The Postal Service is supposedly unhappy with Apple and the directing duo that created both the group’s music video for their song “Such Great Heights” and Apple’s new Intel televison advertisement:
It has recently come to our attention that Apple Computers’ new television commercial for the Intel chip features a shot-for-shot recreation of our video for ‘Such Great Heights’ made by the same filmmakers responsible for the original. We did not approve this commercialization and are extremely disappointed with both parties that this was executed without our consultation or consent. -Ben Gibbard, The Postal Service
http://www.postalservicemusic.net/
[Apple’s new Intel ad looks similar to The Postal Service’s music video because both were both made by the directing duo of Josh Melnick and Xander Charity, whose working name is Josh & Xander. See related article linked below.]
Yeah, right, Gibbard is “extremely disappointed” while he’s loving life drowning in free publicity. The fact is, Apple’s Intel ad is by far the best thing that ever happened to The Postal Service. More people have heard of The Postal Service and at least one of their songs since this story broke a few days ago than all the people that ever heard them – or heard of them – before the debut of Apple’s Intel ad.
The “extremely disappointed” comment by Gibbard is most probably a smart ploy designed to generate another spate of articles, including this one, and a few more days of free publicity for The Postal Service. The usual next step is for somebody’s lawyer to send out a press release stating that their client is “considering a lawsuit” against somebody else over this “controversy.” That “story” will run in all of the usual places and likely here, too. Nothing will ever go to court and then the whole thing will die out, but by then many more people will know “The Postal Service” for making music and videos instead of mistaking them for letter carriers. Mission accomplished.
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Related articles:
Apple offers The Postal Service’s ‘Such Great Heights’ music video via iTunes Music Store – January 19, 2006
Meet the directing duo behind both Apple’s ‘Intel’ ad and The Postal Service’s music video – January 17, 2006
Apple’s ‘Intel’ ad strikingly similar to ‘Such Great Heights’ music video – January 17, 2006
It’s amazing how many people are getting free publicity from Apple now a days.
1. Who knew of or cared about lugz shoes until the hoopla over the Apple ad and the Lugz ad in October.
http://www.lugz.com/timeline/index.html
2. This band Postal service probably never saw so much attention since this latest controversy. They should be paying Apple for the publicity.
3. Can;t forget the threats of Creative labs. They keep themselves in the news with patent lawsuit threats and going as far as copying the ipod vid design.
I’m sure their is more….
genocidal dictators and millions of folks w/ aids, malaria, cholera, and not enough clean water and . . . gates and jobs are both billionaires . . . maybe TPS will write a song about all this non controversy one day . . . who cares
. . . when the smart aliens finally arrive on this pretty planet they might wonder how it came to be dominated by a species that spends so much of its collective extistence with its head up its fundament hole
have a nice day!
dont agree, it is very similar, and i find it hard to beleive that apple didnt know about their work before hiring them for the job???
a few of the mechanical shots are very very similar.
it is however the directors who should have spoken up. however apple may have hired them for the piece specifically because of that music vid. and given them money that they couldnt refuse.
arghhh dont really care.
like Postal Service
like Apple
like commercial
like video
Gibbard should blame the director and ad agency more than Apple. Unless Apple produced the video, I believe it’s not their responsibility to determine whether there is artistic overlap of their ads with previous work.
Are these guys on crack? So becuase their music video is based around a chip fab, can no one else use a chip fab in any sort of video? Come on people things are getting just a bit out of hand with people claiming infringement. I guess because I shot a home video that included shots of the White House and Washington Monument, that if anyone else ever includes those in any from of video then I can cry foul as well. Let’s look at the whole not just individual frames. These two works are quite different. Another example would be Ford makes a care that uses a Champion plug say model CH12345, and GoodYear Eagle XYZ tires. Later Chevy makes a new car that uses the same plug and tire. Can Ford Claim that Chevy has copied their work? Non issue, case closed, Postal Service shut up and try finding publicity with your music.
NEWSFLASH:
MDN, every time Apple fucks someone, you say it’s the best publicity they ever got.
Unlike this halfassed site, not everyone seeks publicity (in your case read: hits) and not everyone is happy to be ripped off as long as they get more famous in the process.
You have no integrity. And as evidenced by your unending Pixar news, this is not a site about MAcs anymore, it’s a Steve Jobs jerkoff. No more, no less.
>Cpt. Obvious wrote: MDN…You have no integrity.
This doesn’t get said enough.
>Cpt. Obvious wrote: MDN…You have no integrity.
This doesn’t get said enough.
>Cpt. Obvious wrote: MDN…You have no integrity.
This doesn’t get said enough.
>Cpt. Obvious wrote: MDN…You have no integrity.
This doesn’t get said enough.
Sogni X,….
one word…. cache..
Who cares? I have never heard of Postal Service until these articles about that obscure band started popping up. Two to three weeks from now, they will be an afterthought like the Sony Connect music store.
comparing the “borrowing” of film footage for a 30 second commercial, to flipping around a band’s name and starting your own similiar band, doesn’t wash… yes that would be a rip, and ‘wrong’.
MW-issue, I can think of many issues worth this much attention… i.e., creeping Fascism in America.
JadisOne,
To illustrate the flaw in your reasoning:
“Who cares? I have never heard of Mac OS X until these articles about that obscure operating system started popping up, complaining that Windows Vista had ripped it off.”
BECAUSE you have never heard of this band, BECAUSE they could be just starting is the VERY reason you should be against a GIANT corporation from steamrolling and taking advantage of them.
Remember Think Different? The little guy beating the Big Corporate borg.
Most of you people here would be up in arms about how MS ripped someone off. Or how HP is stupid because the “invent” in their logo is a lie because the don’t invent they copy or co-brand. But if Apple does it it’s fantastic publicity?
Do you people ever STFU long enough to hear what you just said before? You guys are probably the same guys who think Napster, Creative and everyone else should give up and go out of business because Apple owns the mp3 market with an 83% share. That remaining measly 20% market share that they are fighting over is inconsequential. And out of the other side of your mouth Apple’s 3% market share in the OS front is really significant and they should fight on to bring down the other 95%. Otherwise you seem to be saying that M$ owns the OS biz so Apple should shut down OSX development and only work on iTunes and the iPod.
I think that most of those presenting a counter argument here are not against Apple, I’m not, but rather against you and your stupidity.
MDN get off the air!
(Apologies to Jello)
What’s weird about all of this is that Apple is very good at doing their homework. It’s really ODD and I mean ODD that Jobs is unaware of other ADS and is willing to copy them in such a way .
Both videos are the same. Are you people blind??
Who fu*king cares!. I’m still buying a MacBook pro.
This was the dullest thread on MDN for a long time.
Postal who????
I love this “who” bullshit some of you clowns come out with. I guess if it doesn’t get heavy rotation on TRL, it’s fair game for Apple to trample.
“Who?”
Good thing you asshats don’t work for the companies that continued to create software for Apple and the Mac OS when they were at rock bottom.
genocidal dictators and millions of folks w/ aids, malaria, cholera, and not enough clean water and . . . gates and jobs are both billionaires . . . maybe TPS will write a song about all this non controversy one day . . . who cares
. . . when the smart aliens finally arrive on this pretty planet they might wonder how it came to be dominated by a species that spends so much of its collective extistence with its head up its fundament hole
have a nice day!
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