Enderle Asshatery / How to get page views
Rob Enderle is, yet again, desperately begging for hits with another lame anti-Apple article. (i am doing a disservice to you and to myself by linking to this trash.)
I bet there is a very specific template these pundits use to get the mac blogsphere buzzing about the horribly inaccurate article to generate excessive amounts of hits ad impressions. It goes something like this:
The Hook
Start with a blatantly incorrect and unsubstantiated claim. If possible, follow with selective information that is actually counter to your claim, but write it as if it is supporting.
Shortly after the Apple iPhone was announced, LG electronics, the largest Korean Electronics Manufacturer, announced the Prada which on spec is better than the iPhone and will show up about 4 months sooner and will be more widely available in Europe.
As it turns out, the Prada simply is not better than the iPhone “on spec” – unless of course, Enderle is talking about his own speculation instead of actual specifications. It seems to me that the iPhone is easily better based purely on specifications, and in real world usage, i think the gap between these devices will widen.
He also mentions that it will be available 4 months before the iPhone in Europe, but fails to mention that the iPhone will very likely be available in the US long before the Prada ever is (if it ever even makes it stateside, of which there are no current plans.)
The Hook part 2: Be a little irrelevant / insulting
Here’s a good place to bring up some competitor that is totally going to somehow overtake the market leader while not even being compatible with the ubiquitous hardware. Make sure not to mention that their supposedly fresh business model has failed over and over again in the past.
This is also where you mention some silly details that really have nothing to do with anything, but are sort of a lame attempt at making a company look bad.
I just became aware of a competing service to iTunes that’s growing like wildfire in schools: Ruckus. […] a subscription that allows you to put music on your non-iPod music player. […] Growth is apparently near vertical and from what I’m told; iTunes isn’t even competing for this opportunity.
Finally, right after the iPhone launched there was an iPhone emulator released for the Palm based Treo but Apple’s legal team killed it on a lot of servers. […] Given that Apple copied Xerox (another good reference site) and swiped the name for the phone itself we probably should chat a bit about the irony of this
Enderle is pretty good at this kind of trolling.
Body part 1: Be selective in silly ways
Compare 2 products, but only give information that makes it seem as if the two were actually a close call. Throw a silly insult in if possible.
Let’s go down the spec list as we understand it. Both phones have touch screens, both phones have powerful brands (Prada is very powerful in Europe), both phones are 2.5G GSM GPRS EDGE phones and both phones will be on the market this year. I can’t resist saying that the Prada name was legally acquired.
Those are the specs? really? no mention whatsoever of the iPhone having a larger, higher resolution screen, Wifi connectivity, quad-band GSM, because – you know – that stuff apparently isn’t on his “spec list”.
Next you come to a conclusion based on your biased “spec list” that is utterly silly:
I’d still give the Prada the edge because it doesn’t lock you to Cingular, comes from a company who actually has done phones before, has a removable battery and upgradable memory, and comes to market months ahead of its competitor.
Coming from a company “who actually has done phones before” may not actually be an advantage, seeing as phones these days suck. Having a removable batter amy be nice, but hardly a deal breaker. People these days are accustomed to charging their devices every night. Coming to market before may be a small advantage, but which phone do you think gets all the buzz? You also forget to mention that the LG isn’t even announced for the US market, while the iPhone has both a US and a European release date.
Body part 2: blah blah blah
here’s where you flap your mouth about how eventually this or that company will take down the market leader, but dont mention that thier business model has bet continuous failure time and time again.
blah blah blah
Body part 3: The crazy claims
Here’s the really fun part: making crazy claims. It doesn’t really matter what the claims are, but the more ridiculous the better.
I couldn’t help but go back to 1998 when Philips appears to have come up with the idea for the iPhone.
Take a look at these pictures of Philips prototypes and ask yourself, did Apple do the Xerox PARC thing again and simply swipe an idea from a company unable to bring it to market themselves?
All of the phones had touch screens, and the most advanced had a roll up color screen allowing a phone with a large screen to fit into your pocket. In another phone, the screen folded in half, once again providing for a much smaller device with a much bigger screen.
[…] In many ways, given the technology of the time, the Philips ideas were ahead of the iPhone a decade before it will arrive.
First of all, those are “concepts” and not “Prototypes” – a prototype is “a first full-scale and usually functional form of a new type or design of a construction” which these definitely are not. They are concepts, as in, nothing even close to a working model was ever produced in any form.
Saying that the iPhone copied these concepts is about as sensical as saying that Apple copied Star Trek because they too had pretend handheld thingies that could do stuff.
So there you have it. How to create a successful hit-generating, ad-revenue making, anti-apple trolling, inaccurate and inflammatory yellow article. For any further tips, please go to Enderle, and he is considered one of the best in the industry.
The Alternative / a Note to Enderle:
If you’re really this desperate for page impressions that you’re willing to just troll – I’m convinced you could just grab a video camera, poop in your hand, smear it on your face, and put it on youtube. That’d probably get even more hits.
…i bet people would actually pay to see that. Extra bonus: It’ll be just about as good for your “tech reputation” as these articles are.
Hey,
I love what you’e doing!
Don’t ever change and best of luck.
Raymon W.
RaymonWazerri - April 20th, 2007 at 4:58 pm