would go over well, they're insane, and surely there is someone in the ad meeting who spoke up and said it was terrible, and they got shut down, and right now they must feel so vindicated.
To me, the message is clearly "the world we are creating is going to destroy you, you relic, you outmodded worthless luddite. You will be allowed to consume through our content square." but apparently someone with severe west coast tech brain thought these two ads were somehow conveying something positive?
...in my opinion, for good reason. I haven't seen mentioned in any of the comments the fact that Apple controls their ecosystem, and takes away our freedom to use our devices. That's the antithesis of "creativity", and I'm disgusted that this seems to be OK with HN voters.
It reminded me of the old magazine clipping of a guy holding a camcorder over his shoulder and pointing to a table full of technology. "All of this fits in your pocket now."
Same thing. Chill out. You're free to not like something and have it continue to exist despite your dislike of it.
This is such horse shit. It’s like the university classroom has taken over the world and now everyone gets upset for the sake of getting upset. There’s nothing offensive about this ad at all, and anyone claiming outrage needs to take a hard look at their own fragile egos.
You don't think creatives aren't going to get upset watching all the tools they've been using for all their lives and have a love and appreciation for, tools humanity has been using for quite some time to produce beautiful works of art and have a beautiful aesthetic of their own, being destroyed by an industrial press to only be replaced by a mass-produced iPad isn't a form of higher meaning? If so, then don't go into advertising! They're literally depicted the crushing of the human spirit, to be replaced by a machine. That's the higher meaning here.
Yeah, I "get it" - when the mess was over, I understood the message they intended to convey, but boy did Apple screw the pooch on this one!
Like I said, don't go into advertising. The most problematic aspect of this for Apple is it shows they don't understand those who heretofore were considered a core part of their user base. This is a blunder of epic proportions.
Fair enough, marketing is not my strong suit, especially to creatives. Perhaps I'm biased because I go out of my way to spend as little energy as I can on an ad when one comes up.
Really? Would you put this blunder on par with Meta’s quixotic quest into the Metaverse? Or Boeing’s ditching of its engineering culture? Or “New Coke”?
Or would you say it was an ad that a very small subset of the population was able to take out some of its woke-rage at for a news cycle and then move on?
Literally trashing the things loved by your core market that was key to getting you where you are today isn't a smart move. No matter how you try to spin it otherwise.
Is it at stupid as Elon Musk mocking those comprising Tesla's core market? Probably not. Elon Musk continues on acting like a jerk to the people comprising Tesla's core market whereas Tim Cook issued an apology for Apple's blunder.
It surprises me how upset people get about stuff these days