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I'd somehow been able to talk Apple PR out of a half-dozen 30 and 60 second versions of this very top secret production. (I still have one someplace.) Apple's 1984 commercial has since been voted the best television commercial of all time, selling something like eight-million dollars of product in a single day day. We knew it was special even then and planned to leverage the attention created by the Mac announcement in California to get it played on all the news programs. It worked. The press coverage was fantastic, and the rest is history.
We had all been working overtime since October getting ready for this day. My 'Associate' was on the phone setting up interviews and shipping PR kits all over the territory. Our office repped Apple in Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona, Idaho and some bits of Texas and by the time Steve had left the stage we were getting calls from all over the western US. For a new PR guy, I had hit it right on the head. For a few brief months there in 1984, Steve Jobs, Apple and I could do no wrong.
Of course, the honeymoon only lasted until the following year when we all got laid-off. Mac sales stalled and the balloon popped. Only so many people would buy an over-priced computer with no hard drive no matter how cool it was. Steve and I both had to make career adjustments, I got my job back sooner than he did, but my stock options weren't as good.
Now, Twenty-one years later I still remember how 'insanely great' that time was. The wonderful people, the cool technology, and the excitement of really making a difference will always be one of the high points of my life. Now that Steve has made Apple whole and healthy again, it means even more.
I'll always be a dedicated Mac bigot because I was there when the lights went up. I was lucky enough to be shown the future and even today I insist that this is the 'Computer for the Rest of Us."
1:13:58 PM
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On this day, in 1984, I was dashing about Denver in my old white Volvo delivering two-inch video tapes of the 1984 commercial to all the TV stations. We'd be arranging interviews and handing out press kits for the rest of the week, but the video of that commercial was the trick. 