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Apple to air student-made TV ad; Aperture & Backup updates

A new iPod Touch TV spot due to begin airing Sunday night isn't the work of an Apple bigwig or members of the company's ad agency, but rather a teenage student. Meanwhile, Apple has updated Aperture for Leopard and also posted new versions of Backup, Server Admin Tools and GarageBand.

New iPod Touch ad

A new television commercial for the iPod Touch from Apple, scheduled to begin running on Sunday, is being created by the company's longtime agency, TBWA/Chiat/Day. However, the New York Times reports the spot is based heavily on a commercial that 18-year-old English student Nick Haley created on his own one day last month.

Haley took visual elements in his commercial (embedded below) from video clips about the iPod Touch and other new products, then uploaded the finished piece to the popular video file sharing site YouTube. Among those who would later view his work were staff members on the Apple account at TBWA/Chiat/Day.

"I was sitting on the bus and I got this e-mail on my phone,” Haley told the Times. The message said, "We represent Apple and we’ve seen what you have produced and we’d like a chat with you."

Haley was eventually flown to Los Angeles to work on a broadcast-ready version of the ad with creative executives at TBWA/Chiat/Day. It can be seen on football games starting Sunday afternoon and on “Desperate Housewives” and Game 4 of the World Series that same night. It is also to be shown in Europe and Japan.

Aperture 1.5.6 Update

Aperture 1.5.6 Update [130.6MB] addresses issues related to performance, improves overall stability, and supports compatibility with Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. Other specific issues addressed in this release include:

  • Resolves some minor compatibility issues with iPhoto 7.1, which organizes images by Event rather than Roll.
  • Addresses issues related to metadata and sort order when sharing previews with iLife Media Browser.
  • Improves reliability of queries based on Import Session.
  • Addresses reliability when recovering an Aperture Library from a Vault.

This update is recommended for all Aperture users.

Backup 3.1.2

Backup 3.1.2 [6.3] is highly recommended for all users of Backup 3. This update includes reliability improvements and improves compatibility with Leopard and iWork '08.

Server Admin Tools 10.5

Server Admin Tools 10.5 [63.4MB] contains remote administration tools, documentation, and utilities that you can install on a computer other than your server. For more information on how to use the included software, see the Documentation folder included in the distribution. Additional details on this release are provided here.

GarageBand 3.0.5

GarageBand 3.0.5 update [14.4MB] supports compatibility with Mac OS X 10.5.



42 Comments

zenatek 19 Years · 173 comments

Is anyone else seeing the weird artifacts during the first half? It seems in all the comments on youtube there is no mention of this and I have played it on multiple computers and its always been there.

ireland 18 Years · 17436 comments

"My music is where I'd like you to touch."

ireland 18 Years · 17436 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by zenatek

Is anyone else seeing the weird artifacts during the first half? It seems in all the comments on youtube there is no mention of this and I have played it on multiple computers and its always been there.

Everyone is seeing them, but this isn't the version they'll be running on TV, they'll just be going for this concept and very likely be using the same song.

gregmightdothat 21 Years · 1706 comments

Unfortunately, they cut out the "music is my hot, hot sex" part.

Here's the song in iTunes by the way: http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/M...41&i=162253040

johnny mozzarella 18 Years · 1818 comments

While I think the ad has merit I wouldn't be surprised if this is also a P.R. stunt.
Apple has angered a lot of users in the past few months and has lost some of the good will that keeps it's fans so loyal. This is the kind of story that the general public will eat up and particularly Apple's most zealous fans. Apple looks like the good guy and gets a great commercial to boot.