Oh Goody, Apple "Apologizes"

(Yeah, this picture belongs to Apple. What are they gonna do, slow down my phone until I buy a more expensive one? Wait.)

WARNING: Intense Cory Doctorow-ing ahead.

“Creativity is in our DNA at Apple, and it’s incredibly important to us to design products that empower creatives all over the world. 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.”

Thus goes the apology given by Apple’s communications VP regarding the absolutely horrible ad in which Apple hydraulic-presses implements of human creativity into an iPad, seemingly not realizing why the idea of tech replacing human creatives is so touchy right now. The ad caused a massive uproar, I wrote about it a couple days ago, and now an apology has been issued. Everything’s good, right?

In the words of a very wise 2000s web cartoon, “WROUNG!”

In this apology, there lie many fundamental issues that suggest, to me, that Apple isn’t remarkably sorry about the ad and their apology was mostly lip service. The first is the obvious fact that Apple did not make any attempt to address the underlying cause of the discomfort caused by this ad: AI. Companies have their feet on the gas trying to integrate the latest in art-stealing/-devaluing technology into their products. Creatives hated this ad because it leaned into everything we fear about the AI boom, which is our contributions being replaced with slick corporate tech. Apple, like all of the other companies taking their turn to crap into the bucket, has no plans or desire to protect creatives from AI. And why would they? Big Tech is and always has been about control. If they can control art and writing and music, that will be the greatest thing to ever have happened to them.

All Apple said was that they "missed the mark." That statement was chosen deliberately. It gives the appearance of an apology without implying a change. It avoids stating the transgression directly, and it promises nothing. This "apology" almost says on its face that Apple only did it to get the Internet off its back.

Secondly, the focus of the apology is not the creatives or their rightful anger. Rather, it is the end-all-be-all of a technology company: the new rectangle and the sheep that buy it (I will bet a lot of money that tech execs think of us that way). The apology does not celebrate creatives and the ways they express their imagination. It celebrates "users" and the ways they "bring their ideas to life through iPad." "Users" is deliberately exclusionary language used this way. To them, the only creatives worth celebrating are the ones that own iPads and legitimately think that they are a replacement for the real tools of the trade. Being thought of as nothing more tha a "user" is degrading in and of itself, not even to mention the implication that creatives are only worth celebrating if they use iPads. I can only hope that it's awkward phrasing. Unfortunately, I wouldn't bet on it.

And lastly, we all know exactly how sincere major corporations like Apple are when they apologize for non-fatal mistakes: not at all. This apology reeks of some marketing executive asking how they get those blue-haired Twitter commies off their backs. The lack of action and tech-centered wording only prove this. Apple isn't sorry. The AI model they're planning on forcing down users' throats is going to move forward and it's going to feed on the work of journalists and artists with impunity. All they want is some big headline that says "GODLIKE, LOVING INNOVATORS GRACIOUSLY ADMIT FAULT, GET FORGIVEN BY MASSES," and then a swift exit of the story from the news cycle.

And, unfortunately, that's more or less what's going to happen.

That's two marks you've missed in a week, Apple. See me after class.