Much has been made online about a young trainee journalist, currently in the middle of studying for a journalism degree, contacting Apple's press office and receiving a less than polite response. The student in question, Chelsea Isaac's was set a simple task by her college - to write an article about the implementation of an iPad program at the campus. Naturally her first port of call for comment was Apple's press office, whom she phoned – six times. Becoming increasingly frustrated at the lack of reply, she plucked out an email address from the web that she believed to be none other than Steve Job's and sent him an email asking for comment, stressing that the article was vital to achieve a high grade.
Steve replied putting bluntly that the firm's main aim is not help people achieve high grades but to deliver an efficient service to users of Apple products – fair enough, right? However, Chelsea had tried the press office to no avail and like any dedicated budding journalist, she pressed for an answer. Again, Steve replied stating that he would be unable to help her with her request as she was not contacting him in regards to a complaint about an Apple product.
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| Steve Jobs - A man who simply did what I would have done. |
Chelsea persisted, insisting that she is an Apple user and had a query that could only be answered by the Apple press office, again stating that their co-operation was vital to help her achieve a high grade. Steve replied simply: “Please leave us alone.”
Is Steve wrong to refuse to co-operate with Chelsea or is she not going about the job of a young journalist correctly? Perhaps Apple's press department are to blame for not answering any calls – God only knows there is nothing more annoying than someone having a phone they never answer.
Many would argue that your opinion depends on the industry you come from – everyone knows the (healthy?) rivalry that exists between journalists and press officer's. Many a time I have called a large global corporation myself and not had any sort of reply from their press department or furthermore, been promised a call back that I had never received because they just can't be bothered with regional press. But then, you come to expect that in this line of work. Regional journalists and regional PROs depend on each other just as national journalists and global PROs co-exist together. Swap one with the other though and more than often the 'little' people just repeatedly get ignored. I'm not knocking Chelsea for her persistence – for that she gets top marks and has certainly proved that she possesses one of the most important skills to become a successful journalist but the severity of her issue is questionable. Did she really have to go directly to the Apple press office? Could her local store not have helped her or perhaps the college's own IT department? There are many people you can approach before you need to go straight to the top in business!
Of course, I'm not defending Apple's press office. What is the point of having a press office if they are not happy to liaise with the media? OK, so she is a student, not a qualified media agent but why should this prevent her from getting the information she needs? One day, she could well be a journalist and in a few years, could even be the person that Apple rely on to publicise the launch of their latest newfangled product. The fact is, the press office of any corporation exists to provide comment and information for the press, whether it be national reporters, regional press or trainee journalists and Apple's own press office is doing the brand a huge disservice by not responding to Chelsea's calls.
I've attacked everyone so surely now it must be the turn of Steve Jobs to get a bit of stick? I'm no fan of his or indeed Apple's – I was strictly a Blackberry user until it crashed and burned on me and even now am reluctant to turn to the iPhone - but here, Steve is not personally at fault. If I was the CEO of one of the biggest brands in the world, I would probably do the very same – ask an irritating, nagging wannabe journalist to just go away and leave me alone. At the same time though, he must accept some responsibility for his lacklustre press office. They are not helping his brand by ignoring upcoming journalists and only further the pessimistic opinion that Apple's PR only get in touch when they have something new to promote – a theory I have myself experienced in the past.
Whether it actually was Steve Jobs replying to Chelsea's emails or not will always be debatable but whoever it was must have come from within the Apple family and are therefore hitting their own career-self destruct button. I doubt that Chelsea ever got the comment she was after from Apple's press office but must understand that hassling the CEO of a global corporation is not always the best way to get what you want.
To read more on this story or to see the email exchange between Chelsea and Steve Jobs, read the story on the Guardian website