In a recent Television commercial for a Taiwanese Action Electronics Co.’s combined PC and multi-language dictionary promotion, Taiwanese comedian and impersonator Ah-Ken, dressed in Jobs’ trademark black turtle neck sweater and blue jeans and sporting white angel’s wings and a halo, extols the virtues of company’s new product.
“Introducing the new generation of the pad,” says the “Jobs” character, whipping the Action Pad out of his back jeans pocket, wings flapping as he shows off the dictionary functions on a giant screen behind a darkened stage furnished with a sofa and small table. “Thank God I finally get to play other tablets,” the character adds in the 20-second commercial’s final scene, a broad grin on his face as he taps away on the device on the sofa. The ad is subtitled in English throughout, a nod to the device’s dictionary function.
Jobs, who died in October last year, famously referred to Android as “shit,” – going towards his biography – he was quoted in the book as saying he was going to “destroy” Android and was prepared to go to “thermonuclear war” over the product. “Steve Jobs always promoted things that were good for people, Apple products, so his image can also promote other things that are good,” said Chelsea Chen, a spokeswoman for Action Electronics, a maker of electronic gadgets including portable DVD players and Internet devices.
The commercial does not use any of Jobs’ name or even refer to him or the iPhone maker, Apple in any way – but it results in drawing series of sharp reactions on YouTube.
