{"id":48206,"date":"2025-06-24T15:54:07","date_gmt":"2025-06-24T19:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=48206"},"modified":"2025-06-24T23:07:46","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T03:07:46","slug":"apple-pulls-convince-your-parents-to-get-you-a-mac-ad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/24\/apple-pulls-convince-your-parents-to-get-you-a-mac-ad\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple Pulls “Convince Your Parents to Get You a Mac” Ad"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joe Rossignol<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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Apple today shared The Parent Presentation, which explains why a Mac is a useful tool in college. The customizable 81-slide presentation is available in PowerPoint, Keynote, and Google Slides formats. After downloading the template on this page<\/a>, you can fill in your name and some other key details, and make other edits to your liking.<\/p>\n

The presentation mostly contains tongue-in-cheek comments, but it also outlines a few real benefits of Macs, such as the MacBook Air's portability.<\/p>\n

In an accompanying YouTube video shared by Apple, comedian Martin Herlihy shows a group of high school students how to effectively use The Parent Presentation.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Joe Rossignol<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Apple has marked as private its day-old The Parent Presentation video<\/a> on YouTube, meaning that it is no longer available to watch.<\/p>

Apple has also moved The Parent Presentation to the bottom of its College Students page<\/a>, effectively burying it. When we reported on the marketing campaign yesterday, the presentation was prominently featured at the top of the page. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

John Gruber<\/a>:<\/p>\n

I wouldn’t describe it as “cringe”, but I also wouldn’t describe it as “funny”.<\/p>

[…]<\/p>

It’s also not the least bit offensive, so it really is unclear why Apple pulled it.<\/p>

[…]<\/p>

One obvious problem with “The Parent Presentation” video is that the gist is that everyone<\/em> involved is stupid: high school kids (the ostensible target audience?) are too stupid to know how to ask their parents for a MacBook for college, parents are too stupid to know they should buy their kids a good laptop, and even Herlihy’s lecturer is a doofus who himself doesn’t know how to deliver a presentation. I don’t know how this got past the concept stage.<\/p>

To top things off, the downloadable slide presentation<\/a> — which Apple still has available in Keynote, PowerPoint, and Google Slides formats — is entirely typeset in Arial. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

julesme<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Here’s why the ad doesn’t work: It features a shady salesman. The implication is that you have to be shady to convince someone to buy a Mac (which makes no sense given that Apple arguably makes the best laptops, with the highest quality hardware and OS). The tone of the ad is off base relative to the real-world value proposition of a Mac.<\/p>

The “presentation” is reminiscent of other shady sales pitches, like selling timeshares or any disreputable door-to-door business of the past (expensive vacuums, magazine subscriptions, etc).<\/p>

I understand it’s trying to be funny (and I also found the comedian to be funny), but the tone and connotation of the ad don’t align with Apple’s brand. Don Draper would not have greenlit this.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

It seems to come from the same place as the ad about forgetting the husband’s birthday.<\/p>\n\n

Previously:<\/p>\n