Remembering the '1984' Super Bowl Mac ad
The fact that the Los Angeles Raiders humiliated the Washington Redskins in a 38-to-9 victory is a mere afterthought. Super Bowl XVIII's lasting legacy has been a single advertisement sandwiched somewhere in the third quarter: Apple Computer's iconic "1984" commercial.
It began, in a clear nod to George Orwell's novel of the same name, with tense strains of music, the image of figures marching through a tube across a dank industrial complex, and the start of a bizarre monologue: "Today we celebrate the first glorious anniversary of the Information Purification Directives."
Directed by Ridley Scott not long after Blade Runner, "1984" aired on January 22, 1984, and its narrative is now geek canon. Scores of blank-faced people are fixated on a broadcast of a Big Brother figure on a giant television screen, until a woman in bright athletic apparel sprints down a center aisle, wielding a hammer. She hurls it at the screen, which explodes into a bright white light. The expressions on the faces in the crowd morph into fascination.
The science fiction-like display of iconoclasm versus conformity is then explained in a message that appears onscreen: "On January 24, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you'll see why 1984 won't be like 1984."
In the entertainment industry, it was the dawn of the cinematic Super Bowl ad. For historians, it was a notable moment in Soviet-tinged pop culture. But in the tech world, this was the birth of Apple as we know it--25 years ago this week.
"That was certainly Apple's big debut," said Douglas Raybeck, a professor emeritus in Hamilton College's anthropology department who has written about the Cold War's role in pop culture and admits to being a decades-long Apple fan. "They were around before that. People knew of them. They had had some very clever little ads, but they must have bet the house on that one."
Indeed, they did; and in fact, it's become common knowledge that Apple's board of directors came close to canceling the TV spot altogether. Produced by agency Chiat/Day (which, in its current incarnation as part of TBWA, still creates Apple's ads) with a budget of $900,000, it was also one of the most expensive advertisements in television's history.
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At the time, Apple was a long shot in the nascent PC market share wars and was far eclipsed by IBM in its "Big Blue" heyday: the company was taking a staggering gamble with a highbrow, allegory-infused ad that didn't even display the product onscreen.
"(Apple was) very oblique in the presentation of (its) product," Raybeck commented. "There was no computer shown. None of the marvelous graphics the Mac was capable of were in evidence, and what (was) displayed was very dark. The lighting was dark. The images were dark. And, of course, that was part of what they wanted to get across--that this dark, conforming, restricting environment can be broken through."
"It was a major statement at the time, and it's rare that you make a major statement like that and actually deliver on it in a way that we're still talking about 25 years later," said Ian Schafer, CEO of interactive-ad firm Deep Focus, who says he recalls seeing the Super Bowl airing of the ad as a 9-year-old. "You make a bold statement about a revolution that you are going to start, and it's one that has resulted in the market share that they now have."
Apple didn't keep pushing the "1984" message. Although it went on to win an impressive handful of advertising awards, the commercial was never broadcast again. Nor did it usher in a true explosion of all things Mac. In 1985, founder Steve Jobs left the company after a power struggle with then-CEO John Sculley, kicking off a decade-long absence.
But "1984" was not forgotten: Its production served as the opening scene of The Pirates of Silicon Valley, the 1999 TV movie about Jobs' early years at Apple and his rivalry with Microsoft founder Bill Gates. And in 2007, the 24-year-old commercial was spoofed in a Web-based attack ad against Sen. Hillary Clinton, then vying for the Democratic presidential nomination.
"It's been 25 years, and I still remember the images," Raybeck said. "So it was, in that sense, very compelling, and I remember them not because I thought at the time, 'Oh, what a brilliant ad.' I later came to believe, 'Oh, what a brilliant ad,' because it sticks with you."
Not to mention the fact that Apple's underlying marketing message has remained arrow-straight over the past two and a half decades.
"In a few years, we may be talking about the 25th anniversary of the Think Different campaign," Ian Schafer said of the Apple ad slogan that first debuted in 1997, shortly after Jobs' return to the company, which placed Apple's logo in photographs of the likes of Alfred Hitchcock and John Lennon.
"That was another way of Apple talking about change, about intellect. You could make an argument that using Gandhi or John Lennon in an advertisement is almost blasphemous because these guys were bigger than whatever advertising claim you were about to make. These guys meant more to the world than your brand could ever be. But again, they were able to pull it off."
The legacy of "1984" remains present, too, in the current string of Mac ads, the witty Get a Mac series, which pit actor Justin Long as a cool-guy "Mac" in jeans and a hoodie against the incarnation of a "PC."
Played by comedian John Hodgman in hideously outdated business-formal attire, the doltishly unflappable thought process of the "PC" evokes a more twee strain of the conformity highlighted in "1984." It's Apple's same message, adapted for an age in which political commentary takes the form of The Colbert Report rather than Brazil.
"It's probably the most explicit statement of, basically, a cultural revolution," Douglas Raybeck said. "This is what they're saying--that this is new and really different and revolutionary."
But as "1984" turns 25, its images of conformity and totalitarianism have grown increasingly sprinkled with irony. It's the irony of the launches of both the iPhone and its iPhone 3G successor, reflected in the faces of the Apple "fanboys" willing to wait in line on the sidewalk for the better part of a week in the midst of a stifling New York summer and then--wait for it--descend into the underground Fifth Avenue store in formation as uniformed Apple retail employees guided them through a gauntlet. As critics of the "Apple cult" have pointed out, they seem to be willing to believe their fearless leader's every word.
The irony of "1984" is there, too, in the conflicting reports over Steve Jobs' health that put the spotlight on Apple's tight-lipped corporate culture and shadowy PR-speak, making Cupertino seem much less like the lone runner and more like the image of Big Brother onscreen. And it was there when journalist Dan Lyons anonymously satirized Apple in his "Fake Steve Jobs" blog, as though the CEO were a corrupt monarch worthy of a Jonathan Swift-like tongue-lashing.
Over the years, Apple's market share has indeed grown, and it has come to be a force in the music and entertainment industries with iTunes and the iPod, not to mention the telecommunications business with the iPhone. Like a populist revolution that becomes a little too successful, its trademark gutsiness and cult following start to look less like a scrappy innovator and more like, well, a sprawling conglomerate bent on global domination.
But even that might not matter. Marketing, even marketing of "1984"-caliber brilliance, has to be bolstered by a worthy product, Ian Schafer said.
"I think that people are willing to look past that," he said of the occasional Apple-Big Brother parallels. "At the end of the day, keep making a great product, keep delivering on your promise, and I will continue to be a loyal consumer. That's the value exchange that happens between a brand and a consumer...(They've) built up enough equity in the consumer's emotional bank account, which Apple can afford to make withdrawals from every so often."
Caroline McCarthy, a CNET News staff writer, is a downtown Manhattanite happily addicted to social-media tools and restaurant blogs. Her pre-CNET resume includes interning at an IT security firm and brewing cappuccinos. E-mail Caroline. 
[i]The aim of the High is to remain where they are. The aim of the Middle is to change places with the High...For long periods the High seem to be securely in power, but sooner or later there always comes a moment when they lose either their belief in themselves or their capacity to govern efficiently, or both. They are then overthrown by the Middle, who enlist the Low on their side by pretending to them that they are fighting for liberty and justice. As soon as they have reached their objective, the Middle thrust the Low back into their old position of servitude, and themselves become the High. Presently a new Middle group splits off from one of the other groups, or from both of them, and the struggle begins over again.[/i]
And thus Apple (middle) traded places with IBM (high), pushing the consumer back in his lowly place. It's the natural order of things.
I laughed when I watched that commercial because the brainwashed "zombies" looked exactly like all the Mac fanboys I know. All walking in line, wearing the same clothes, carrying the same products, they probably even all have the same playlists on their iPods.
I just came here to see the ad because I had never seen it before and the irony made me laugh enough to want to comment.
And why do you think I don't use Apple products? I'm just not a fanboy who thinks Steve Jobs is the reincarnation of Jesus Christ and every product he releases is a gift from God.
"davecandialex is right. Apple is all about conformity. All their products look exactly the same, they don't want any of their customers to be individuals.
You really need to get out more. What you seem to fail to realize is that sheep are OS agnostic. The same people you accuse of blindly following Steve Jobs would be blindly following MS if they were using Windows.
The point of the ad was to say that people who buy Macs aren't sheep. I've been commenting on how ironic and backwards that message is.
Also, I'm sure some exist, but I've never met a person as devoted to Microsoft products as most of the people I know who love Apple products.
I just use whatever is available and will get the job done.
@ setgo: And I'm curious as to why you fanboys blog and post so much about Microsoft? Why do you care? There is also one clown that complains just because some people don't like to live with walls. Thank you for priving us from your content-less comments on PC/Windows articles, but please don't try to prive other people from their right to show their opinion, even if it hurts you and people like you because it states the truth that you and people like you don't have the guts to admit or even see or realize. And please don't be so ignorant and naive as to assume that everyone is as close/short-minded as you and most Apple users show to be: I myself have an iPod and use iTunes and love both. And I'm sure they don't need my hand, nor do I want to put words on their mouths, but, from what I can understand from their comments, davecandialex's and Grifter02's story is basically the same as many other people that think with their own brain: they don't like to live with walls, and they realize the irony in this 1984 Mac ad.
@ protagonistic: "You really need to get out more. What you seem to fail to realize is that sheep are OS agnostic. The same people you accuse of blindly following Steve Jobs would be blindly following MS if they were using Windows."
I'm afraid the only one here who needs to get out more is you. What you seem to fail to realize is that just because someone uses a certain product, it doesn't mean they are a sheep of the company who produces that product. I (and many other Windows users, dare I say the vast majority of them) use Windows and I'm definitely not blindly following MS, or I would be using Live Search, a Microsoft mouse, Virtual Earth, a Windows Mobile phone, WMP (as music jukebox), Zune, etc. as opposed to Google Search, a Logitech mouse, Google Earth, a Samsung, iTunes (as music jukebox), iPod, etc. - I defy you to find a single Apple user who uses anything from Microsoft by own choice.
25 years later the Super Bowl again is in Tampa , FL, I use a mac everyday . work and my iphone.
I hope to see an iconic ad from apple again .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_clY2-Y_eFg&feature=related
What's annoying was that the ad was about editing photos or something stupid like that which can easily be done on any PC with free software.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_II
The ad may have drawn interest, but it didn't prevent Apple's decline.
@setgo: ageism? Oh grow up!
Moron alert! Moron alert! The Apple II is a friggin' 8-bit computer! The Macintosh, which started off as a 16-bit system from day 1, was never meant to replace the Apple II line. Actually, I was around at the time of the Mac's revealing, and the Macintosh 128K was supposed to compete with the IBM PC Jr, while the Apple Lisa competed with the IBM PC/PC XT. So, you can't say that the Apple II market share shrunk. As of today, the Apple II has at least a 90-percent market share of the 8/16-bit market, followed by The Commodore 64 and Atari 800. To say that Apple as a company is losing market share.... idiot thinking on all levels!
Yet the original Mac was truly different. Lots of people bought one - later, along with a laser printer - instead of a new car - the two together cost about that much at the time. User groups distributed the next operating system *free* of charge face-to-face, on disks handed from one volunteer to another. Hypercard - also free - encouraged legions of users to inch their way from software consumers to software producers. Without an Internet, before household ftp, Mac users shared wildly over BBS systems, taught each other how to use the "secret" features of the Mac that were actually necessary to keep it running, despite Apple's marketing claims of simplicity and easy of use.
The world's only wide-spread graphical interface was an incredible high, one we paid hugely for, one that also encouraged our elitism, believing we were the "real people" and not the geeks who used those plain-Jane DOS computers.
The real differences between OS X and DOS/Windows have shrunk year by year, starting with Apple licensing its windowing paradigm to Microsoft, and are minuscule compared to what they were back then - very similar hardware, configuration, interface. At one time all graphical apps - all the Adobe stuff - was *only* available on the Mac - that's where all the computer artists hung out back *then*. Today the most popular apps are completely cross-platform; Mac users are even running Windows on their own computers.
If you haven't noticed, Apple is now iPods and iPhones (buy 'em at WalMart). Nothing new has come out on Apple since OS X - and even that is actually NextStep, developed by Jobs' other company in the late 1980's.
My question is, was Apple just at the right place and right time to be the incubator of the graphical interface? why else have they come up with nothing else that is nearly as significantly differentiated since?
And - what will replace the current Mac/Windows/Linux graphical interface, if it has, as it seems to have done, gone about two decades past its peak of innovation?
In any case, that ad was a classic. But I'm not sure if it was introducing a new computer or sports bras.
'No...I do not like it...change it...it is not like macintosh!" Bill Gates...expounding about the developement of windows 95. Tell me again how Apple was not the incubus for the GUI. Get real!
Andy Hertzfeld (one of the original Mac team) talks about it at his site as well:
http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=1984.txt
Apple is objectively one of the leading PC manufacturers in the US and the world. They absolutely dominate the market for music (online, offline, whatever). They are changing the market, for good or ill, for telecommunications.
Fan-"bois" don't dominate comments about Google, Wal-Mart, or RIM, or Amazon. What is it about Apple that pisses people off so much?
Yes, this is a hugely successful American company that is defying Great Depression 2 while other US companies like Intel and uSoft and Dow Jones lay off thousands. Why does that make fan-bois feel so insecure?
I just don't get it ....
Apple is objectively an trailing PC manufacturer in the US and the world (as the number show: 1st - HP, 2nd Dell, 3rd Acer, etc.). They absolutely dominate the market for MP3 players (online, offline, central, edge, white, black, big, small, left, right, up, down, boy, you name it). They are barely changing the market, if anything for ill (security), for telecommunications (as, again, the number show: few more than 1 % market share).
Fanboys don't dominate comments about Google, Wal-Mart, or RIM, or Amazon, no, because their users are generally enough intelligent to think with their own brains and enough open-minded to use products from several different companies. What is it about Microsoft that pisses Apple users so much too?
No, this is not a hugely successful American company that is defying Great Depression 2 while other US companies like Intel and uSoft and Dow Jones lay off thousands; it is a reasonably-successful American company (only dominates 1 of several markets they are in [MP3 players] and has around 80 % less market share than the world market leader Microsoft on the most important market they are in [computers/OS's]) that is so insignificant that it is barely showing any effects of this so-called "Great Depression 2" (for now). Why does that make fanboys feel so insecure?
I just don't get it either...
Now that's what I call success. xD
Source: http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8 (careful: viewer discretion is advised; content might be unsuitable to Mac users).
When you are not at the top you have to look up and innovate in order to rise.
Since when has a company risen to the top and kept looking up? Perhaps Google?
- by chambcm January 26, 2009 4:42 AM PST
- Every year at this time (Super Bowl time), someone trots out and re-hashes this same old lame story. Give it a rest already. PLEASE.
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