| |||
| |||
| | | |
 | ||||||
 | ||||||
Hello, thank you for calling the Apple store, where the future is always slightly less available than you want it to be. How can I help? Yeah, I was reading about this PowerBook 5300 trade-in and I was wondering how I go about claiming it. Oh, gee, I'm sorry. Oh, shucks, have I missed it? I only read about it last week. No, it's still on. I'm just saying sorry we ever sold you a machine quite that bad. That's all right, it did me OK... No, really, take it from me, and I speak with the full authority of Apple, that we're heartily mortified that such a dog ever slipped through quality control. Oh, well, thanks. But I can still do it? I mean, can I just send you my 5300 and you give me $1800 towards a new PowerBook G3? Yeah, hell, it's the least we can do. In fact it's not all we do. Our 'A Dog Really Is Just For Christmas' campaign now features other fringe benefits. Oh, cool. So what do I get? A software bundle? A Zip drive? No, you get Gil Amelio's phone number. Why? So you can ring him and tell him what you thought of his decision to rush an underpowered machine to market. Look I told you, it always suited me fine. Mind you, it was a little bit slow. And I really hated the way the mouse pointer used to disappear when you moved it. And the screen refresh rate was poor. OK, I've been conning myself for the past four years. My 5300 sucked. That's the spirit! Are you angry about it? Damn right I am! Why I was on the verge of buying a Vaio until I read about this deal. Marvellous. I'm so happy our little exercise in corporate humility is worthwhile. I'd like to offer you a real treat as an extra special way of saying sorry. How'd you like to hear the original 5300 product manager grovel? God, yeah! Is it a recording? Nope! All live! Sorry, what's that Greg? Oh, no, not live. It is a recording? No, he's not alive: Mr Jobs just shot him. Whaaaat!??? It's OK. It's legal. It's in our new contracts. Mr Jobs believes in pour encourager les autres. He shot the entire System 7.5 team last week. Keeps us on our toes. Uh, right. Look. I've been thinking. Now, I'm a believer in caring global capitalism as well, but this does strike me as being a bit weird. Weird? Yeah, I mean, I believe in looking a gift horse in the mouth, but the horse might have a tongue canker or something... That metaphor is going to sue you for a stress-related condition you know. I know. Anyway: what's in this for Apple? You're effectively giving me a new machine for money that went into your cash-flow years ago. OK, I shouldn't really tell you this, but the answers are landfill and G4. Huh? Well, it's like this. We've foolishly pre-announced PowerBook G4s for next year. Every time we do something like that our low-end PowerBook sales tank. Utterly. By doing this we ensure the loyalty of a rightfully pissed-off portion of our users AND get a few hundred dollars for machines that would otherwise be dumped in a landfill, like every other low-end PowerBook before it. I see. Tell you what. I've changed my mind. I don't want a new G3. You can still have my 5300. And my money. What do you want then. A Cube? Nope: I want information. Where's this landfill? | ||||||
16/02 16/03 16/04 16/05 16/06 16/07 16/08 16/09 16/10 16/11 16/12 16/13 16/14 16/15 16/16 16/17 16/18 16/20 16/21 16/22 16/23 16/24 16/25 | ||||||
| | | | | | |