Posted May 11, 2026
Fifteen years ago, Apple integrated Siri into its iPhones. Users met Siri with shock and awe—a voice-to-voice robot that could do tasks, never mind how menial. At this time, Steve Jobs was still spearheading Apple. His approach at Apple was controversial and visionary. In those days, Apple led technological breakthroughs, for better and (maybe mostly) for worse.
Siri seemed like a new breakthrough. However, in fifteen years, Siri seems to have never improved. It struggles to do basic tasks, despite the advances of AI. Last year, Apple teased breakthrough new AI features with Siri, called Apple Intelligence, for its iPhone 15 and 16. The massive improvements are featured everywhere in ads.
But they have yet to deliver.
The settlement accuses them, “Apple allegedly saturated the market with deceptive ads, inducing consumers to purchase iPhones based on the promise of certain Enhanced Siri features.” A class-action lawsuit was filed against them last year for overpromising in their massive advertising campaign. On the eve of CEO Tim Cook’s departure, Apple has agreed to pay a quarter of a billion dollars in settlement over accusations; Apple admits no wrongdoing.
The $250 million payout will go to consumers. CNET summarizes, in case you bought one of these models:
Anyone living in the US who bought a phone from the iPhone 16 series, an iPhone 16E, an iPhone 15 Pro or an iPhone 15 Pro Max from June 10, 2024, through March 29, 2025, can claim a part of the $250 million settlement pool, starting at $25 per device, which may be higher or lower depending on how many people apply to claim their portion. Recompense maxes out at $95 per device.
However, Apple is not the only company to receive a slap on the wrist recently worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
Ticketmaster and Live Nation (merged under Live Nation Entertainment since 2010) are the middlemen between big concert venues and concertgoers. In March of 2026, they reached a settlement deal reaching $280 million with the US Department of Justice. But many states pressed on and continued the lawsuit.
Last month, a jury found them to be anticompetitive monopolies. Their tactics were to smother competition, then raise prices on consumers. The head of ticketing for Venue Nation wrote to another employee that they were “robbing [customers] blind, baby.”
This highlights the distinction between what people say and mean, or say and cover up. On their website, Live Nation describes the merger like this:
In 2010, Ticketmaster and Live Nation merged to form Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. … to join forces and create an artist-driven company that provided fans with the highest quality live experience.
Artists have long complained about this merger—and so have fans. To many outsiders, such an apparently monopolistic merger seems like a lose-lose for fans and artists.
But this brings up an interesting question.
Theology of Work, a non-denominational ministry that teaches the theology of Christian work, has an excellent white paper titled “Truth, Honesty, and Deception in the Workplace.” They write, “Jesus described himself as ‘the way and the truth and the life’ (John 14:6), and we understand that truth is the way of life God calls us to.” But the truth gets tricky in the modern workplace.
They make a case for nuanced, biblical discernment for withholding truth, extreme cases of ethical deception (lying to Nazis), and more. Of course, though, Christianity is a faith of truth, and that remains true in our work. They write, “Besides emulating the character of God, truth-telling is critical for a flourishing society.” In Deuteronomy 25:15, God ties together flourishing and structural, societal trust: “A full and fair weight you shall have, a full and fair measure you shall have, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is.”
So, what about advertising and gray areas of marketing?
In marketing, Theology of Work distinguishes between specific, concrete claims that consumers expect to match with facts and what is called “harmless puffery.” For example, if a burger joint calls itself “Texas’s best burger,” consumers recognize this as a slogan or exaggeration, not a demonstrable claim. However, even when most people would take the claim as not literal, wrongdoing can still occur.
Consider their illustration: “Take the example of a car dealership that advertises, ‘Credit problems? No application refused.’ Most people would not take an ad like this literally because we recognize it as commercial puffery. . . Yet because it makes a specific claim—‘no application refused’—it does have more potential to mislead than a vague opinion statement does.” Therefore, Theology of Work argues, this is an “unacceptable violation of truth-telling.”
There are also cases in advertising we all recognize: implicit promises. This product will make you happy, good-looking, and successful, since everyone who uses it seems this way. The product in question might be a sponge, arguably irrelevant to one’s attractiveness, joy, and prosperity.
In the US, our laws protect against certain, specific kinds of false advertising (the kind Apple allegedly committed). Nevertheless, there seems to exist a general erosion of trust in American society between government and the governed, consumers and companies, and neighbors in general. Perhaps the long history of advertisers saturating our attention with “puffery” and edge cases of outright deception contributes to this breakdown in trust.
And Scripture speaks to that distinction as well.
In any case, the Bible uses hyperbolic imagery and language in a poetic sense. “Every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping,” says David in Psalm 6:6.
Any reasonable student of Scripture will recognize the hyperbole as hyperbole, and therefore no deception has been committed. In a similar vein, if we play a game of poker, you’ll be expecting me to bluff and lie! Is marketing just a game, like poker? Certainly not, but perhaps because we all know advertising exaggerates, it lets them off the hook ethically.
In the case of advertising, there are clearly gray areas. There’s space for Christians to disagree on edge cases like this. But if you’re in marketing, I think there are ways for you to make a more honest market that goes beyond the bare legal minimum. If you’re a believer: don’t break the law and commit false advertising, obviously.
But we’re not called to the bare minimum. We’re called to love not “in word or talk but in deed and in truth.” (1 John 3:18) Ask yourself, can you follow Paul, who says, “Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor.” (Ephesians 4:25)
How can you introduce a new culture of truth-telling in advertising? Do you think harmless “puffery” counts as deception? What might count as harmful puffery?
Even if you’re not in advertising, each of us is called to follow Jesus as the “truth.” How can you do that better today?
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