Among Apple’s many anniversaries, one of the most curious is the one we are experiencing this week with the fortieth anniversary of the Apple ad ‘1984’broadcast precisely that year and in a nod to the novel of the same name by George Orwell, published in 1949. An advertising spot which was also on the verge of not being broadcast.
Son many curiosities surround the announcement. For example, not a single Apple product is released. However, it has been considered the best advertisement in history by marketing experts. This is why, 40 years later, this work by Ridley Scott remains remembered.
Apple has already sensed the potential that its “1984” would have
We know Ridley Scott as the director of great films like “Alien”, “Gladiator”, “Thelma and Louise” or more recently “Napoleon”, which will soon be visible exclusively on Apple TV+. However, his first contact with Apple was for advertising in the early 1980s, leading to the “1984” commercial.
This advert is remembered for its broadcast during the 1984 Super Bowl held at this time (January 22). However, as content creator Gisela Baños recalls in X (Twitter), the first broadcast took place on the night of December 31, 1983. The reason was that Apple already knew this announcement could be historic
So things, The real first broadcast took place in silence on local television. More precisely, in Twin Falls, a small town in the state of Idaho. Obviously, someone would see the ad, but it had no social or media impact until this halftime broadcast of the Super Bowl between the Los Angeles Raiders and the Washington Redskins, being the title of these first.
But what was Apple announcing in this ad?
We said in the introduction, and we didn’t mention, that during the minute this commercial lasts, we don’t see a single Apple product. However, they intended announce the presentation date of its first Mac computer, the Macintosh 128Ka project in which the entire company was dedicated and which would ultimately be one of the last for Steve Jobs, who ended up leaving Apple a year and a half later (then returned triumphantly in 1996).
Therefore, the advertisement ended with the following literal sentence (translated):
“On January 24, Apple Computer will introduce the Macintosh. And you’ll see that 1984 won’t look like ‘1984’.”
And that’s it the important thing in the ad was in the middle. George Orwell’s famous work “1984” showed that year how an all-powerful entity nicknamed “Big Brother” acted as a totalitarian dictator capable of controlling absolutely every aspect of citizens’ lives. In Apple’s ad, what is shown is reluctance and completely absorbed citizens watching the gathering that Big Brother is organizing for them through a giant screen.
All those who appear are men, oddly enough, but not by chance. The protagonist is a woman who crosses the corridor until reaching the room, pursued by dozens of police officers. Just before they can stop her and after gaining momentum by spinning around several times, she throws a sledgehammer at the screen, literally and metaphorically ending Big Brother.
It is already after this scene, and while the remains of the screen fall on the still sleeping citizens, that Apple launches the message from its Macintosh. The reference is more than obvious and is it Apple saw in this computer a way to change the futureand this at a difficult time for the company.
This advert somehow presents IBM as the “villain” of computing in 1984 and Apple as “the savior”.
And the resounding failure of the Apple Lisa, partly sabotaged by Steve Jobs, This left Apple facing certain emergencies in the face of IBM which was emerging as the major competitor in the sector.. In fact, one analysis that can be made of the “1984” ad is that IBM is Big Brother and Apple appears to be the savior.
Today, some Macintosh 128Ks are being sold at auction for a fortune, but the truth is that Although his announcement made history, its consequences were ultimately disastrous.. The new graphical user interface it featured allowed it to achieve good sales, but not enough for a company that had just gone public. CEO John Sculley and the rest of the board wanted to fire Jobs because they saw him as an obstacle to the company’s progress. In the following decades, Apple was on the verge of bankruptcy. They were saved by Steve Jobs and, paradoxically, by Bill Gates.
Transcendence of the ad and even the parodies that gave Apple its own medicine
The title “1984” not only brought success to Orwell’s novel, but also to Apple with its advertising. As we said before, this one received numerous industry awards and went down in history as one of the most impactful advertisements. So much so that even Apple itself wanted to commemorate it on the occasion of its twentieth anniversary with a remastered version in which the protagonist was dressed with an iPod and headphones.
Even in the political realm, there have been versions of this announcementlike that of 2006 where loyalists of Barack Obama, then candidate in the Democratic Party primaries, recreated the Apple spot putting his rival, Hillary Clinton, in the role of Big Brother.
Although if there is a curious version, it is the one that we learned almost four years ago from Epic Games. In this document, the roles are reversed and it is Apple who plays Big Brother and Epic who saves humanity. A reference to the lawsuit that video game developers have initiated against Californians over commissions on in-app purchases on iOS. A trial which also ended in favor of Apple, which is now demanding 70 million dollars in compensation.
Cover image | Raw Pixel | Wikimedia Commons
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