“It seems like you can’t turn on the television without seeing an Apple computer. Apple’s unparalleled product placement efforts have landed it on more than 1,500 TV movies and series over the years, from ‘Friends’ to ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer,'” Bob Keefe writes for Cox News Service.
“On the big screen, Apple is just as popular, showing up in hits from ‘You’ve Got Mail’ to ‘How to Lose a Guy in 10 days.’ In fact, in the summer of 1996 Apple computers had cameo roles in a trifecta of blockbusters: ‘Mission: Impossible,’ ‘Independence Day’ and ‘Ransom,'” Keefe writes.
“Mac aficionados are quick to note that in many movies and shows – such as television’s ’24’ or the big screen’s ‘Austin Powers’ – Apple is the computer of choice for the good guys, while bad guys often use Windows-based PCs,” Keefe writes. “If Hollywood likes to imitate life, why does a computer that commands only about 3 percent of the personal computer market play so well in the pictures?”
Full article here.
One reason. The majority of Windows machines are very ugly to look at.
Cameo appearance in Independence Day, I’d call saving the world best supporting act or something…
MacFinn: And let’s not forget the fact that not only could Jeff Goldblum’s Powerbook talk to Windows systems, but it was actually compatible with technology from a completely different star system. That’s what I call commitment to standards.
Dont’t Get me wrong…I LOVE Macs….but what those the fact that Macs are seen in movies and Tv shows have anything to do with market share?
the fact that it reaches out to a wider audience, DUH
Apple has a special marketing team devoted to placing macs in films/tv etc… I cannot remember the name of the dept. MacCentral(I think) did a piece on it a few years back.
Were the bad guy aliens in Independence Day using Windows computers? No wonder they caught a system crashing virus!
Because most film crews, ad agencies, designers and photographers use Macs and like to give them cameos in movies whenever possible.
Too bad we won’t be around in a thousand years when some future archeologist starts to view all this old TV and does an analysis and determines that the Mac was the dominant platform of this era (well, we know it is in many ways already, but not in the way that will be postulated by all this TV exposure)…
Besides, when all of your technical people have macs, why not put your own computer in, it saves on cost. It’s not like any of them run mac os, though…it’s some other operating system with buttons like “hack into system” or “upload secret missile plans.” Something that moves in a 3d space. Such as jurrasic park…the little girl says “this is a unix system, I know this…” and she’s navigating sometype of battletank vector graphics system.
Yes..and just like everything in the movies, the fact that everybody uses macs…is makebelieve
And have you seen the cartoon strip “Rudy Park” today (26 Jan) or last Friday?
Roger Ebert also wrote about this in the latest Macworld (http://www.macworld.com/2004/02/features/themacturns20/) saying “…any reasonable person would choose a Mac over a PC.”
Noticed lately on UK that the Apple logo on powerbooks is being covered (by postcards and other strange things).
… and the nominations for best supporting technologies are… the Apple iPod….
PCs actually get more than their share of screen time, it’s just that they don’t get as many lines.
Anytime the action goes through an office, you see hundreds of PCs. Anytime there is a computer in the background (not part of the script), it’s almost always a PC. If you counted the number of computers seen in a year, Macs would be less than 3 percent.
Macs only appear when a computer is important to the script. Having a Mac says something about the personality of the person using it. “Interesting” and “quirky” and “unconventional” are all traits you want the hero to have, so they usually use a Mac.
Don’t forget the good guys used Macs in the first season of 24, and the bad guys used PCs.
The reason is that they count every crap and crany PC they sell. Buying a 499$ PC is not the same or doesn’t have the same use a Buying an iMac.
They should compare similar machine. A PC boutht just to shut up a teenager should not count the same as an Mac bought to make a newspaper.
You cannot compage a G5 system with a Celeron system. The G5 should have more bonus that the celeron.
I looked at the Folding site during the weekend and OSX was having 5.38 index compare to 4.91 for windows. That is the number returned versus the machine used.
There are people paid huge salaries to get seen on TV and in movies. The apple employees are good at it and who knows, possibly aggressive.
oops: There are people paid huge salaries to get PRODUCTS seen on TV and in movies. The apple employees are good at it and who knows, possibly aggressive.
The protagonist (played by John Cusack) in “The Runaway Jury” stored all of his critical computer files on an iPod which he hid in the floorboards of his apartment. (He also had an iMac G3.)
Can anyone think of an earlier appearance of an iPod in a movie?
It’s also funny that in many office supply catalogs and other computer ads, we see PCs used as props, but the simulated screens are actually from the Mac OS!
I want to try the Hollywood OS where all the computers make those “electronic” noises when you open windows, scroll about, type, etc etc. They always sound so hi tech, but computers are annoying when they do that crap. I think it’s humorous. I think Longhorn is going to be similar to what you see in “Minority Report”, where you have to strap in, and constantly move folders around with your fingers, requiring a Tom Cruise-ish charisma and coordination to keep all that crap organized.
Maybe Apple should open Apple stores in every Cinemark an AMC. So instead of dancing cartoon popcorn and soda, you could have a dancing Imac during intermission.
MMMMMMMMMMMMM. Imac. Must taste creamy dreamy Imac.
They left out “Absolutely Fabulous.” Unforgivable!