Apple Inc. AAPL has issued an apology for a controversial advertisement for its new iPad Pro, which has now been pulled from TV.
What Happened: The ad, titled “Crush,” was released on Tuesday and was met with criticism from the creative community. It depicted various creative tools —from a piano, to a camera, to cans of paint— being crushed by an industrial crusher, leaving only the new iPad Pro intact.
The ad was intended to showcase the creative potential of the new iPad Pro, but it was interpreted by many as a grim representation of technology crushing human creativity, reported Ad Age.
Apple’s VP of marketing communications, Tor Myhren, issued an apology, stating, “Our goal is to always celebrate the myriad of ways users express themselves and bring their ideas to life through iPad. We missed the mark with this video, and we're sorry.”
Although the advert remains online on Cook's X account and YouTube, Apple has canceled plans to show it on TV.
Several social media users also made unfavorable comparisons with Ridley Scott's iconic 1984 Apple Macintosh ad, which portrayed an Orwellian future being challenged by a sledgehammer-wielding heroine and had the tagline "You'll see why 1984 won't be like ‘1984'."
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Why It Matters: The new iPad Pro comes with an M4 chip and OLED display, and the iPad Air 6 has also received a hardware update as it is now available in two screen sizes for the first time.
Apple’s iPad sales are expected to surge this year, but Deepwater Asset Management’s Gene Munster has predicted a decline in 2025. “Looking into 2025, I expect the iPad to be on a steady decline of around 2% as the segment is impacted by the reality of infrequent upgrades,” he said earlier.
Meanwhile, tech YouTuber Marques Brownlee said that while the new iPads come with impressive spec bumps, their software prowess is still lacking. "We have these really impressive spec-bumped iPad Pros, the most powerful iPads of all time the thinnest Apple devices literally ever made, but the list of things it can do, is the same as my 3-year-old M1," he said.
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Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of Benzinga Neuro and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
Photo courtesy: Apple
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