[G4] Apple's New G5 Marketing Approach

[Joseph B. Gurman]

    John Erdman wrote:

>Uhhh - For those of us who weren't around to watch the Rockford
>Files..... what were the phone practices you refer to?

     Private detectives, as well as people with even worse intent, 
often use human engineering on the phone; that is, posing as someone 
they're not (an IRS agent, the police, the motor vehicle 
administration, the electric power utility, whoever) to get 
information you wouldn't give to "just anybody." Time after time, 
human engineering beats high tech when it comes to breaking into 
phone systems and corporate networks, as well as getting individuals 
to tell you things they'd never tell a stranger at the door. Worked 
for Jim Rockford every time on the show.

     But getting back to the topic, I think several posters are 
missing the point: Apple's marketing and advertising is almost never 
geared to the faithful, some of whom frequent this listserv. They 
know we'll buy some Apple product if it's cool enough. They want the 
people who see themselves as hip (iPod ads), people who've had really 
negative experiences with PC's (Switch ads), people who might 
normally be in the market for a car or other product that supposedly 
shows how big a certain part of the male anatomy they have (G5 ad), 
and so on. (If you feel belittled or shunned by such market 
segment-dedicated advertising, relax, it could be worse: at least 
you're not the target audience for dimwitted Dell ads, which I guess 
is people with IQ's at least standard deviation below the norm.)

     No company ever knows in advance what will sell really well and 
what will flop. Market research may mean we'll never see another 
Edsel, but it can't tell, either, when a single product (e.g. the 
original iMac) hits a chord with the buying public and designing 
class so well that its look and feel gets copied in many other market 
areas (translucent, colored, everything). Sorry if the Edsel is too 
ancient a reference, but I'm old enough to remember Jim Garner's best 
series: Maverick.

						Joe Gurman
-- 
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound they make as they go by."
                                                             - Douglas 
Adams, 1952 - 2001

Joseph B. Gurman, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Solar Physics
Branch, Greenbelt MD 20771 USA