“Entertainment gear maker Apple has dropped its offer to allow punters to play with a Mac Mini for 30 days,” Nick Farrell writes for The Inquirer. “The marketing scheme had only been running for a few hours before Apple pulled it and now it is refusing to say why.”
“In the absence of a word of command from the Apple Press office, various Apple message boards have been speculating on the reasons. Various ideas have been touted ranging from Apple didn’t have enough of the machines to, well, you take your pick,” Farrell writes. “We are sure taht [sic] as soon as Jobs’ Mob spinsters give Apple fans a reason, any reason, they will accept it.”
Full article here.
“Apple once again shows that consumers shouldn’t trust the computer maker. Only two days after it launched a promotion offering users a free 30-day trial of the Mac Mini computer, Apple sneakily pulled the programme,” Silicon Valley Sleuth writes. “When I asked an agent with Apple’s store about the promo, he said that: ‘We haven’t been told anything other than that it has been taken off.’ He did recommend to check back in about a week, in case Apple had only temporarily suspended the programme to iron out some last minute glitches.”
“If Microsoft would have pulled a similar stunt, the world would be all over them. But this is Apple, the darling of the computer industry. The only company in high tech that gets away with screwing over its customers,” Silicon Valley Sleuth writes.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple is more than an “entertainment gear maker,” of course. The Mac mini is a personal computer, for example, that can be used for entertainment and much more. We doubt “Apple fans” will just accept “any reason” Apple gives (if they ever do). In our report, for instance, our comment dripped with sarcasm, “Too good of an idea? It would have sold Macs and created more Mac users. No wonder they pulled it so fast!”
As regular MDN readers know, we are critical of Apple’s marketing to the personal computer market and wish they would do a more effective job getting the word our about the Mac platform to the “average Joe and Jane.” We hope to see Apple revive a promotion similar to the “Mac mini test Drive” ASAP.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Apple pulls ‘Mac mini Test Drive’ promotion one day after launch – August 31, 2005
Apple launches ‘Mac mini Test Drive’ promo: try it for 30 days – full refund if you don’t love it – August 30, 2005
I could market Macintosh better than Apple Marketing in my sleep – April 19, 2003