With its latest advert for the launch of the new iPad Pro, Apple has drawn the wrath of many Internet users on social networks. The company has had to apologise.
At a time when artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly divisive, Apple has reinforced this mistrust. To coincide with the launch of the new iPad Pro M4, the American company unveiled its new advertising campaign on 7 May. A new iPad that condenses all human creativity into a technological object as big as a sheet of paper. And the advert, entitled “Crush! The short, one-minute video shows musical instruments, sculptures and books being crushed by a press, which when lifted reveals the new iPad Pro.
Controversy on social networks
An advert that quickly caused controversy. By crushing a multitude of objects representing human creativity, Apple seems to be offering a rather devastating and negative symbol of the future. It all started with a tweet from the famous English actor Hugh Grant, who described Silicon Valley as responsible for “the destruction of the human experience”. After that, many celebrities and artists joined in and supported him. Most of the comments pointed to their fear of being replaced and of art being replaced by AI.
Another Apple ad also caused controversy
The symbol and the visual are very strong and shocking for some, who drew a parallel with another Apple advert from years earlier. On 22 January 1984, Apple broadcast its “1984” advert, inspired by George Orwell’s famous novel, to mark the release of its first Macintosh. The ad evoked a world in which human beings no longer had any freedom. At the time, Apple wanted to break the mould and demonstrate that its microcomputer was synonymous with freedom, not productive mindlessness.
Apple apologises
Faced with this sea of criticism, Apple apologised two days after the video was published.
“Creativity is part of our DNA at Apple, and it’s incredibly important to us to design products that allow creative people around the world to flourish. Our goal is to celebrate the myriad ways users express themselves and bring their ideas to life with the iPad. We missed the boat with this video and we’re sorry,” apologised Tor Myhren, Apple’s vice-president of marketing, to specialist website Ad Age.
The American company has therefore decided not to broadcast the advert on television, although it will remain available on YouTube and X.
To counter this publicity, some Internet users have had fun reversing the direction. The new iPad is squashed to reveal instruments, books and paintings. The message is that AI can’t replace everything, and isn’t all that powerful when compared with historical art, which is far more revealing.
Artificial intelligence is both fascinating and worrying. Whether we like it or not, it is forcing the creative world to ask questions and, faced with a multitude of innovations, to be increasingly on the defensive.
To complete the article, here is a video explaining the same subject :
