Apple Is Ruining The Blogosphere
It used to be that Apple would make an announcement and there would be some hoopla about it and then things would return to normal. Even when the iPhone was announced, there would only be a day or two of fawning by the blogosphere before things in geek-world returned to normal. But then, something changed.
At the end of 2008, there was a rumor – which turned out to be true – that Steve Jobs was very ill. That he had pancreatic cancer was well-known. As it turned out, Steve Jobs was to get a liver transplant. He stepped down temporarily and returned and all of the blogosphere went onto a rather morbid death watch. Then he came back and things were back to normal. But they weren’t.
Soon, every little Apple development became a cause celebre on the internet. New iPhone? Devote a week of coverage to the announcement and another week to the release. New iPods? Devote a week of coverage to the announcement and another week to the release. New MacBook Pros? New iMacs? New iWork? New iTunes version? Same drill – devote a week of coverage to the announcement and another week to the release. It got to the point that coverage was going to Apple’s manufacturing processes and other relative trivialities. Apple changed their in-store POS machines – give it a story.
Things came to a head this year with the iPad. Petabytes of coverage before during and after the announcement went to Apple. Coverage of lines outside of the Apple Store at 57th Street. Coverage of the release of the iPad. Coverage of all the great ways that the iPad has changed the writer’s life. Coverage of the 3G version of the iPad coming up.
And then – Leak Day. The day that the next iPhone was given a teardown and a comprehensive dissection of features. That was over a week ago. And the blogosphere won’t shut up about it.
I’m guilty of this too. Apple is the low-hanging fruit of tech writing. Everyone understands what an iPod or an iMac is. The ads are everywhere.
It needs to end. Unless it’s something truly earth-shattering, Apple news is utterly worthless drivel. I have no experience in the tech industry nor any journalistic training but can speculate with the best of them. It’s easy, it gets pageviews, and it’s not news.
Friday was the 5th anniversary of the first YouTube upload. That is newsworthy. YouTube has revolutionized the media, intellectual-property law, the way music, films and television programs are marketed, and even helped spread democracy. And yet the same blog that has given endless breathless coverage to their iPhone 4G leak story, threw the YouTube anniversary story up as an afterthought. More pixels were given to a “No Shit, Sherlock” article about how it’s a wiser investment to buy Apple stock than Apple products.
Blogosphere – just stop it right now. Confine the Apple fluff pieces to release day. There are other more important things to talk about.
