Craig Federighi is Apple’s Meme Strategy
Calm down they said. It’s just a bit of fun.
Apple lightened up a boring and disappointing 2023 WWDC by going full-speed with its meme strategy. This is nowhere so apparent as how they treat their main host, their own Craig Federighi.
What’s wrong with that?
The situation
Craig is a fairly good-looking guy. Not a problem.
He has a good head of hair for a member of the 50+ club.
Good for him.
The problem is that Apple is using a meme strategy to hide the fact that innovation left the room a long time ago.
How bad has this gotten?
Apple is pushing the same limited technology year after year. They always hid this under the glitz and glam of presentation and getting a team of fanboi journalists to love their magical products.
Introducing a new laptop CPU is nothing like introducing the iPhone.
Expecting an Apple car? You’ve got a M2 chip 20% faster than last year’s M1.
The solution to Apple’s poor delivery of great products is the meme strategy. Dad jokes and stupid outfits make the host out to be idiotic. For a serious company, this isn’t a good look.
What’s the harm?
The SVP of software engineering at Apple has a great position.
If he wants to call a lock screen “an act of love” that’s, well, weird but I respect the passion. He needs to help Apple in its mission to bring its products to consumers. It’s fine.
So what’s my problem?
Well, search for Craig Federighi and you might get the following related searches:
This means people, yes people really will be obsessed with a celebrity SVP of software engineering. This isn’t the same as looking for Taylor Swift’s house, this guy is an SVP and shouldn’t need security to protect themselves against stalkers.
The Solution Should Be The Product
The product should be at the center of Apple’s strategy. Quality, innovation, and giving people what they actually want, should be at the heart of the modern Apple.
The meme strategy sucks.
As demonstrated by this image
I guess Apple isn’t able to create great products. They can’t let the product speak for itself.
But Memes of Craig aren’t that bad, Surely
He’s a husband and a father.
He’s in charge of great swathes of the Apple empire, and by all accounts overseeing the Operating Systems of the iPhone and iPad is a big deal (oh, and the Mac).
The fact that he has longer than usual hair should not be a massive deal for watchers of the annual developer fest that is WWDC. Isn’t that the point though? Craig should deliver great OS features and development.
You would have thought that few people would be interested in the appearance and memes delivered around such a conference. Yet here they are.
Are they a good thing, though?
Conclusion
This isn’t about Mr. Federighi at all. WWDC is not about one man. Apple isn’t about one man (it never has been).
This article isn’t about Craig Federighi.
It’s rather about the idea that a trillion-dollar company is using memes for one of its senior members of staff to divert attention away from their products and software engineering efforts.
It was not like this in the past.
The past was better, in this case.