Watch the Epic Parody of Apple’s “1984” Ad

Posted on August 14, 2020 by Paul Thurrott in Apple, Mobile gaming, Google, Mobile, iOS, Android with 24 Comments

Epic has released an amazing if somewhat obvious video parody of Apple’s iconic “1984” advertisement for the original Mac in which it recasts Apple as Big Brother and a Fortnite character as the hero.

“Epic Games has defied the App Store Monopoly,” the ad notes. “In retaliation, Apple is blocking Fortnite from a billion devices. Join the fight to stop 2020 from becoming ‘1994’.”

Brilliant.

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Comments (24)

24 responses to “Watch the Epic Parody of Apple’s “1984” Ad”

  1. tim_lowes

    "Join the fight to stop 2020 from becoming ‘1994’" => should be 1984. Great Video!

    2 years ago
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  2. cavalier_eternal

    I'm super curious about what Epic's strategy is here as it is bigger than simply suing Apple and Google. They could have sued at any time it didn't require intentionally getting kicked out of the both App stores and the video is completely irrelevant to the lawsuit. Yet, this was all timed and choreographed to happen at once. They also could have had the App restored but are choosing not to. Somewhere at Epic there is a larger project plan and I'm totally curious what it is and what the endgame is it clearly involves some sort to PR component.

    2 years ago
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  3. davidblouin

    Waiting for the one mocking Google !

    2 years ago
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    • Paul Thurrott

      Google doesn't have that rich history of public hubris to work off of. Apple makes itself ripe for this kind of mockery.
      2 years ago
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      • angusmatheson

        In reply to paul-thurrott:

        In Apple’s defense, in 1984 they were a small company fighting against an IBM clone empire that was sleeping the Apple IIe aside. Epic is not that. We not have two huge cooperations battling over millions of dollars.

        2 years ago
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        • Paul Thurrott

          Epic literally is that. That is the exact comparison. Here's a fun little game you can waste your time on. Make a chart that shows the difference between $0, $17 billion (the June 2020 valuation of Epic Games), and $2 trillion (Apple's soon-to-be market cap). What do you see? Right. Epic is much closer to $0 than it is to $2 billion. You know what? I'll do it. https://www.thurrott.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/08/worth.jpg Now stop wasting everyone's time
          2 years ago
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  4. Vladimir Carli

    They are so right. Apple needs to be forced to side loading of apps. Then they could charge as much as they want and it would be fair. I’m worried that if epic exaggerates and they get their ass kicked, it would be a huge setback for consumers

    2 years ago
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  5. waethorn

    On the counterside to this: if game microtransactions die because of this, I'm all for the "evil overlords" reigning game publishers in.


    Fartnite is trash.

    2 years ago
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    • angusmatheson

      In reply to Waethorn:

      Remember when you bought a game and could play all you wanted for free and not be penalized in the game for not spending as much as the other guy? Yep, now I really sound like an old Geezer on his porch.

      2 years ago
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      • waethorn

        In reply to Angusmatheson:

        I remember paying a flat price for games (including multiplayer ones) and having communities that would make mods for free using modding tools also created for free by the game developers.

        2 years ago
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        • Paul Thurrott

          Yep. Id Software was particularly good about making modding open for all. I used to play a Quake variant called "Runes" or similar that was quite good.
          2 years ago
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          • dftf

            In reply to paul-thurrott:

            Yeah, id were impressed by how-many people made their own custom-levels for Wolfenstein 3D, and decided from DOOM onwards to facilitate that more-easily. (The release of the source-code later-on helping with ports, too.)


            Can't think of many-other examples from the era where anything official liked that happened, though in 2000, "Tomb Raider: Chronicles" for PC did come with an official level-editor included. (And more-recently, the "Mario Maker" series.)

            2 years ago
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            • Paul Thurrott

              Yeah. Aside from Minecraft, which isn't exactly the same, this kind of thing has kind of fallen by the wayside.
              2 years ago
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  6. chrishilton1

    Live stream not working

    2 years ago
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  7. wapembe

    beautiful

    2 years ago
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  8. doon

    Nicely done.

    2 years ago
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  9. beckerrt

    If nothing else, this is brilliant marketing as well, regardless if this issue has any chance of being taken seriously by the feds.

    2 years ago
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  10. beckerrt

    Paul, I know you think Tim Sweeney is a raging lunatic, but you gotta love all this!

    2 years ago
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    • Paul Thurrott

      Yeah. That's exactly my position, and maybe we needed someone with this exact brand of crazy to put a stop to Apple's (and Google's) monopoly abuses.
      2 years ago
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  11. remc86007

    It's great to see someone with real market power actually stand up to Apple.

    2 years ago
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  12. atimms

    Since the era of iPad's introduction Apple has taken the place of the 'evil overlord' so it's long overdue that they start to get the stick (and hopefully government investigation) that Microsoft went through in the early 2000s. Not to say that Google and Amazon aren't due it too but so far Apple has had the easier ride.


    That's why, as Epic have parodied, Apple's 1984 advert is sooooo ironic.


    2 years ago
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  13. waethorn

    If stunts like this make consumers reconsider their choices, and for Apple to learn humility, then so be it. They need to be taken down a peg or two.

    2 years ago
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  14. kshsystems

    that is awesome!

    2 years ago
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  15. dftf

    It is a great parody, yes, but I think the real issue is that many Apple fans still believe we are living in the times when that advert came out: Apple is the massive underdog we must always route for.


    Thesedays Apple has the third-largest market-cap; is the 11th largest company worldwide by revenue (3rd highest when considering US companies only); is the second-largest mobile OS after Android (and, let's face-it, there is only two thesedays); has an ever-increasingly money-making services sector; the iPod was the dominant device in that product-category ("MP3 players"); the iTunes Store was highly-profitable; WebKit is the de-facto standard on iOS devices (no competition in web rendering-engines) and Siri is one of the most-used voice-assistants.


    Apple is not this tiny, small underdog thesedays people still seem to think it is.

    2 years ago
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    • BrianEricFord

      In reply to dftf:


      The flip side to that, of course, is that many Microsoft fans to this day feel some strong need to oppose every move Apple makes, with a burning desire even more irrational than it was back when Microsoft wasn’t actually in Apple’s shadow in so many important markets.


      As with then, it’s a fairly one-sided preoccupation with needing validation.

      2 years ago
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      • Paul Thurrott

        That kind of partisan attitude is as dumb as believing that today's Microsoft is just as bad as (or is "the same") company as the Gates-led monster of the late 1990s. What people should be looking for here is fairness. A system in which innovation isn't destroyed, and that existing monopolies don't get to continue abusing their market power to prevent those things from happening. It doesn't matter what the companies' names are---Apple, Google, Amazon, whatever---they need to be stopped. They're going to go do the right thing on their own. So we should applaud Epic's lawsuits, and the many antitrust cases against these firms. And hope that they all succeed and change things for the better. For all the soapbox nonsense I see out there, there is no version of "Apple lowers developer fees" that harms consumers. But the current situation does harm consumers.
        2 years ago
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  16. madthinus

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=euiSHuaw6Q4


    Link to the working video.

    2 years ago
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