31–40 of 44 posts
"Nobody stands around the water cooler talking about print ads." Outside ad agencies, does anybody stand around the water cooler talking about TV ads? This reads to me as if Julia Ward Howe were to explain how she turned the tide of the Civil War after First Manassas...
Seems that the biggest contributor to the Think Different concept was whoever created Nike's athlete ads. Think Different follows essentially the same style/format but instead starring athletes it stars historical figures. Really quite derivative. Jobs even mentions the Nike ads in a talk about Think Different: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vNjpgLD0Xw
There is an amazing, astounding paragraph in this article. Picture the scene. Steve Jobs looks at the pitch, and is actually, viscerally grabbed by fear. The fear that all of us experience once in a while when we realize there is a big opportunity ahead, but one that we need to jump off the cliff to grab. And he realizes the fear has grabbed him, and he pushes it away. "What am I doing?" he asks himself. "Screw it. I…
One of the elements that made the TV ad so effective (and is common today with premier brands such as Nike) - was that the actual Apple Logo only appeared for a few brief seconds at the very end of the commercial. It's a fine line between setting the mood, and not being crass - (for the opposite, see "GoDaddy") but hopefully not being so subtle nobody can figure out what the ad was for.
The first time I saw it, I was blown away by the Chipotle logo in the closing seconds.
"Nobody stands around the water cooler talking about print ads." Outside ad agencies, does anybody stand around the water cooler talking about TV ads? This reads to me as if Julia Ward Howe were to explain how she turned the tide of the Civil War after First Manassas...
"Nobody stands around the water cooler talking about print ads." Outside ad agencies, does anybody stand around the water cooler talking about TV ads? This reads to me as if Julia Ward Howe were to explain how she turned the tide of the Civil War after First Manassas...
And this was when Apple was a laughingstock at the Brass Ring job fairs (if any of you remember those). I remember no one even bothering to line up for a job for Apple.
When I read about the 'Think Different' campaign in the Isaacson book, I was surprised to find out that they had recording a version of the ad with Jobs doing the voiceover instead of Richard Dreyfus. I looked the ad up right away on YouTube, along with the Dreyfus one, and compared the two. The Jobs one was so much more powerful, but the power likely came from 1) his death and 2) everything that occurred AFTER the c…
[1] Steve Job's Voice http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQaAg3uxS24
The final Apple TV version: "Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward.…
I think the turns of rhetorical device are most notable: why would the original not start with "here's to"?! You don't just rip into a toast mid-paragraph. The pacing and repetition in the first draft had no logic behind the choices, while the final piece is pitch perfect on several levels. Editing!
I wish that the Isaacson's biography of Jobs had contained this level of detail. I just love reading about how all the different threads of the story came together to produce the Think Different commercial. I often found the biography to be brief on detail and too verbose when it came to repeating Jobs's flaws. Overall the book was inspiring but I felt it was despite, not because of, Isaacson's writing.
Given the length of this piece on just a small part of the book, I think you'd end up with encyclopedic tomes about Steve Jobs + Apple. This may not be a bad thing, but it would be a huge thing.
I am NOT a Mac.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of the elements that made the TV ad so effective (and is common today with premier brands such as Nike) - was that the actual Apple Logo only appeared for a few brief seconds at the very end of the commercial. It's a fine line between setting the mood, and not being crass - (for the opposite, see "GoDaddy") but hopefully not being so subtle nobody can figure out what the ad was for.
There is a chipotle ad playing in the movies to the tune of "back to the start" that has a similar effect. The first time I saw it, I was blown away by the Chipotle logo in the closing seconds.