Roger Fingas
Apple CEO Tim Cook took to Twitter on Friday to mark Turkey's National Sovereignty and Children's Day — which actually takes place Apr. 23 — and to showcase a local billboard campaign, using iPhone photos shot by children.
Two billboards seen in Cook's post feature close-ups of animals, one real and one a toy. Translated from Turkish, the executive talks about "great photographs taken by young talents."
Apple has so far been marking National Sovereignty and Children's Day with a series of videos recorded by kids. As with the billboards, animals have been a primary theme, excluding one clip in which water balloons bounce up and down in slow motion.
The focus on Turkey comes at a potentially controversial time, since the country's President — Recep Tayyip Erdogan — recently claimed victory in a referendum giving him authoritarian powers. The vote was decided by a narrow margin, and there are have been accusations of fraud and rigging, especially in Kurdish parts of the country.
For Apple, though, Turkey is an important market. In fact it's one of the only countries in the Middle East with official Apple stores, specifically located in Istanbul.
Apple's marketing strategy has shifted to concentrate on digital and regional campaigns in recent months, another example being its "Meu Bloco na Rua" commercial signaling the start of the Carnival season in Brazil. Previously, the company often commissioned international ads it localized as necessary.
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A NATO member who has become a dictatorship. Can Sharia law be far behind? So long to a secular Turkey. How will Apple deal with this? How will NATO?
Eye-catching ads alright. Erdogan's reach into Europe...
"Speaking in the central city of Eskişehir, Turkey’s president urged “his brothers and sisters in Europe” to begin a baby boom in their new countries. “Have not just three but five children,” he told his flag-waving audience... The place in which you are living and working is now your homeland and new motherland. Stake a claim to it."
On the face of it, apart from no concern for general over-population, not too bad. However, quite insidious coupled with this remark...
"We will keep supporting the integration of the Turkish community in Germany. Unfortunately, some media organisations [in Germany] misunderstood it. You never never make difficulties regarding the integration. But if we're talking about assimilation, no! We can never make concessions on our language, our religion, our culture..."Turkish Secularists are doomed, and so is Europe. Turkish aggressive Quranism can't be met by polite liberal acquiescence. I say this as a Liberal!
NATO is a secular organisation that fitted, at best, awkwardly with a secular Turkey. Now that Turkey's secularity is on the wane, Turkey in NATO will be like a festering sore.