Steve Jobs has left the building. He is no longer Mr. Apple. While this day had to eventually come, it doesn’t make it any easier to take.
No other business leader has been such a visionary, and no other company is such a reflection of its inspirational leader. Jobs is Apple, Apple is Jobs, and we will see if the great company can continue going forward without him at the helm.
I suspect it will. After all, Jobs stocked the pond.
In its early days, back when IBM ruled the PC world, Apple was positioned as “the computer for the rest of us.” Us were those who could care less how the damn thing worked. Us were the technophobic crowd who merely wanted the magic without knowing how the trick was done. Us were the ones who wanted to do a task with one keystroke instead of three, and wanted to make it possible for typography to be beautiful.
That’s what Jobs and Apple gave us: easy to use computers and devices that did what needed to be done, while doing some other cool things, all while looking pretty cool.
I spend most days hunched over an Apple laptop. I listen to an iPod on foot, in the car and on the plane. I talk on an iPhone and surf the web with it, too. I rarely resist the siren call of an Apple store and lust for all the goodies within (MacBook Air, I’m stalking you). And, of course, I’ve been a fan of Apple’s advertising from the start.
Aside from those couple years when Jobs got das boot from Apple and created NeXT and turbo-boosted Pixar, the company was a reflection of the man in jeans and a black turtleneck. A man who is sick, but still generously shared his wisdom a few years back with this inspiring commencement address.
A man who was our modern day Edison with his name listed on 313 Apple patents. A man who thought differently, and asked us to think different. A true American legend, this Steve Jobs. He will be missed. Enjoy.
As the world prepares for the greatest game in the history of the world, the earth also prepares to watch the bestest commercials ever aired on planet earth.
Not to overstate the case, but this Sunday night’s Super Bowl broadcast will be the defining moment of civilization.
In preparation, here are VI little known facts about some famous Super Bowl commercials of the past.
I. The “Mean Joe Green” spot for Coca-Cola was originally written for comedian Shecky Green. In the spot, Shecky is followed by a young fan after performing in Las Vegas. The kid offers the yuckster a Coke. Shecky resists, sees that the kid is upset, takes the bottle and chugs it. As the kid walks away, Shecky tosses him his microphone as a gift. Later it was decided that the commercial should take a more ‘football slant’ and Mean Joe Green of the Pittsburgh Steelers was cast. A little known fact: Shecky and Joe are NOT related.
II. Apple’s “1984″ spot never aired. Steve Jobs merely thought about it and we all saw it.
III. McDonald’s “The Showdown” commercial using Larry Bird and Michael Jordan in a shoot-out for a Big Mac and fries showed the basketball stars making incredibly impossible shots. The shots were real, but it took 134,824 takes to get them. The basketball stars demanded the behind the scenes story never be revealed to save their fragile egos and reputations.
IV. The Tabasco Sauce exploding mosquito commercial almost never aired due to extensive protests from the SPCBSI (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Blood Sucking Insects). When vats of hot oil were dumped on protestors outside Tabasco headquarters, they agreed the commercial was O.K. to air.
V. The famous Bud Bowl spots were rigged. Bud Light always covered the spread and bookies made huge profits on the vig. When Budweiser demanded Bud Light be tested for steroids, the Bud Bowl quickly disappeared before a scandal started.
VI. Go Daddy uses sexy girls to grab attention. Seriously.
Come back to The Lint Screen on Monday, February 7 for our annual wrap-up critique of all the spots aired in the 2011 Super Bowl– and let the debating begin!
Not exactly what people had been expecting from Steve Jobs.
With the announcement by Steve Jobs of Apple’s new tablet device just minutes away, The Lint Screen has learned the gizmo will have a definite retro feel.
“The designers at Apple were getting tired of the sleek, modern look for devices,” said a Cupertino insider, “so they went for something a bit more classic. The tablet is made of stone and weighs 42 pounds.”
The device will come complete with a hammer and chisel. “From a technological standpoint, it’s pretty radical. It doesn’t even require a power source or software.”
Soon we’ll see if this rumor is true, and also the rumor that Steve Jobs will be wearing a blue knit shirt and black jeans.
This world is a funny place. It comes with serendipity as standard equipment. Take yesterday.
I find a posting that leads me to an old Apple commercial that happens to tickle me and so I write a blurb about it and post it (see below). Less than a half hour later, I check my Facebook account and a pal has listed a quote from Jack Kerouac and it sounds awfully familiar. Lo and behold, it is the skeletal structure for the Apple spot that I had just posted, yet said spot gave no credit to the original author. Tsk, tsk, finger wag to the plagiarizing cretins who would steal from the Beat Master.
So, for the benefit of Mr. K., here is his quote. Read it, click on the Apple spot and have a simultaneous sense of familiarity and deja vu, goo goo g’joob (I’m channeling Lennon): “Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify, or vilify them. But the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
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