Apple has debuted a new television on U.S. broadcast and cable networks called, “If You Asked.”
If you ask a parent, they might call it intuitive. If you asked a musician, they might call it inspiring. To a doctor, it’s groundbreaking.
To a CEO, it’s powerful. To a teacher, it’s the future. If you ask a child, she might call it “magic.”
And, if you ask us, we’d say it’s just getting started. (graphic, black on white: iPad 2)
MacDailyNews Take: These are unique, defining, aspirational spots; Apple should continue to explore this style as the campaign continues.
See the first ad in what looks to be a very strong campaign, “We Believe,” here.
Related articles:
Apple debuts new iPad 2 ad; reminds the world what ‘We Believe’ (with video) – April 3, 2011
great ad.
Love the kid at the end ….. Takes hands off of eyes, surprise …..
Love it, love it, love it ……
One of Apple’s BEST …..
great commercial
now that’s excellent
Apple commercials are always spot on, clean and simple, but have huge impact… Much respect Apple.
I ama always amazed with what Apple can do with a 30 second ad that the competition utterly fails to do with their 60 second spots.
Loved it! Not a single mention of gigahertz this or megapixel that. It shows you distinct ways in which the device can be used while stirring up an emotional reaction that makes you want the device. Brilliant.
“We’re just getting started.” … interesting.
Yes. Competitors take note.
“It’s just getting started.” … sheesh
But… but… where are the robots? The spaceships? The cool sound effects??? I don’t want to see what it actually can do!!! I want to see a cool sci-fi space ship and a brief glimpse of the tablet playing a movie!!!!
LOLZ. Those commercials for the Droids always elicit eye rolling from me.
Not to mention all of that neat stuff is “simulated” in the small print.
Interestingly, Apple usually puts a “sequences shortened” to make it fit into a short spot, but this time there’s no shortening. According to Apple, everything in this ad is real.
I don’t like it, I find it somewhat boring and dark. The old ones were fun. It looks like the new Mac ads, the ones that show how nice it looks, not what it can do. Those make me want to cringe.
I do like that they are showing industries that can, and do, use the iPad. A lot of tech writers don’t see value in it because they won’t look outside their job needs. iPad is very useful for business; I wish they would show less kid books.
I’m sure it has something to do with my being an old fart, but I like this commercial also because it doesn’t have shouting, or “regular” people singing. That’s become the de facto standard for many commercials, and it makes me crazy(er).
My father complains about the singing and dancing all the time. I completely agree, it seems to be the “hot” thing in advertising right now.
Inspiring advert.
Brilliant! It’s the underlying, unspoken “Go for your dreams” message and beautiful images that make the whole thing work. There it is presented as more than a product. It’s a way to make your life better and that concept compels people to buy.
Conan the Grammarian, wake up!!! Decent commercial, but two grammar errors right off:
“If you ask a parent (singular) they (plural) might say…” and “If you ask a musician (singular), they (plural) might say…”
It’s a ridiculously common mistake, occurring here no doubt because Apple did not want to say “he” (or the more politically correct “he or she”) instead of “they”. Too bad, though.
This is one of the most irritating trends I’ve seen in English language recently — replacing he/she with ‘they’ in singular form. The other one is the spelling of the possessive form of proper names ending in ‘s’ (like “Steve Jobs’ new house” or “Thomas’ English Muffins”). You’ll never see Economist, or New York Times spell it like that (hint: it is not a plural noun to ad an apostrophe at the end; it is a PROPER name, so possessive is Jobs’s house; Thomas’s muffins, etc. Pronounce it properly and you’ll hear two ‘s’ sound, not just one).
Sure enough, I was bound to have a few misspelt myself when I started preaching about improper spelling…
Ranks right up there with misuse of it’s. (And that damned autocorrect that is forever inserting the apostrophe.) Here’s what I tell folks: If you don’t know how to use both forms, NEVER use “it’s”. You will at least be correct more often. Of course, that is rather pathetic. As for misspellings, I once wrote an article about misspelled street names in my city. Must have gone over that thing 30 times to make sure it was correct.
I pray to god that Snookie from Jersey Shores
doesn’t read your comment. It would cause her
mental anguish. 🙂
The “singular” they is the use of this pronoun, where they is used as a gender-neutral singular rather than plural pronoun. – Wikipedia
The other option for third person singular would have been “it”. Try not to be so useless in the future.
You quoted Wikipedia, but failed to quote the sentence that follows:
“The correctness of this usage is disputed”
Both are followed with the discussion on the subject, which implies that ‘they’ as singular is slowly and, alas, irreversibly penetrating standard modern English, although it is still not quite there yet.
I’m quite OK with “they” being a singular, gender-neutral subject pronoun. But if it is singular, then it should take singular verb forms. This wouldn’t change the Apple ad, since “would” is the same whether singular or plural. But in the sentence “if someone doesn’t know their grammar, they’re an idiot” it needs to be “if someone doesn’t know their grammar, they IS an idiot.” That would be the consistent way to use “they” in the singular, and if it were done that way, I’d have no problem with it. But done the other way (a “singular” pronoun that takes plural verbs) is inconsistent, lazy and confusing. If you want to invent new usage / meanings of words, go for it, but take a goddamn stand, don’t just throw other rules out with the bathwater because you’re too chicken to face the consequences of your invention.
Ah, but why include any evidence to weaken your assertion? And to think that just a few days ago I took to task a poster who accused MDN of improperly using “massive ” to describe the square footage of a new Apple store, as opposed
to its literal mass. Sounds like we can all also agree that lite and
tonite shall replace antiquated spelling forms, and efficient constructions such as LOL and STFU should be elevated from the text-messaging of the semi-retarded to their rightful places in
scholarly works. By golly, the thinking different has begun. Come to think of it, “is begun” has a nicer ring to it. Just ask them musicians.
HAHAH! Well done, Sir.
They in this case, is a plural pronoun.
‘They’ refers to all holders of the title ‘parent’, and is grammatically correct.
Maybe in Milan. “If you ask a musician, they…” No way.
English, unlike Latin, for instance, is a living language. They, in this context, is quite permissible today. When you were in grade school, in this context, they was the wrong pronoun to use.
Grow with the language.
Thryll, you woke me up and I respectfully disagree. The English language lacks a third person singular pronoun. This is the way real people, even highly educated people, speak. 🙂
But don’t get me started about “I” as an object! Now that is a cringe-inducing problem with a perfectly correct and natural sounding solution.
“Think Different” is also, technically, incorrect.
Note to Thryll: please try to think different.
The ‘Think different’ campaign would have been correct (more correct) if it were written “Think: different” (as in “Think: green” or “Think: peaceful” when showing someone a garbage landfill and trying to describe how it will look once they build a golf course on top of it). Obviously, advertisers didn’t like the way that colon looked in the sentence, so they just dropped it for a cleaner visual appearance (damn the grammar).
Brilliant is right! Peter Coyote as narrator is a great choice.
His voice is too old.
An ad that effectively reaches out emotionally without the drama. I am touched by what apple has created.
A very creative and powerful ad indeed.
“And, if you ask us, we’d say it’s just getting started.” I might say it is a veiled caveat to the so called competitors.
Wouldn’t work in the UK – far too schmaltzy. Reminds me of those nauseating ads for Werther’s Originals.
Steve must be losing it in his advancing years.
Apple will target the UK market with something schmaltz-free, like the Royal Wedding.
Touche.
Did anyone catch the tablet on NCIS-LA last night? Couldn’t identify what brand, but jeez it was clunky looking. About 2 inches thick, looked heavy. I was afraid the character “Nell” was going to drop it and trip. Wonder how much product placement money was spent on that?
Best commercial from Apple since the Think Different campaign.
If you ask me this a brilliant Ad. The brilliance of this Ad is the fact that it attack the competition with ever mentioning them. If you ask Apple competition they should be scared.
Dear English experts, thanks for showing me what it’s like to be an anal retentive, socially retarded, douche-bag…
Your write, 3monkies. Know won kneads two rite descent draughts too bee excepted. Eye no watt ewe meen.
…now you’re just being silly.
This commercial blows the xoom and playbook commercials out of the water. VERY FAR out of the water.
The xoom commercial is infantile – what with its lousy CG of a male model in a pretend space pod in front of a roller coaster.
And now the playbook ad showing gestures that first appeared on the iPhone, and the Chrissie Hynde “I’m Special” song.
In both ads you can tell the the companies are desperate to make you understand how “cool” and “special” their derivative pieces of crap really are.
Peter Coyote is the BEST!