Apple's Infantilizes An Anonymous Flack

Let me start off with all kinds of disclosures: I'm really not into Apple the brand, at all. Folks who lined up for hours to get the iPhone on the first day are silly. The way folks fawn over the company is embarrassing (to themselves) (all my friends excepted, natch.)

That being said, they do make some good products. I'm seriously getting an iPhone 3G and my wife, who does video editing, just ordered a MacbookPro. I don't blame her for not wanting to deal with Windows these days.

Anyway, perhaps you know Apple's been having some problems with its MobileMe service, which is some kind of evolution of .Mac, but more mobile. Something about having access to your "cloud" wherever you go. Not sure exactly. But the service has not worked well at all since its launch. Anyway, that prompted Apple to put up this quasi mea culpa. It starts off like this:

Steve Jobs has asked me to write a posting every other day or so to let everyone know what’s happening with MobileMe...

Ha! "Steve Jobs has asked me..." That's like when your parent makes you go apologize to the neighbor for terrorizing their dogs. "My mother told me to apologize..." What's more, this 'Status update' has no byline, so it's an attempt to personalize "Steve Jobs has asked me" without explaining who the "me" is. Pathetic and silly.

Meanwhile, if you're an Apple hater, looking for another reason to dislike Steve Jobs, check out Joe Nocera's piece in the NYT today, discussing the company's culture of secrecy and all the stuff about Steve Jobs' health. Apparently Jobs called Joe Nocera up to clear the record:

On Thursday afternoon, several hours after I’d gotten my final “Steve’s health is a private matter” — and much to my amazement — Mr. Jobs called me. “This is Steve Jobs,” he began. “You think I’m an arrogant [expletive] who thinks he’s above the law, and I think you’re a slime bucket who gets most of his facts wrong.” After that rather arresting opening, he went on to say that he would give me some details about his recent health problems, but only if I would agree to keep them off the record. I tried to argue him out of it, but he said he wouldn’t talk if I insisted on an on-the-record conversation. So I agreed.

Because the conversation was off the record, I cannot disclose what Mr. Jobs told me. Suffice it to say that I didn’t hear anything that contradicted the reporting that John Markoff and I did this week. While his health problems amounted to a good deal more than “a common bug,” they weren’t life-threatening and he doesn’t have a recurrence of cancer. After he hung up the phone, it occurred to me that I had just been handed, by Mr. Jobs himself, the very information he was refusing to share with the shareholders who have entrusted him with their money.

Anyway, that's that. Saturday morning rant ends now.

Comments

[rattyuk]

Joe Nocera - ego on a stick

[Curmudgeon Geographer]

Joe climbed a few steps down the esteem ladder as he danced all around and over that "off the record" request.

[Patrick]

I did check out Joe Nocera's piece in the NYT as you suggested. Steve Jobs comes across as every other person who has ever been in the newpaper - frustrated and angry that some no-talent bum like Joe Nocera could make stuff up, write it down, and pretent they got it from "sources".

[PO]

another interesting opinion - http://realdanlyons.com/blog/2008/07/27/pr-rule-1-people-who-are-telling-the-truth-about-themselves-do-not-insist-on-being-off-the-record/