Apple is not so genius after all

Please enjoy Guest Editor Barbara Jackson’s piece on Apple’s choice of logo for their undeniably excellent technical help desk they tagged as “Genius Bar”. Let it be said that if Microsoft tried this, the “bar” would close unexpectedly, reopen then close again while you wait, and gradually begin to overtake the Applebee’s, Victoria’s Secret and the other mall shops next door.

Barb and I have been close friends, political fellow travelers and confidants for (really?) forty-five years.

We and other contemporaries grew up in the desert of southeastern Washington, in the shadow of Oppenheimer, Hiroshima, and the live human testing resulting from our experimentation with “clean” nuclear power. We all have relatives dead or dying from that high school chemistry adventure. All our fathers and some of our mothers worked in secret and beyond the fence, and many played a role in what happened in 1945.

In 1969 ’70 and ’71, Barb and I and a small cadre of colleagues undertook do-it-yourself journalism, writing, editing and publishing “The Wasp”, which was our attempt to be real adult reporters and commentators, if not revolutionaries. We got it right once in awhile. What we lacked in reportorial skills, we made up for with chutzpah. We dared ask the questions nobody in a “company town” of 100,000 did. We toured the nuclear plants and suggested that the Atomic Energy Commission, its various corporate contractors, the “elected” local public representatives and our civic and business leaders not only had it wrong, but were serving the public a toxic lie.

Years later we all still have the same bit in our teeth.

Barbara pokes Apple gently but firmly:

 

 

Imagine my surprise

the first time I walked into an Apple Store

and saw the Genius Bar logo.

 

I immediately thought the Genius Bar logo was

way too similar to the Atomic Energy Commission logo.

 It’s true that when our computer problem is solved

we truly think the person is a genius—

but I think there needs to be another way to deliver the message.

 

 I figured Apple was trying

to link the genius of Einstein

and the genius of the Apple product line.

 

 But I wanted to ask if the people in marketing knew anything about

the Atomic Age that began in 1945

in the desert of the United States?

Were they aware of Oppenheimer’s quote

“ I am become death, the destroyer of worlds”

from the Bhagavad Gita?

 

I need to go back in the store and

ask those sitting at the Genius Bar

“Do you remember what happened at

Fukushima in 2011 as the result of an

earthquake and tsunami and how it is effecting

the ocean today?”

 

Was it genius

or ignorance to use a symbol

that is more about war than goodness,

more about destruction than peace?

 

 

 There are many ways to deliver the positive message you had in mind—

it may be time to step back and  think

differently about that not so genius Genius  Bar logo…

 

 “Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent.

It takes a touch of genius — and a lot of

courage — to move in the opposite direction.”

“Where ignorance is our master,

there is no possibility of real peace.”

“A man is but the product of his thoughts.

What he thinks, he becomes.”

I know people with relatives who experienced the Holocaust—

now there are  certain brands they will not buy

in memory of those relatives.

It would be unfortunate to have people

make associations with the Genius Bar logo

 that cause a boycott because

they have a bad experience with that logo.

In our world, people get offended

by words or actions that others see as

 “no problem”.  Ultimately, the wise course

is to listen to what is being said

—because there is a truth there.

It’s always good to run an idea

through a larger lens to make sure the best decision is what will result.

Looking at the Genius Bar logo through

 different eyes —I asked someone what they thought

—They said “It reminds me of Lithium  –

the three dots suggest it’s place in the periodic table

—and lithium suggests madness or mental health  –

which is difficult to have in your world.”

Is there another way to make sure

your customers feel good about

their association with Apple?

Is there another way to deliver the message?

To avoid fallout from a possible misunderstanding?

Hey Apple Marketing Geniuses—which you are truly are—please go back to the

drawing board and figure out some other way to tell us about the genius of

Apple—to connect all the dots…..

Thanks!