How Apple’s ‘crush’ advertisement missed the mark on so many levels

There is a fine line between creativity and self-destruction. Apple’s new crush advert, which shows items linked to creative pursuits being pulverised to make way for the new iPad Pro, tried to find that line but instead appears to have made a rare misstep. It has angered a lot of people in the process. Apple has now apologised and said it no longer plans to air the ad on TV.

Creative destruction is a term coined in the 1940s to describe revolutionising the economic structure from within – destroying the old one to make way for the new. Creative destruction is an essential factor of capitalism and, in Apple’s case, it used to be previously commonplace with the cannibalisation “by design” of products by new developments.