Apple has changed a significant longstanding policy and its evident from a new TV commercial for the iPad – a spot Apple largely had nothing to do with.
Verizon has debuted a new TV commercial for the iPad and its MiFi for wireless Internet connection.
In the past, Apple has never allowed any business partner – including AT&T – to independently produce television commercials spotlighting Apple products.
To this very day, in fact, Apple is largely behind all AT&T ads for the iPhone, despite that AT&T is the exclusive wireless carrier of the iPhone in the United States.
Suddenly, however, Verizon isn’t being held to the same rule vigorously enforced by Apple in other applications.
But is Verizon really unique to the situation or just a beneficiary of a much bigger altered Apple policy of inclusion?
In recent months, Apple has done deals with more retail outlets, for example, than ever before to carry the iPad and iPhone in time for the rush of the holiday shopping season. As a result, Apple has been forced – for the sake of big business – to loosen up and expand its circle of trust and market exposure.
While some are quick to assume that Verizon must be preparing to carry the iPhone in the US any day now, it is much more likely that the carrier’s ability to independently produce its own iPad TV commercial simply reflects Apple’s more laxed policy regarding who stocks the company’s products and who promotes them.