Advertising Cognitive Dissonance
This to me is proof that Apple leadership is suffering from cognitive dissonance over their slide into advertising. They’re conflating cause and effect. The Apple brand stands for high-quality superior user experiences because the devices and software Apple makes traditionally deliver high-quality superior user experiences. The work Apple ships is what makes the brand what it is. But now they’re stricken with the mindset that it’s the Apple brand that makes something a high-quality superior experience.
[…]
If you refuse to admit that the ads make these services worse, you also can’t admit that there’s a reason to offer an ad-free experience. So the thinking is something like “Apple always focuses on the user experience, and never deliberately makes the user experience worse. Therefore, if an Apple service shows ads, those ads are high quality and don’t detract from the quality of the product or the experience of using it. Therefore, there’s no reason to offer users a paid ad-free tier, because there’s no reason to want to avoid Apple’s ads.”
What a brand stands for can change over time. It’s eventually determined by the products, not the mantras.
- “It just works.”
- “A thousand no’s for every yes.”
- “What happens on your iPhone, stays on your iPhone.”
- “Music runs deep in Apple’s DNA.”
- “Design is how it works.”
Manton Reece (2010):
I feel bad admitting it, because some of my friends are betting on iAd revenue to feed their family, but I’m just not on board with Apple running an advertising network. I don’t want to see ads in my apps, and I don’t want Apple to ever lose even a little of what it means to be a product-driven company.
Previously:
- App Store Personalized Recommendations and Keylogging
- Ads in Apple Maps
- Apple News Scam Ads
- More App Store Ad Spots
- Alan Dye Leaving Apple for Meta
- Apps for YouTube℠™®•!
- Giving Up on Siri and HomePod
- A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Permissions Requests
- Warren Buffett’s Paper Wizard
1 Comment RSS · Twitter · Mastodon
Yeah,I had decided over a year ago I wouldn't ever buy another Apple product. Way to make me feel even more certain about that decision, Apple.
