Samsung vs Apple or Obama vs Romney?
Can the real election campaign of Fall 2012 please stand up? (At least one really does have to do with free market enterprise.)
All joking aside, the Samsung vs. Apple battle has raged throughout the year mainly due to a lawsuit between the two that was won by Apple. However, it just intensified with the phone wars over the Samsung Galaxy S3 and the iPhone 5.
The battle is set to intensify after Samsung released an attack ad poster comparing the two and showing off how Samsung has more features than Apple. But what makes the ad so harsh is not the comparison but the slug line which reads "It doesn't take a genius." It's a clear jab at Apple's "genius" retail employees but also a desire to state that deciding between the two phones is easy. To accentuate their argument, they added an unattractive picture of the iPhone 5 to emphasize how much better their phone looks.
The ad is actually quite interesting in how Samsung starts with technical specifics about screen size and HD resolution, weight, RAM storage, etc and then reverts to more generic terms such as "Smart Stay," "Direct Call," "Tilt to Zoom," "Palm Touch Mute Pause," "Turn over to Mute," and "Shake to update." The vague quality of the latter arguments actually weakens Samsung's advertisement and even makes it a tad bit laughable.
How did Apple respond to such an aggressive attack? They didn't need to as their fans took care of it for them. Apple fans drew up a similar add with the headline " Don't Settle for Cheap Plastic" as a reference to the fact that Apple has been known for its high end resistant plastic while Samsung's phones are a tad bit more susceptible. The Apple fans then resorted to compiling a similar comparison list but add more specific features such as iCloud, Quad-Core A6 CPU, 700,000 apps, Panorama, Passbook, iMessage, Airplay, and many others. Otehr Apple fans devised their own ads.
Samsung released the Galaxy S3 in June to pre-empt the release of the iPhone 5 which is due September 21. Samsung has also announced the impending release of the Galaxy Note 2 as a means of diminishing Apple's phone business. It should be interesting to see how the attacks from either side progress as the holiday season gets underway and each company vies for new customers to elect their product as their next phone.