Actually, Futurama did a fantastic spoof of the 1984 ad a few weeks ago, when they were putting together an advertising campaign for "Planet Express."
It's amazing how much more jaded we've become to advertising in the past two decades or so. No, it's not obvious what the ad is
for, and of course we would now see such an ad as pointless hype. But at the time the ad was something of a phenomenon. According to the page I linked to earlier, CBS, Apple and Chiat-Day were all totally swamped with phone calls immediately. News programs reran the ad in full after the Superbowl (more advertising, for free).
And even though you now say it's impossible to tell what or who is being advertised, at the time the commercial produced an unprecedented level of "recall," which means that, when polled later, the audience remembered both who (Apple)
and what (Macintosh), even though they had no idea what the Mac was at the time. Right now, I bet at least 75% of you couldn't tell me which idiotic online dog food company used a cute sock puppet for their mascot without looking it up. You remember the puppet, but not what he was trying to sell you. With the 1984 ad, everybody knew it was Apple's. Not IBM or Tandy, for instance.
Also, in contrast to the long lead time that characterizes most modern hype campaigns, Superbowl XVIII was on January 22, and the Macintosh was unveiled on the 24th.
Also keep in mind that in 1984, the idea of a "home" computer was still relatively new. Computers were tools of business. IBM, the big kids on the block, were still making all their employees wear identical gray suits, white shirts and blue ties. Even programmers who never saw daylight and IT guys who had to crawl under things running cables had to wear the suits, every single day. They made female employees sign contracts stating they would not get pregnant while in the employ of IBM (I assume this would be illegal now). That was the philosophy driving the computer industry.
And "home" computer users were mostly still nerdy hobbyists hiding out in their basements putting things together that hooked up to the TV and offered such astounding features as "4K BASIC in ROM!" There was, at the time, really very little practical
use for a home computer. What software was available was crude and difficult to use. It was looking a lot like the computer revolution wasn't going well for home users. The popular conception of PCs was that either they were something your boss was going to force you to learn, or they were something your kid spent too much time playing with when you thought he ought to be paying more attention to girls.
In other words, computers were seen as dehumanizing. The whole goal of the Macintosh project was (and still is) to have computer technology driven by
human needs, and the "1984" commercial captured that idea brilliantly. Say what you will about the ad now, but understand that in the proper context it
worked, and worked far better than anyone expected.
Originally posted by jefhatfield
the the most famous ad of all, is the duracell bunny...or was that energizer
It was the Energizer Bunny, and unless I'm mistaken, Chiat invented him.
