Today, thousands of people crowded around their or their officemates computers to watch liveblogs of the Apple launch event in San Francisco. I, and my office mates, were in the majority. To say we have an interest in the new iPad is a bit of an understatement, but I digress.
And as Tim Cook rattled off the various improvements Apple made to the the new iPad he got to the final screens showing the actual name of the device: “The new iPad.” Several people in my office and many, many more on the Web immediately got their panties in a bunch over the name. Journalists, obviously not familiar with the English language, couldn’t figure out what to call the new iPad.
It would appear that Apple’s “Think Different” mantra includes product nomenclature, as well as simplicity and substance.** You see, for a small moment, and even in articles like this it appears that Apple stumped some journalists when trying to describe the device.
But while people were stumbling over their words and had to rewrite entire graphs of articles they pre-wrote with either had iPad 3 or iPad HD, the decision to just call this version iPad (or formally on the website “The new iPad”) is a very important one.
When you’re designing anything, be it hardware, software, etc. longevity should probably be kept in mind. And this naming scheme speaks to the perceived longevity of the company. You don’t want to sound stale in a few years, but you also want to wow people at the same time. If you’re as aggressive as Apple when designing new products, or new versions of products, then keeping the brand name in tact is very important. What if they really are around for another 50 years making hardware, would people still be excited for the iPad 53?
Culturally, dropping the number from the latest iPad feels like a shift in humanizing technology even more. No one outside of techy people or those designing for the iOS system are actually referring to their “iPad 1″ or “iPad 2″. People refer to it for what it is: an iPad. To them, it’s one device with multiple generations of improvements under it’s belt.
Prior to Apple creating cutesy names for their products that all being with a lowercase i, we had to refer to some computers like the “Optiplex 6400″ and other TRON-esque names. With so much emphasis on the “tech” aspect of Dell’s computer, it can be very confusing to consumers on what model of computer they actually have.
So much so, that an IT friend of mine continually used to complain to me that people would ask for help fixing their Dell. When he asked them which model they had, they really could never tell. “I dunno, it just says Dell.”
Point I’m trying to make is that most consumers have no clue what computer model they have. They know who makes it by the logo on the outside, but as far as the actual model, I can almost guarantee they do not know…unless they own an Apple product. (Even as I write this with several websites pulled up, there is an advert for the “HP Pavilion dv6t laptop with Beats® Audio”—very long name that doesn’t quite roll off the tongue.)
It’s also worth pointing out that it appears they’re going with the same naming scheme with their desktop and laptop models. For years know they have been the same names as they are now: MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac Pro, Mac Mini, etc… They don’t feel the need to slap a version number to the product name. On their site it’s not listed as iMac 3 (or whatever version they are up to at this point). Like cars or wine, they are more referred to by the year they were released. For instance, the laptop I am writing this on is a 15-inch MacBook Pro Mid 2010.
The brilliance of Apple’s brand comes from their simplicity of design and constant delivery of messaging that pushes people’s expectations of what computers can do, without overburdening them with technobabble. Despite whatever you think about their hardware, their services, pricing, etc. you have to be impressed with their marketing decisions, and the new name is just another tick in the box of how to properly promote a product.
(**For the record, I have no idea what their mantra is, but if you look at the line of products they released today and the improvement to the software featured on these devices, it is at least on their radar, if not their driving principle behind their development.)