14 DAY TRIAL // In a non-typical move, Apple has just started airing a new iPhone 3GS advertisement, following the recent release of two brand-new TV spots aimed at promoting the handset. Compared with the first two, the new “Family Travel” ad is spot on.
Earlier last week, yours truly wrote a personal piece noting that Apple’s new iPhone ads were not very impressive. While the situation hasn’t changed for those two spots, the same thing cannot be said about “Family Travel,” which features both a convincing female voice actor, and a much more believable scenario – a family trip.
“It’s unbelievable how much better family trips have gotten,” the female voice actor, portraying a mother, says. “Just last week, I checked us in, on the way to the airport...” using the Southwest app, the ad shows, “...found the kids a snack near the gate...” by launching GateGuru on the device, “...and had their favorite movie ready to go,” via the iPhone’s built-in iPod application.
“Then my husband turned to me and said: ‘Did we turn off the lights?’ So we turned off the lights,” the mother says, launching Schlage LiNK and remotely switching off the lights at home. “That’s why I don’t go anywhere without my iPhone,” she concludes. We couldn’t say anything bad about the new ad even if we wanted to.
Apple continues to promote the iPhone as the best platform to run a huge array of applications aimed at improving one’s life. The iTunes App Store is key here, hosting around 150,000 applications that run both on the iPhone and the iPod touch. Most of these applications will also be supported on the iPad, when it’s released in March.
In related news, Apple has reportedly purged some 5,000 iPhone and iPod touch applications that promoted adult content in a move that suggests Apple is doing some spring cleanup ahead of the iPad’s launch. New policies have been set in place, according to one developer who claims to have talked to Apple. While the business model remains the same, Apple is now doing away with apps that are just too explicit.