“Meet Ken Segall — the man who dreamed up the name ‘iMac’ and wrote the famous Think Different campaign,” Leander Kahney reports for Cult of Mac.
“Segall is a veteran creative director who worked at Apple’s agency, TBWA\Chiat\Day, back in the day,” Kahney reports. “‘I’ve put in 14 years working with Steve Jobs on both Apple and NeXT,’ says Segall. ‘I’m the author of the Think Different campaign and the guy who came up with the whole ‘i’ thing, starting with iMac.'”
Kaheny reports, “Segall was still consulting for Apple until a couple of years ago when he started working for Dell. ‘Dell and Apple: It’s night and day,’ Segall says. ‘It’s a transactional world Dell lives in. It’s all about numbers. Everything they say about Apple making products for themselves is true. Apple — it’s about changing the world. For everyone else, it’s about the money.'”
Kahney reports, “In this exclusive interview, Segall talks about working with Steve Jobs, how Jobs initially hated the word ‘iMac,’ and the importance of the Think Different campaign to Apple.”
Read the full interview here.
Actually, Apple paid Digi International, of Minneapolis, MN, $250,000 for the iMac name. I was working there when it happened.
To Jaundiced and Ken Segal
Advertising copywriters have been abusing English grammar for decades (I should know I’ve been presenting ungrammatical ads since the 1970s).
I’ve just always thought it funny that this iconic campaign (and it is one of the great campaigns) is built on a solecism (and Apple so strong and passionate about education!).
And however much you think it can be, “different” is not a noun and never will be. (Ken; “profits” is a noun, “green” is only a noun in the minds of the eco-fanatics).
To make a noun out of different you would probably have to use a word like “differentness” or differentity”!
Now that would be catchy!
As a raving iEvangelist, I’d like to hear more from Ken about his DELL experience rather than his Apple experience! So long as he doesn’t get into too much hot NDA water. OK, so maybe there’s no real need (since Dell might not even be around in 5 years anyway) but it would be good war story education for long time industry watchers. So how about it Ken? More guerilla marketing from you please, while the iron’s hot with this article of yours! Please!