Apple iPhone Hype Machine in Overdrive

This article is part of the hype machine. Keep fueling the fire. Congratulations, Jordan Robertson.

So based on this allegation,

Technology analysts say Apple started its publicity campaign for the iPhone uncharacteristically early, first showing off the device six months ago and shrewdly stoking the media feeding-frenzy since then with incremental announcements that have kept the sleek cell phone-multimedia player-Internet browser in the news.

A quick check of press releases by Apple that had ANY reference to the iPhone at all, direct or indirect, shows 8 of 39. That's less than 25% of all the press releases from the January product announcement, for any reference to the iPhone. In terms of ad placement there was the ad set that ran during the American Academy Awards, and then the ad series that stared running here in June. Except for the interviews with Mosser et al, that's it.

The hype (short for hyperbole for those who wondered where that came from) has been almost exclusively on the part of analysts, pundits, fans and haters, who created the maelstrom of speculation around it. Apple did as it has always done. Announced the product, declared it wonderful and then sat back and let everyone else go crazy talking about it. Easily, half or more of all the storm has been naysayers, who, for some obtuse reason felt compelled to weigh in negatively. Which is about as ironic as things get - since they are clearly, in their part, as responsible as the fans (or even moreso) for whipping up the frenzy.

So yes we can charge Apple with incredibly canny and risky PR. If it sucks - they go down- and down hard. But if it flies... The irony is the potential impact this has for the stock market, as so many otherwise intelligent and insightful, not to mention savvy and cynical analysts have weighed in positively on this and declared Apple golden. If this is a flop this will have a strong negative impact on the market. This is worth watching for all the aspects of impact that it will have. Who could have predicted that the company that so many had written off would have resurrected itself and gone on to become so impactful?

As this seed points out, it's the AP that's fueling the hype machine, not Apple.

Keep in mind that AP moved multiple versions of most of these stories. We collected 52 separate copies of these 17 (we forgot the "hype" story itself) stories. Just in 14 days. Just from AP - the service that says Apple has gone into overdrive to hype the iPhone by issuing six press releases in six months.