How similar is Apple and Malaysia?

How similar is Apple and Malaysia?

It’s a never ending debate, no man is bigger than a company, and apple is not steve. (, that’s line actually originated from articles on Manchester United “no player is bigger than the team, when David Beckham and many other stars left the team” ) now that’s an undeniable truth.

Imagine Steve Jobs, leaving apple the next week and starting his own tech company call chemography and launching its own line of product and services. Surely, there the hype and all, but after several products that more than misses the mark (or perhaps inconceivably a disaster story from the start), chemography get sweeps under the carpet among all the other junk stocks. Wait, that did happen back in 1985 when Jobs was ousted as CEO, and he started NeXt, which didn’t really take off.

On hindsight, can you imagine Apple without Steve? I think many can and many already have. Countless articles retelling the same story of how Apple should have enough depth in their product development cycle waiting to be unleash. No apple insider will tell you that, but that should be generally the case.

Sure, Apple should have stuff up their sleeve for now, but without that blinding philosophical leadership, awe inspiring product launches, speeches that were so simple yet effective, steve at apple has the world at his feet.

Think back a decade ago, how relevant was the apple brand and think today. Apple stores (or resellers) in every other shopping mall in Malaysia, every tom and jane holding the iphone (sorry nokia, you got screwed, too slow to catch on the wave that iphone was going to bring). It was simply put it this way, a marvel.

I think Apple will survive, but it will surely fall into mediocrity. Just like Microsoft, Dell, and to a certain extent Malaysia, post Mahathir era. Mahathir went to the extent that he nearly ruled with a iron fist. At the height of Mahathir’s career, Malaysia was growing at a unprecedented pace, towers came up, Petronas was billed as one of the best managed NOCs in the world and mentioned in the same breath as Gazprom, Petrobras, an alternate future to Multinational such as ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron. (there were also failures of course (Putrajaya/Cyberjaya, Labuan) , and countless  other money sapping strategies that no one dares to talk about) Post Mahathir, Malaysia went on autopilot, and at least from an economic standpoint, there little to look forward now that the focus has gone to obviously, China, Indonesia. Even countries like Vietnam and Cambodia are getting noticed with plenty of population to boot.

What Malaysia and Apple needs is, a charismatic leader, who could lead, inspire and get people back to the drawing board and work their ass off. Malaysia/Apple needs a leader, which would not bend over when the going gets tough; a leader who can capture their emotional essence and inspire hope and belief. Malaysia needs a leader with a strong personal branding that is consistent, with a strong drive and track record to the likes of Shell’s CEO, Peter Voser (strong, calculative, thoughtful and inspiring). Apple probably would need someone more to the likes of Tony Fernandez (opportunist, entrepreneurial, ground breaking)

Independence Day Malaysia - Tenaga Nasional

I haven't seen themed advertisements (i.e independence day or one of the major holidays) overseas but I do hope they are more intelligent than the ones we get on our newspapers or billboards here in Malaysia.

*Okay, so I have been lazy, I've scanned these newspapers adverts way back in early September and did not bother doing anything with them till now. in the case if you're my potential  new employer. this is not reflective of my work ethics. I am highly proffessional and keep to my deadlines as well as being upbeat about new ideas.

Lets start with what I think is the worst of the lot. Tenaga Nasional.

There so many conceptual errors with this ad that it I really don’t understand how this ad could come from Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB), where the Top director apparently gets paid almost RM 1million a month! (to put that into perspective, that’s about USD  310k a month) and this does not include all other miscellaneous allowances and share plans.

Utter rubbish, amateur copywriting (my gf writes better than this!) here’s some of gaffe’s

Setting.  –

1)      OMG, back in 1957, I really do not believe that such a diverse bunch of ethnic neighbors come together and read, listen watch the news regarding nothing else but the independence of our country in a presumably Chinese house. (I judge this from the Chinese calendar hung on the wall, no other race in this country uses this type of calendar where the dates are torn off with each day in passing, which is easy.)

2)      Why in the world would the art director try to fit so many people in one room? Seriously, was there a quota to meet that you have to stuff in the 3 main race in the country with men and women,

a.       (4 malay men,(1 dude wearing bow tie holding an old school phone, too obvious, did I mention how ugly the bow tie looks. One malay dude using the obvious old school camera (is that model even available in Malaysia back in 1957?) 1 Leopard print headscarf  malay lady, gosh.. the costume designer can’t get anything right and lastly, a typical malay men wearing pointing out the obvious

b.      The Cheongsam the Chinese lady is wearing looks to contemporary for 1957. No comments of the Chinese dude

c.        1 funny Indian man wearing a shirt and a tie which doesn’t look anywhere authentically real back in 1957, 1 weird Indian lady tuning the radio with a psycho silence of the lamb expression.

d.      Orange juice!?? Typical, if you watch the local malay dramas, whenever they are in restaurants, normally beside the pool, they always drink orange juice!.

e.      The list goes on, you be the judge.

As a summary, this looks like something that been put together quickly, without much thought and TNB gets away with it, because they can, much like the ruling government.