Filed under: Apple Corporate
Apple pays for placement?
Corey Greenberg, the tech editor for NBC's Today show, admitted yesterday that numerous technology companies have paid him sums upward of $15,000 for talking up their products on several NBC local and national news shows, including Today, The Wall Street Journal Report and the thankfully-defunct "McEnroe," a show that you couldn't even pay
viewers to watch! The companies named include Sony, HP, Creative Technology and... gasp... Apple Computer.
Greenberg glossed over his indiscretion by saying "I have never accepted payment to place a product on NBC News." As for other news shows, he says "I have never accepted payment to say nice things about a product in any venue." He insists the companies retained him as "a spokesperson who could talk credibly and understandably about consumer products."
Product placement is nothing new on TV or in the movies. You can't
watch primetime television on any channel - premium cable included -
without spotting at least one Apple product every single night. iMacs
and Cinema Displays look just as sharp on TV as they do in real life
and they are used liberally on the big and small screen. But... and
this may surprise you... the Apple product placements on many of those
shows are not only NOT paid for by Apple, but Apple doesn't even make
it easy for these shows to display their products or the familiar Apple
logo to millions of viewers.
I have first hand experience with a few highly-rated shows that film in New York who regularly rent (as in for money) Apple products. Yes, there are cases when Apple provides the scenery for free and they do have a special department that handles such things, but quite often it's the show that foots the bill because they want that sleek Apple "look" for their scene.
According to the Washington Post, NBC has not severed its relationship with Greenberg and doesn't plan to. "This is a way of doing business for these people," said one NBC official who declined to be identified because the network frowns upon executives talking to the media. "It's hard to find a contributor who doesn't have a connection to one of these things."
Should this bother me more than it does? Because I a) am not surprised this goes on and b) don't really care that it goes on. I'd go so far as to say I actually expect it to go on. How about you?
By the way, if you have any questions about our ethics (wha? we have ethics?) here at TUAW or WIN in general, Jason answered those questions back in January.
I have first hand experience with a few highly-rated shows that film in New York who regularly rent (as in for money) Apple products. Yes, there are cases when Apple provides the scenery for free and they do have a special department that handles such things, but quite often it's the show that foots the bill because they want that sleek Apple "look" for their scene.
According to the Washington Post, NBC has not severed its relationship with Greenberg and doesn't plan to. "This is a way of doing business for these people," said one NBC official who declined to be identified because the network frowns upon executives talking to the media. "It's hard to find a contributor who doesn't have a connection to one of these things."
Should this bother me more than it does? Because I a) am not surprised this goes on and b) don't really care that it goes on. I'd go so far as to say I actually expect it to go on. How about you?
By the way, if you have any questions about our ethics (wha? we have ethics?) here at TUAW or WIN in general, Jason answered those questions back in January.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Porchland said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
If the president of the United States does it, it must be OK.
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scar said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
This is nasty, however far from shocking. How pathetic of Apple, don't they think their products can stand on there own? Corporations that act like this sicken me, such deviants make capitalism unsustainable/flawed.
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Jake of 8bitjoystick.com said 5:49AM on 7-09-2005
I love how Apple of Japan had product placement in some 90s Godzilla movies. Take a look at Godzilla VS. Destroya and there are 90s Macs all over the place. I am just ashamed that Apple was in "Independance Day".
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Gerald Buckley said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
I think it's the cost of doing business. I worked for a Fortune 1000 company a couple of years ago in the marketing dept. We paid ALL THE TIME for placement in movies. ALL THE TIME.
In addition we bought spots on cable and prime time TV, radio, internet, etc. It's what BigCo, Inc. does.
Why not let the free market determine what works and what doesn't? It may turn out that the Greenberg's of the world are the next iteration of the business model (and that's OK). If it works, it lives. If it doesn't, it mutates until it finds a suitable hold or expires.
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Mister T said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
Paying for product placement is one thing- that I can understand. Its called advertising.
Paying for a positive review in the media, is another. That would be like posting false product performances. Its not a fine line, but its worth examining the process by which a review is obtained and if the company is "sponsoring" good reviews.
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Tenacious MC said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
I'm interpreting this as being that he gets paid to talk about the products in his tech report. What he says about them is his own opinion and hopefully not influenced by the money paid to him. Apple could be paying him to just mention the product, but he might not like the product which means he could easily just give it a negative review. Apple doesn't pay him to say nice things about their products, just to give them a mention, as he's suggesting.
It's just product placement that's being paid for. The marketing (positive or negative) is free, regardless of whether he likes your product or not.
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janeiro said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
it makes me sad to see all the apple logos covered and them using some real fakey unix-like OS in Alias. i point out macs to my girlfriend whenever i see them, and Alias is chocked full of them, however they all have the apple logo covered with a big red dot.
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John Doe said 12:48AM on 8-12-2005
Guys, the bottom line is, everytime you see an Apple computer or Apple product on your television screen, it cost Apple a great deal to get it their. Now, this is not 100% of the time, the case (although it is if we are talking motion picture movies) yet the vast majority.
As the NBC official said, it's just the way things are run. Hell, tell me who to contact about this stuff and I'll go onboard! Where can you make $15K in about 30 minutes other than this? Err.. You could be a drug dealer but thats illegal.
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dave said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
um, this is news? Cmon kids, this is America Inc. EVERYTHING you see, touch, hear or smell from the media is bought and sold - including your favorite color, tv show and the last amazon shipped you.
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J said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
Tenacious:
Do you also think that the "donations" made by lobbying groups and corporations to politicians don't affect the way they vote? Do you think that they remain unbiased and those "donations" only buy them face time?
Technically these companies like Apple may just be buying insurance that the commentor talks about the product, but do you really think there isn't a conflict of interest that might lead to overly positive reviews given the desire by the commentor to keep these lucrative arrangements?
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restless said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
This is not unlike how ExxonMobil spends millions funding global warming skeptics (http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2005/05/some_like_it_hot.html). It's wrong. Apple should be ashamed as should NBC for calling their product News.
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J said 4:17PM on 6-16-2005
Tenacious:
Do you also think that the "donations" made by lobbying groups and corporations to politicians don't affect the way they vote? Do you think that they remain unbiased and those "donations" only buy them face time?
Technically these companies like Apple may just be buying insurance that the commentor talks about the product, but do you really think there isn't a conflict of interest that might lead to overly positive reviews given the desire by the commentor to keep these lucrative arrangements?
Reply