Writing to Comment: The Shiny Apple

By Matt |

Sunday, December 6, 2009

C.P. Snow once said, “Technology… is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other.” When one pictures a computer, the typical image contains a loud, ugly, beige box which causes all types of frustrations and headaches. Due to this negativity, many people great dislike interacting with computers, often referring to them as necessary evils. Technology doesn’t have to be loud and ugly or used with fear; they ads from Apple successfully reel in and illustrate to the viewer that technology can be beautiful and fun. Most importantly Apple’s ads illustrate that while they may “Think Different” but they make products that “Just work.”

Since their creation in the late ‘70’s, Apple has strived to make their products simple in all aspects of the word. Apple has chosen to mirror the simplicity of their products in the simplicity of their ads. Take, for example, an ad Apple ran for the first generation iPhone. The first thing to grab one’s attention is the completely black background. This contrasts and highlights the iPhone and hand that appears to emerge from the darkness. While most cell phone ads try to use as many colors as possible listing feature after feature, Apple’s stance is effective in portraying that this phone is not like anything anyone has ever seen before. With a complete touch screen interface the iPhone changed the definition of a cell phone, making it more than just a device to talk to another person. Apple summarizes this revolution with the simple phrase, “Touching is believing.” This statement fulfills the inner human desire of wanting to feel everything, like a kid in a toy store running through the aisles grabbing everything within reach.

While Apple wants their products to be fulfill those inner human desires, they have a deep commitment to designing products that are remarkably functional and easy to use. Apple’s iMac is the flagship that demonstrates precisely this belief. In the ad, the first words one sees is the bold, “You can’t be too thin. Or too powerful.” Those two short sentences get right to the point; drawing the customer in by effectively saying, this computer is sexy, it doesn’t create wasted space, and it’s a workhorse for whatever you can throw at it. In the not-too-distant past, it was difficult to show a newborn daughter to her grandparents who lived across the country. In this ad, Apple tells the potential customer, “Super simple to share and enjoy [your media] like never before.” With this computer, Apple makes it effortless to upload pictures to the internet and send Grandma an e-mail containing the web address. In addition, due to the camera built into every Apple product, Grandma can see live video of her newborn granddaughter without the cost and mental anguish of air travel.

Ads such as these show a significant transformation in Apple. When they were Apple Computers a magazine ad was full of text, explaining a situation in which a Macintosh came through in unbelievable odds (a house fire for example). The modern day ads do more than just tell the reader the reasons to buy a Mac, they show the reader what owning a Mac can do or how easily it will fit into one’s life. Apple strives to break the mold with their products and their ads show that they live their motto: Think Different.