I'm a Mac

This has been stewing in me for a while now. I was tempted to start another blog for my non-political/religious stuff, but decided against it for reasons I don't quite remember. When I feel strongly enough about something technical I usually post a comment on some of the other tech websites such as Macintouch, MacNN, ArsTechnica, etc. If you can't tell, I use a Macintosh and yes, I own an iPod; two actually. But something has been bothering me about Apple ads of late and I need to let it out. I'm not entirely sure if this is "accidental" or research based, but I'm pretty annoyed at the presence of black folk in Apple advertising.

I've been listening to Talaam Acey's "Market 4 Niggaz" remix track and the general theme has been reverberating in my mind. That theme is that so long as black folks are entertaining everything is cool. I've been mentally going over the Mac ads I have seen and I'm seeing a pattern. See there are recognizable black folk in the iPod advertising. First we had the Black Eye Peas, and then the silhouetted iPod dancers, who I'm sure are of various races, but feature folks who you "know" are black. We've even had Wynton Marsalis do a piece. Then we had an Apple event where Kanye West made an appearance at the end of the show doing his then chart topping "Gold digger" track (I hesitate to call it a song but...). There was some buzz on the net about his performance but when the web video showed up, Kanye was removed. That annoyed me. Invisible, silhouetted blacks= good, actual real life black MC's on stage= Bad. Alllrighty then.

Then the infamous "I'm a Mac" advertising came out. I enjoy most of them really I do. At first it was just white man PC and white man Mac. BUt then came the extra characters such as the lovely Asian camera, The white female Mac Genius. The serious white male security guard who stated "You are having a sad realization". Yes folks, black silhouetted dancers = Good. Now there WAS a black character at the "Vista" party, a minor character, oh yes there was the black dead PC guy. Yeah OK.

Now we have iPhone commercials abound and yet again not a Negro to be found. Now given that in large parts of the markets where Apple does its sales, there are HUGE "minority" populations why is there such a lack of lead black, latin or Asian characters in Apple advertising? I can't think this is accidental since whenever I see pictures of Apple's core team of decision makers there isn't a black face to be found. Now that means that either there aren't enough black executives to go around, or black people just aren't bright enough to work at Apple or the marketing departments of both Apple and TBWA \ Chiat \ Day have come to the conclusion that white faces sell better than black ones and therefore black faces (or hands) are bad for Apple marketing. I kinda hope it's the latter since it would make economic sense (not agreeing with it but it's logical). It could also be possible that no one thought of it, though I seriously doubt that not a single black person auditioned for either part.

Now personally I thought that with the advent of the black Macbook, that a nice I'm a Mac ad with a black character would have been forthcoming. I mean there are SOOOOO many directions that ad could go in, and on a side note I'm a huge fan of the Geico caveman ads.
Any way you cut it, I think there is a serious issue with Apple's advertising, which may or may not reflect the company or it's dealing with the social reality in America, but I'm glad I got that off my chest.