Thinsp, I mean Thinnovation from Mac
When asking some friends for advice computer shopping, one of them referred to a certain brand of laptops as becoming glorified paperweights after a short period of time. While my Toshiba hasn’t exactly descended into paperweight-dom, it’s certainly on the way to a slow demise (after only having it for a year). Always a fan of the safe, long-lasting Mac computers, I thought I’d check out the site to see if they had any deals - as a poor grad student, Apple products are a little out of my price range, but it’s fun to browse. Apparently they’ve just released the “MacBook Air”; while the computer looks interesting enough, it looks like Apple hasn’t strayed very far from their thin-centric advertising of the past:
Maybe I’m reading too far into it, but “thinnovation” is a smidge too close to “thinspiration” or “thinspo” for my likings. And ah, what a clever play on the weight insecurities of the populate: “you don’t lose inches and pounds over night.” How very innovative.
Except not.
(Oh, and please do let me know if anything’s wonky here at Seeworthy; I’ve installed a new theme and I’m afraid my tweakings may have caused a catastrophe somewhere on the site!)
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The criticisms of my students would serve as a good warning to visitors of Seeworthy: she talks too fast, she's too hard on us, she assigns too much work, and you have to be a dyke to get a good grade.
In other words, I'm a big, fat, queer, feminist meanie, and I am totally out to get you. Graaagh!
i did take issue with some of the earlier advertising (and my mom even wrote a letter to apple, before the ads were pulled), but - and i say this with all love and respect for you, darling - at some point i think we just have to accept that they are advertising that this is an extremely slender piece of technology - that’s all. it’s thin and ultra-portable. people want thin technology because it’s lighter and easier to carry. i appreciate your reservations, but you have to look at it from a marketing perspective. if you had to lug a laptop around everywhere, would you buy something bulkier just so as not to “buy into” the whole “thin tech” revolution? would “light” be a better word, or “slender”?
Meh, it’s not even so much the “thinnovation” word choice - though that is a little creepy - as the bit about shedding pounds and inches. I’m all for teeny tiny pieces of technology and it’s fine to advertise them as thin/slender/skinny - because they are, after all. My only real problem comes when they start including weight-loss rhetoric in their advertising (however subtle it may be, I’d be highly suspicious if the ad execs over there claimed the above ad had nothing to do with the whole New Year’s resolutions by everybody and they mama to shed pounds). I’m not sure it’s malicious, but it’s definitely thoughtless.
Yeah, I hate Apple on principal, but their marketing doesn’t do anything to shift that. The oh-so-”clever” plays on dietspeak seem to come up again and again. Plus, anybody else notice that in their Mac v. PC television spots, Mac is young and thin and hip, and PC is stodgy and chubby and desperate? Wonder if that was intentional…
If the products are so innovative, why does the marketing need to be so predictable? I mean, “thin and sexy” is right out of the same old Madison Avenue playbook.
Yikes, I hadn’t even thought about their TV ads. Totally not effective, though: I think PC is way more adorable than the Mac guy.
see, maybe i’m just hopelessly naive. i just thought those ads represented the “old” PC users (john hodgman, playing at being a stuffy nerd - i also thought it was because he kiiinda resembles bill gates) and the “new,” hipster mac users (justin long, mista hipsta).
i guess i’m just not cut out for fat activism