"It’s a great day for dreaming...It’s a great day for dreaming...It’s a great day for dreaming."
If I told you the above was from the opening Theme Song at a recent Scientology festival, I’d only be half lying.
In actuality, it was the closing theme song to the Apple Keynote where iPhone 12 was announced.
Come to think of it, the #AppleEvent felt a bit like it was BUILT using Apple Keynote, Apple's presentation software.
Don't get me wrong, the actual content was quite good, the products announced were truly innovative and Apple has a terrific vision and a disciplined approach to execution.
But, Apple product descriptions have begun to sound like the medical safety disclaimers in pharmaceutical product commercials.
Meanwhile, the Keynote cast and crew has grown, like literally, five-fold, and everyone demonstrates high adderall energy, unnaturally so, almost to the point of feeling like an episode of Big Brother.
So much so, in fact, that their (varying) aptitude as performers left me wondering how many of the presenters are going to get voted out of the house before the next Keynote?
The Rooster Strut
Unlike past Keynotes, because of COVID-19, the event was pre-recorded and there was no audience.
Apple's futuristic headquarters were richly showcased in the Keynote, and harnessed as an extended set (which it was).
While the lack of a live audience gave the event a hermetically sealed quality to it, let's be clear.
Apple was in full rooster strut mode, clucking with pride about Apple innovation after Apple innovation, crowing about the multiple technical disciplines requiring care and feeding to deliver the magic that Apple creates, not to mention the deep cohesion between its:
- Product lines
- The layers of its Software, Hardware and Service stack
- Apple organizationally
- Earth friendliness
- Gluten intolerance
Okay, I fibbed about the gluten part.
Time and again, Apple happily got into the weeds about its myriad of technologies, such as "wound wire coil" and "magnetic flux."
In fact, I practically buckled when Apple announced ProRaw, their new imaging format. Say Apple ProRaw three times, and seizures can't be far behind.
When Apple announced the MagSafe Ecosystem, I thought -- hoped -- that what they were talking about was a MAGA-free ecosystem.
No such luck, I guess, so MagSafe it is.
Apple is all about APPLIED technology
I love the new HomePod mini, and the narrative around Computational Audio, which like Computational Photography, which Apple talked a lot about, just makes a ton of logical sense.
Think of Computational Audio as a real-time equalizer that course-corrects both from song to song and within the song itself. This is all about algorithms and silicon.
By contrast, Computational Photography enables not only algorithmic enhancement and optimization of imagery, but offers wholly new ways to create derivative versions of images.
Put another way, Apple doesn't build stuff for proof of concept purposes but to push the envelope forward.
Then again, I don't want to live in a world where CeramicShield is a verb, so I'm conflicted, as I like the functionally (it's a screen break-proof technology).
But the point, rendered over and over and over again, punch after punch after punch was this:
Apple products are designed to be easier to use, to work together better than the dis-integrated approaches of everyone else (whither Windows, Android), and more innovative and visionary because Apple develops the entire stack from hardwire to software, services, tools and marketplaces.
This is the same 'Halo Effect' that Apple has created for itself, which I wrote about over a decade ago ('Holy Shit. Apple's Halo Effect').
I won't spend any time writing about the iPhone 12 rollout other than to say that I am dubious about 5G near term, but that doesn't matter.
The build quality of Pro. The fact that better photography is a primary driver for me, and the enhancements there are really good.
Little Brother's Approach to Privacy
"At Apple, we put the user at the center of everything we do," so said Apple CEO Tim Cook, and for the most part, I believe him.
That a company the size of Apple actually stands for something is beyond refreshing, knowing that we are all chum for the sharks on Facebook, and to a lesser extent, within the Google universe.
This is where Apple's credibility serves it well when it comes to being the brand that has religion about Privacy.
Integration with your iPhone and HomePod is built on privacy integration. It fits with a now focused vision about tying your Home Automation into your HomePod (and by extension, iPhone, iPad and Mac).
Apple is the Hub, and by playing the long game, and not crossing consumers -- and because of Privacy -- they're more credibly a 'little brother' than a BIG Brother.