Apple’s “iPhone ad slip up” reveals “mystery app”
Posted by Dr. Macenstein
[UPDATE: Apple has apparently re-edited iPhone commercials, and removed the “mysterious 12th iconâ€]
In looking through Apple’s newly posted iPhone ads on their site, I noticed something interesting.
In every shot we have ever seen of the iPhone’s main menu thus far, there are 3 rows of icons for applications (2 rows of 4 icons, and the 3rd row has 3 icons) for a total of 11 icons. (See below).
However, there is an odd shot in the newly released “How- To” iPhone ad, where the screen goes from the traditional 11 icon view, to a new 12 icon view. (See below).
Above: Scroll to 00:00:02.76, and you will see an interesting jump cut from 11 icons, to 12, and then back to 11 again.
The idea that the iPhone will add functionality and apps via software updates is nothing new; Apple has mentioned as much. However, you can clearly see that one moment the last row has three icons; “calculator”, “notes”,”settings”…
And the next it has four “clock”, “calculator”, “notes”,”settings”.
Apparently some mystery app has pushed the icons down 1 slot, but we cannot see what it is.
This brings us to 2 questions. First, what is the mystery app that has bumped all these apps down one spot? And second, why didn’t the editors of this commercial catch this lack of continuity between shots?
Since this is the most highly anticipated electronics launch in recent history, surely Apple must have known geeks like us with too much free time would scroll through the video frame by frame and catch something like this.
Sloppy editing to be sure. Hmmm.. the ad looks like it is actual footage of someone using the iPhone as opposed to a 3D mock up of the screen, but you never know. Screens are hard to shoot (glare and all), so maybe it was added in and motion tracked, and this is an artist’s slip up? although where would he have gotten the odd icon order? And odds are, they would not have accidentally left in a wrong effects shot, since they realized and got the icons right on other shots.
I don’t know. The HD version looks pretty real, not effecty. Nice catch!
I feel ashamed. I think I have more free time on my hands than ANYBODY, but I didn’t catch that. 🙁
Ahhh… but we don’t know what that mystery app is and we’ve got 26 more days to contemplate, talk about, wonder, guess, and dig about to discover it. And that kind of publicity can’t be bought.
Apple KNOWS fanboys will pour over every word and picture morsel put out there and what better way to keep the [free] publicity rolling then to keep the mystery app a mystery – at least for now?
Tonight your discovery sits in the “upcoming stories” on Digg. By next week it could be a very big story on the “popular stories” garnering more publicity.
It could just be a diagnostic app that they won’t be shipping with the fully released version….
OR it could be the coolest thing EVER, TIMMY!
I’m going with that, because I am a total, unapologetic Apple fanboy.
LONG LIVE THE iPHONE!
It wasn’t a 3D mock up and it wasn’t sloppy editing. Apple is as innovative with their marketing and strategic planning as they are with their hardware and apps. These ads have a very specific design and set of objectives.
Also, how did the Maps application know where the guy who wanted calamari was? I’m still hoping for a hidden GPS receiver!
Chances are its not a diagnostic app, Apple wouldn’t want anything on the main page of its new device showing that it might have flaws and require a diagnostic app (though i bet they are in there hidden), its like having diskutil on the main screen of the appleTV, Marts got a point, i mean having the localisation preset is one thing, but if it can track where you are.. ohh yeah baby..
It would be easy to figure out the phone’s position based on signal strength and what which receivers it is talking to. These logs are sometimes used to track the prior movement of mobile phones, and would be relatively easy to add to realtime applications.
It’s just a Games button for games downloaded for the iPod.
Another widget?
whatever it is, it is definitely a continuity error that seems like it can only be intentional.
I agree with The OS2Guy, someone let that stay in to generate even more buzz.
increase the whitepoint of the original…you’ll see a seam next to clock.
maybe cut a paste?
maybe they just did it to make the diagram more intuitive?
try it with original.
>>I’m still hoping for a hidden GPS receiver!
Don’t all Cell Phones have one now?
This is how a freaking RAZR from Verizon can give someone directions and maps walking down a street. If the iPhone really doesn’t have GPS, that is truly sad and in violation of 911 requirements isn’t it?
They may have rearranged the icons simply because the bottom empty space looked visually awkward in the close-up shot.
exactly who has enough time to figure this shit out??
No, very few GSM cell phones have GPS built in, and there are no 911 requirements for having one. Still too many privacy concerns.
911 calls operate at a higher power level than regular phone calls, and are triangulated by the network to give location to the required 500 yard radius in the painfully few areas that actually are equipped with e911. In denser areas like Manhattan, where towers are every block or so, hence making reasonably accurate tracking trivial.
That being said, the latest demo seems to imply GPS because the user did nothing to input his location. It would certainly be at least compatible with the US Globalsat unit like almost all other AT&T phones, and I highly doubt that Apple would stand for such clunkiness.
exactly #15 it just looks better to fill the screen with color. Empty space is never good
It could also possibly a “now playing” widget so you could quickly go back to your music/movie from the home screen. Since it probably took multiple takes to piece that ad together, it could have just been left over from a previous take.
I’ve heard from a reeeeally good source that it’s either Photoshop or FinalCut Pro…
Perhaps the extra icon is YouTube functionality, the same that is being worked into the AppleTV? They made a point of mentioning how the FLV file format didn’t play on the iPhone as well as the AppleTV.
Probally some ad exec. making a note just to make a note. Like “There needs to be 4 icons in that shot, not 3 that looks stupid!! get the flame artist to add one!”
or it could be photoshoped …
My money is on a stand-alone youtube application.. given the news earlier this week.
Finally, after 14 posts, somebody points out the correct answer. Thank you Kim.
i’m sure the icons can be managed by the owner. you can set up the ‘desktop’ with whatever shortcuts you want. the phone shown with 12 must have just had the settings tweaked to have 1 more icon than the phone comes with ‘stock’
@Kim Hill:
There are a number of close up shots in the other two ads [and I’m pretty sure even in this ad] that use the standard 3 icon 3rd row interface, so I can’t imagine they changed their mind just for one shot.
I think Kim is right on. It was simply an aesthetic decision.
steve
Its Microsoft’s iOffice. On the first screen shot it was still loading so we had 11 icons. On the second shot it was finally done loading up and pushed the icons down because we now have 12 icons. On the third shot iOffice crashed and we went back down to 11 icons.
Perhaps it adds some kind of icon for the running application just to make “alt-tabbing” easier and that pushes the icons downward?
I agree with Kim. I’m a commercial director myself, and I can SO see the client demanding that the “weird space on the right” be fixed.
No matter how meticulously we geeks scrutinize each frame of a commercial, ad agencies and clients will even more meticulously critique each frame of a commercial hundreds of times before it gets released. So I’m leaning towards the opinion that this is not an editing or continuity glitch but a deliberate use of “artistic license”.
But of course, if there’s a cool app that they’re hiding then I’m all stoked to find out what it is 😀
Don’t read too much into it. It’s just how marketing and advertising works.
The close up showing the 4 icons would have looked slightly odd to the eye if a 4th icon was present and symetrical to look at. In the zoomed out view the ‘gap’ does not distract the eye.
I agree with neil, probably another widget… Or maybe Steve doesn’t like the odd number.
It’s probably something stupid like ‘Now Playing’
What if they simply removed three icons from the row above?
Why assume they ‘added a mystery app’
~Dude
>> Don’t all Cell Phones have one now?
>> This is how a freaking RAZR from Verizon can give someone directions and maps walking
>> down a street. If the iPhone really doesn’t have GPS, that is truly sad and in violation of 911
>> requirements isn’t it?
No. E911 enables 911 dispatch operators to locate a cell phone based on information reported through the tower that received the 911 call; that is, if you call 911 from a cell phone in Manhattan at Broadway and W 34th, and the nearest tower is at 7th AVE and W 34th, The 911 dispatch center will know that the tower at 7th & 34th is the one being used. More advanced systems can use what amounts to triangulation to give a location for a cell phone call within a certain tolerance. Some phones use a GPS, or GPS-like system for location with E911, but it is not a requirement.
>>Kim Hill
Exactly my thought. Stop fussing over that iPhone and buy the Neo1973 when it comes out of beta sometime in the next millenium.
Keep in mind something. The icon was not added to the bottom, row. Logic would follow it’s something that Apple UI designers would feel is used more often than the icons below it. A Diagnostics button would surely goto the bottom row as the last possible button if there ever were one.
it’s not the only shot where you see evidence of the 12th icon.
the first close-up in the “never been” spot, where the iPod icon is selected, you can see the “notes” icon doing the expose zoom down and to the right. if there were only 11 icons it would be going down and to the left and not be seen in this shot.
Have to agree with the last comment. Possibly done to fill the space…
@TheNetAvenger :
No. most cellphones do not have a GPS in them. The only ones that all have GPS receivers are the nextel/boost mobile motorolas. Other than that, they are scattered around. Not even Cingular’s top of the line $500 8525 has a GPS.
IF the demonstrator had pushed the iPod button, it could be a “What’s Playing” application popping up on the menu?
I’m thinking something like the iphone will have the ability to create and arrange shortcuts etc, so it’s probably just someone who’s made a shortcut to some game or app installed on the phone.
I’m going to guess it adds an icon up there while the iPod is playing music.
>>> And second, why didn’t the editors of this commercial catch this lack of continuity between shots?
Because even thought the editor of this commercial is paid to do it, chances are he doesn’t pore over these videos as much as our rabid fan community.
Either that, or, as suggested by other comments, it was a purely asthetic change, and Apple did not consider the technical implications.
there is evidence of a 12th button in the “Never Been” add. In the very first close up, when the iPod button is selected you can see the Notes icon zooming down and to the right. if there were only 11 icons it would be zooming down and to the left.
iphone will rule
Powder, that was hilarious.
===
“Its Microsoft’s iOffice. On the first screen shot it was still loading so we had 11 icons. On the second shot it was finally done loading up and pushed the icons down because we now have 12 icons. On the third shot iOffice crashed and we went back down to 11 icons.”
🙂
YouTube.
GPS?
no