There was a lot of discussion-worthy content pouring forth from Apple’s big WWDC 2013 keynote this week, but aside from the technology and the nuances of interface design a significantly human element came to prominence on stage which has since set journalistic tongues wagging.
I am referring to Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering and the man who was probably on stage most during the big reveals – Craig Federighi. A quick Google of his name shows that the internet has exploded with discussions about this charismatic new figurehead and where his future at the company lies. Many see him as the new late Steve Jobs.
I can understand this argument. I daresay that despite the fluctuating confidence of investors the current CEO Tim Cook is probably, in reality, doing a good job of steering the ship that is Apple from a business perspective – management is his background after all. By all accounts he’s also a very nice man and sits down, chats and has lunch with his employees, which is great and a big improvement over how Jobs allegedly was.
But, importantly for me he’s never had the same sense of ‘presence’ on stage as Steve Jobs: I have not found him an interesting mouthpiece to listen to at Apple events and I mean that as no slight on his character. People are just good at different things.
And that’s where Federighi comes in. As other analysts of the event have noted, he slipped into the role with ease. He was entertaining and he made it look effortless. In this regard I agree: he would be an ideal candidate to become Apple’s new frontman in terms of its ‘public face’ for keynotes and the like.
There’s another dimension to this though which, to me, is a bit more important. Federighi’s focus on stage was in showcasing the new features of iOS 7 and OSX, of course bigging-up Apple in the process. He engaged with audience members, laughed and joked. It was very casual, very easy going and highly accessible.
But he didn’t make individual elements of Apple’s new products seem more important than they actually are, he didn’t make digs at the competition, the humour was playful and if it was aimed at anyone it was primarily self-deprecating of Apple’s old habits.
As a tech journalist (and indeed as a consumer) I do tend to find the way tech companies present themselves incredibly tiresome – this applies to launches and keynotes, but also to advertising campaigns too. I’m talking about the shameless and sometimes slightly venomous digs at competitors, the over-exaggerations of certain product features like they’re the best thing since sliced bread, that slightly cult-like hubris which borders on the infantile and which wouldn’t look out of place on the televised live feed of the House of Commons.
I could write out a list of all the names, large and small, which engage in this kind of behaviour, but there’d be little point. It’s pretty much all of them - though some are worse than others [Samsung].
Apple is also included on the list, in fact, indeed, aside from Federighi I was not particularly surprised to see plenty of sideways swipes and over-smugness from the rest of Apple’s inner circle as they paraded on stage, including Tim Cook. And, lest we forget, Steve Jobs also indulged in these kinds of activities back when he was under the spotlight.
I’ve written at length before about how two particular advertising campaigns annoyed me immensely with their arrogance, self-importance and antagonistic tone, to the point of actually insulting viewers and potential users.
At the time this was when Apple’s advertising was refreshingly Federighi-like in simply talking about the good stuff the company’s devices could do. Meanwhile the two competing brands kept harping on about how bad the competition [Apple] was and how stupid anyone who used such devices was.
I won’t re-name them here (I will provide the link though), but suffice to say one has largely dropped this approach and the other hasn’t entirely. Although the former still exhibits a bit too much ‘self-love’ when hosting its own events and the latter does so unashamedly and with more gusto than ever off the back of its recent successes.
Not only is this kind of behaviour unappealing and somewhat distasteful in its own right, but as someone with no particular allegiance to any one brand (ie: not an evangelist) it does nothing to endear me to the company or the product carrying on in this way. In fact it usually has the opposite effect of pushing me away.
So what’s the point of all this rambling? Well, to put it bluntly, I think tech companies and their representatives could and should behave better on the public stage and I think Federighi’s conduct at WWDC 2013 sets an example for the rest to live up to. The broader public face of tech has become ugly and it doesn’t have to be this way.
by pbriden via Featured Articles
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