How Apple Orchestrates Controlled Leaks, and Why

Lanxon writes "'I was a Senior Marketing Manager at Apple and I was instructed to do some controlled leaks,' confesses John Martellaro. Monday's article at the Wall Street Journal, which provided confirmation of an Apple tablet device, had all the earmarks of a controlled leak. Here's how Apple does it. Often Apple has a need to let information out, unofficially. The company has been doing that for years, and it helps preserve Apple's consistent, official reputation for never talking about unreleased products. The way it works is that a senior exec will come in and say, 'We need to release this specific information. John, do you have a trusted friend at a major outlet? If so, call him/her and have a conversation. Idly mention this information and suggest that if it were published, that would be nice. No e-mails!'"

Comments

duh?

[falcon5768]

Thats how they all do it. Hell its even how the government does it. This isnt news, its well known common practice. Thats why its always fun when Apple goes after someone about a leak. Because in those situations, you KNOW Apple didnt authorize the leak and it makes you snicker.

Re:duh?

[Cronock]

I think it also gives Apple a way to test reaction to its products without ever promising anything. That and along with the very active Apple news/rumor sites create a culture that just gets people exited about products, and builds anticipation. I'm sure often these leaks are red herrings too, which keep the "sources" from being accurate often enough to be trusted.

The reasons

[Sockatume]

For those who don't feel like actually reading the article, here're the specific reasons given for the tablet leaks:

* to light a fire under a recalcitrant partner
* to float the idea of the US$1,000 price point and gauge reaction
* to panic/confuse a potential competitor about whom Apple had some knowledge
* to whet analyst and observer expectations to make sure the right kind and number of people show up at the (presumed) January 26 event. Apple hates empty seats and demands SRO at these events.

I'm especially curious about the first and the third. Who is the competitor? The Google/Alex Reader partnership? The rumoured Chrome OS tablet? And who is the partner, a content provider or an OEM? Were they concerned that there wasn't enough interest in the device to guarantee volume, or was it something else?

Re:I will need some help with this.

[peragrin]

That's because apple wants to release good products at launch time. Sure you can use the latest screen technology hut it doubles the cost comes with unstable drivers and if you sneeze at it cracks. Apple sells the whole widget. Having an easily scratched screen material is just as bad as buggy software.

Most people don't realize that hardware and material science is a major part of product design. Bringing a final product to market is about trade offs.
There havebeen touch screens and tablets for years upon years. But until recently the hardware and software haventbeen ready for mass deployments. Just look at Microsoft. Is windows tablet edition a good piece of tablet software? Ithas all the pieces but they haven't been assembled properly yet. The need for convertible tablets is why. Msft is trying to shove a mouse and keyboard based desktop at tablet users. But that isn't how tablet need to work. They need their own UI

just having the ingredents doesn't mean you can bake cake.

Re:How anyone orchestrates leaks

[Archangel Michael]

The leaks work so well because Apple is a hot, popular company. They don't, by themselves, make Apple a hot, popular company.

Actually, I think it is a chicken/egg issue. At this point, the kind of leaking that happens is partly responsible for building the chic, hot, popular. People generally want to be in the "in crowd", and Part of the whole "leak" mentality is build momentum before a product is released.

The leaks accomplish this "in-crowd" mentality, especially when it is accompanied by pictures of people waiting in line at the local Apple store for days, for the latest coolness a few months later when said coolness is released.

Apple has MASTERED this like no other company. Nobody waits in line for the lastest "Dell" or "HP". Why? Because they aren't "cool", and all of the products they release are in fact part of the YAD (yet another device).

Other companies get this kind of response once, or twice a decade. Apple achieves this on a regular and consistant basis.

Apple is cool, because people think it is. People think it is cool, because on a regular basis, they release things that people want because Apple is cool.

It is cool to be Apple.

Uncontrolled leaks

[200_success]

Also of interest is how Apple handles unauthorized leaks from its employees. Apparently, they lock down buildings and inspect employees' personal communication devices to hunt down the perpetrator.