> Our devices should be making a statement about who we are and what we do
No. That's for us to do. Not to buy.
No. That's for us to do. Not to buy.
All those other examples the author shows are SCREAMING for attention. They demand the limelight. and like all things that scream for attention, soon they will get none.
And on top of that, items like that have to have SOME aesthetic, which means they become fashionable, which means they have a "shelf life" of acceptability. No one wants to be seen dead with one of those god-awful matrix phones, yet an iPhone 4 still looks relevant today...
It's possible, I suppose, but there's something frankly terrifying about everyone looking the same. It's a staple of dystopian fiction, and I think one of the authors' points is that we get the same effect, albeit smaller, when everyone's devices look the same.
Such a policy existing in society at large, whether de facto or de jure, would of course be a different matter entirely. But I don't know that it is reasonable to argue that this is the case with devices, either. While there are certainly places to be found where uniformity of style in personal electronics is the norm, my experience suggests that they are actually quite rare, and hardly approaching any degree of prevalence that would make this a reasonable concern. Perhaps it would simply do the author good to get out more.
By making their devices generic, Apple has (perhaps inadvertently) encouraged individualism.
Aspirationally speaking: I agree. Practically speaking: everyone is already buying it.
It might even be a paradox of Apple's success that the author is writing what he is. Apple's popularity is, in no small part, due to selling people a statement to make.
The appetite for buying the branding of individuality has existed for ages. Apple was the first to master using that style of marketing for their tech. But Apple is a default choice now, everyone uses it and everyone copies their style (or even when Apple is following a trend, everyone else follows it because Apple does).
Apple sold people the high of a luxury product everyone could have and show off. Now everyone has it, and we're all coming down. Apple is bland now, GIVE ME SOMETHING NEW!
It seems like the author just wants to be able to buy his own self-expression through his devices.