Bad taste. Is nothing off-limits anymore?
I’m always up for a good satire but this Action Electronics’ video promo airing on Taiwanese for the Action Pad misses the mark. It’s not the turtle neck, stage, or even the premise. For me it’s the angel wings and halo. The little props takes the ad from a tasteless parody to an absurd stunt. But personal feelings aside, this company won. Their ad spot went viral and the Action Pad won’t go unnoticed.
PC World spoke with an Action Electronics’ spokesperson who indicated they’re not trying to “use his death.” She added “This is not meant to make fun of Jobs.”
The tablet in question is just another budget 7-inch Android tablet. It runs Android 2.3.3 and costs 6990 yuan ($236 USD) — nothing special besides the marketing.
The commercial started airing on Taiwanese TV late last month. The company even held a mock press conference with the impersonator, which is slightly less offensive because of the lack of angel wings and halo.
Apple is known to aggressively defend its image and Steve Jobs likeness and generally quickly releases the legal hounds. But this is a slightly different case. This isn’t a Steve Jobs action figure. This is some company, desperate to sell their wares, turning to a dirty tactic that they knew would go viral. It’s hard to hate on swaggering bravado even if the result is fucking ridiculous and rude.
Started by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne, Apple has expanded from computers to consumer electronics over the last 30 years, officially changing their name from Apple Computer, Inc. to Apple, Inc. in January 2007. Among the key offerings from Apple’s product line are: Pro line laptops (MacBook Pro) and desktops (Mac Pro), consumer line laptops (MacBook Air) and desktops (iMac), servers (Xserve), Apple TV, the Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server operating systems, the iPod, the...
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