Apple Event: iPhone X and the allure of Apple brand immersion
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Apple Event announces iPhone X and new brand immersion initiatives to keep consumers in the Apple world.
Apple Events, since the iPhone 1 in 2007, showcase the cutting edge of tech. The iPhone X is it this time, the new sun of Apple’s ever more immersive world.
There were numerous advancements, including the anticipated button-less screen and updated camera for perfectly lit portraits. How the iPhone X unlocks is where things get predictably Apple Event-y.
Face ID is how. It’s exactly as Minority Report as you imagine. The phone unlocks by looking at it. Apple’s new True Depth camera system projects invisible dots that map and recognize your face.
You can pay for things with your face. Some apps already work with it. Face recognition appears to be the future. Security is the largest curiosity in seeing how that future plays out.
This was the most technologically awe-inspiring announcement. The rest of the event featured the company’s cultural selling approach – complete Apple brand immersion. The Apple life; everywhere you look there are Apple products, like you are in the Apple orchard of Apple CEO Time Cook’s dreams.
The Apple Event began in the Steve Jobs Theater as the voice of Jobs fills the auditorium. He never meets all the people who share in his invention, but, he said, “something is transmitted there.” Jobs’ quote conjures tech connectivity while conjuring his spirit, conflating the two: wireless connectivity is how modern spirit’s traverse, interact and intertwine.
After how revolutionary the iPhone has been, each event holds more cultural heft. And Apple assumes more cultural authority and responsibility.
Jobs created this space in which he would speak straightforward, authoritative truth about the shortcoming of competitors and proclaim the sure-fire significance of a product. Every carnival barker does this. But Jobs delivered and delivered and so he received every benefit. And his product pitches became more. They became philosophy on the priorities of the technological life, the modern life.
Cook, the current boss, assumes the head of this platform, responsibly addressing Hurricane Harvey and Irma and Apple’s relief efforts. This, of course, is on everyone’s mind. Everyone with a platform – politicians, TV/podcast hosts – make mention before beginning whatever they are doing in earnest. Apple’s oxygen-bar air of legitimacy, though, makes it more than a mention but another targeted hardware problem that will, simply, in their hands, be handled.
There’s real power behind an Apple proclamation, even if it is just a telethon. The Steve Jobs Theater sits amidst Apple’s $5 billion campus, Apple Park, no longer venturing out but drawing the rest of us in, centralizing their influence. Cook went on in detail about the green space and 100 percent reusable energy and other very considerate things in their new home, doing the thing all Silicon Valley bigwigs do – mesh politics and lifestyle. This makes politics sexy while making lifestyle choices pointlessly political. As innovative as they are, even Apple can’t escape this Valley culture.
Apple committed to more brick and mortar Tuesday with the announcement of its new ‘town squares,’ (barf) their new term for Apple stores. Apple’s senior VP of retail and online stores Angela Ahrendts’ town square presentation began talk of the brand vying for total cultural immersion of its consumers.
A new flagship store is to be built-in Chicago on Michigan Ave and made to “blend seamlessly with the promenade,” Ahrendts said. You could be randomly walking down the street and suddenly find yourself in an Apple Store. On the street, not in an Apple store, in an Apple Store – Apple is working to erase the distinction.
The new Apple Watch, Series 3, is doing the same with our bodies. The big news: you can make calls and use the watch to stream music.
It was back to Cook for Apple Watch talk, and he cut to a satellite feed of a woman standing on a paddle-board in the middle of a windy lake. She listens with wireless headphones and the microphone is on the watch, way down on her paddling wrist. Still, you can hear her clearly. The watch is powered by new microchips and the display, remarkably, also acts as an antenna. “Pretty damn close to magic,” Cook says. I will never understand the science so it definitely is.
The display is the antenna. Your body is a phone, an Apple experience wonderland. With Steve Jobs Theater in place, they are breaking ground on our body, affixing to our wrist. Forget it’s there. It’s not in your pocket. It’s an appendage.
“You can text when needed while staying in the moment,” Cook says. This is not possible. Looking down at a screen is leaving the moment, the physical world. The appendage keeps you in their virtual world, the current moment is the distraction. And, ya know what, I wouldn’t want to leave Apple world that much. It’s so sleek, so sleekly convenient. I honestly don’t know where else the company can take Job’s vision for convenience and usability next. But a phone-computer-iPod on my wrist seems so incredibly convenient as to seem like a curse.
Senior VP of internet software and services Eddy Cue walked out with a two-fingered kiss to the sky for Jobs, which was super real and Diddyesque (RIP Biggie), to talk about Apple TV.
Other than the tech stuff, the big TV news was the addition of live games and live news broadcasts. You can watch an NBA game airing on ESPN live.
Rights to live TV events, like sports, have gone up in value. It’s one of the few things people actually sit and watch when it airs on TV. And games last for hours. This means eyeballs which means big advertising bucks which means everyone is getting in the game, from ESPN to Fox Sports to Amazon to Twitter.
Cue began the live games news by simply saying “live sports” while the words appeared on the screen in Apple’s white font. It seemed like he, for a moment, was putting the networks currently with live sports TV rights on notice.
Before going into the new iPhones, Cook gave us a quick history. A decade of announcements have included, among others, the multi-touch screen technology on iPhone 1, the App Store, FaceTime, Siri, Touch ID and the iPhone camera.
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Face ID is added to the list. It is truly remarkable (and hopefully safe). Apple has done it again. The all-encompassing suite of products has a cultish allegiance to one brand. But the compatibility and sleek design and functionality is incredibly alluring. I bend the knee (but won’t un-bend the wallet, my iPhone 5 works great).