Microsoft Uses "I'm a PC" Character In New Ads 837
arcticstoat writes to tell us that in the wake of their largely unsuccessful Jerry Seinfeld ad campaign Microsoft is setting their sights directly on recent Apple ads by featuring the "I'm a PC" character in their new advertising campaign. "He then follows this with another phrase, such as 'and I've been made into a stereotype' before the advert shifts to a range of people performing a diverse assortment of jobs, all of which also say they're a PC. Among those featured are astronaut Bernard Harris, as well as religious author Deepak Chopra and 'Desperate Housewives' actress Eva Longoria. The ad also features a wide range of anonymous people, including a shark diver, a teacher and a guy with a beard."
Guy with a beard? (Score:5, Funny)
Deepak Chopra? (Score:5, Funny)
If that quack uses Windows then I'm going to hug my Linux box when I get home.
Unedited version: I'm a PC... (Score:5, Funny)
...but I run Linux.
The hidden meaning (Score:5, Funny)
Lie! (Score:5, Funny)
Apple counters (Score:3, Funny)
Prediction: Apple, in what is becoming a war of "Who can make the most annoying ad" hires carrottop to do their next series.
Microsoft responds with bill gates simply walking on camera, then making "the most annoying sound in the world" for 2 minutes straight (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cVlTeIATBs)
No, I'm sorry, can't accept that (Score:3, Funny)
Okay, you had me up until that point, but this campaign is as doomed as the previous. We all know which operating system guys with beards use.
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Re:No, I'm sorry, can't accept that (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No, I'm sorry, can't accept that (Score:5, Funny)
Emacs?
Re:No, I'm sorry, can't accept that (Score:4, Funny)
Okay, you had me up until that point, but this campaign is as doomed as the previous. We all know which operating system guys with beards use.
Beard OS?
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
do they have a guy running round a street with a shotgun shooting people shouting "It crashed and lost my f***** work, I'm a b****** PC you c**** !"
No? Perhaps its modelled after Vista... a huge fat guy stuffing his face full of burgers, "I'm a PC, now give me more resources".
No? Pity, they'd be more in-tune with reality :-)
Mac vs. PC parody (Score:5, Funny)
Given that Microsoft is parodying the Mac vs. PC ads, this is on topic, right?
Best Mac vs. PC parody [youtube.com] ever.
Computers suck.
Microsoft just don't get it (Score:5, Funny)
I find it amazing the extent that Microsoft is screwing up at the moment.
Hey Apple marketing guys, Microsoft is doing your work for you!
This one is for free:
Justin Long: I'm a Mac.
John Hodgman and large crowd, together: And I'm a PC.
Justin Long [sincerely]: Hey guys, nice to meet you! There's so many of you! And you look like cool guys!
[John Hodgman looks smug]
Justin Long: I'd really like to hang out with you guys. [face lights up with idea]. Hey, would you like so see some of the new products we're working on?
[Lots of enthusiastic noise and nots - everyone follows Justin as he exits stage right. John Hodgman desperately tries to stop people. Final sequence - John Hodgman on his own, looking sorry for himself and a bit confused.]
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Guy with a beard? Fucking traitor!!!
Re:Guy with a beard? (Score:3, Funny)
Don't be. It's obviously false advertising. Guys with beards are old-school UNIX hackers, not Windows users. They could also be circa-1983 stock brokers.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
My wife saw the ad and made the best comment ever.
"I need to go out and buy a Mac now! I can not dorky enough to use Windows anymore."
Re:I liked it. (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, don't you mean "they're still getting a lot of things done..."?
It's a Freudian Astroturf!
I am just waiting for ... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Microsoft just don't get it (Score:3, Funny)
Another one:
Justin Long: I'm a Mac.
John Hodgman and large crowd, together: And I'm a PC.
Justin Long [Friendly and sincerely]: Hey guys, how's it going?
Crowd: [Friendly hellos.]
Justin Long [sincerely]: How are you getting on with Vista?
Crowd: [Lots of mururing and head shaking].
Justin Long [wanting to help]: Oh. Well maybe I can help.
John Hodgman [frantic]: No!
[John Hodgman tries to usher everyone out as Justin Long looks on with a bemused and apologetic look]
Live Without Walls (Score:3, Funny)
In Windows, you don't have any practical walls, firewalls, that is.
Just remember, with Microsoft, simply because there are no walls doesn't mean you aren't behind locked Gates.
Re:Guh. (Score:1, Funny)
False advertising is illegal, why isn't massively disseminating misinformation?
Because then all advertising would be illegal.
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
So, the message is, if you can't use proper English, you should buy a Mac?
You = dork. (Score:5, Funny)
2 days ago, I was posting how I thought Vista sucks (see here [slashdot.org]. Then I was accused of having a religious stance against Microsoft - which I thought was ironic considering I don't own a Mac, haven't owned a Linux system for about 12 years (Slackware 3.1 was the last distribution I used if I remember correctly) and work all day every day on Microsoft products.
So now I say I like Microsoft's commercial and now I'm astro-turfing for Microsoft.
Gotta love the Slashdot crowd.
Re:Lie! (Score:2, Funny)
You've got your correlation and causation backwards. Having a beard doesn't make you run Linux; running Linux makes you get a beard.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
Oh, the guy with a beard? He's using a PC, but it's running Linux. He was just forced to pay the Microsoft tax.
I AM SUPERMAN? (Score:3, Funny)
These are as annoying as those stupid "I AM" ads that Lotus used to run. Remember them? They had guys holding up "I AM" signs like this [scarydevil.com] to try and convince you that Lotus R5 was the bridge everyone else was jumping off.
Who the hell actually liked Lotus R5? Anyone? Anyone?
Who in the hell actually likes Windows? I mean, enough to identify themselves with it?
"Hi I'm a PC, and I'm really defensive about it..."
You = (person - humor) (Score:5, Funny)
Title says it all.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
The purpose of John Hodgman was not to "stereotype" PC users.
In that case, they failed hard, because that's exactly how he comes off in the commercials. What they supposedly were trying to make cheeky, light-hearted ads came off as insulting and mean-spirited towards the very people they want to advertise to. If that isn't bad marketing, I don't know what is.
Gee, if the shoe fits - do you look like John Hodgman by chance?
Johnny 5 (Score:1, Funny)
I use a Mac (as well as a Windows box), but I would no sooner say, "I'm a Mac" than I would, "I'm a Pepper."
But wouldn't you like to be a pepper too?
Re:New ads (Score:4, Funny)
College? Maybe you'd like to try some of that delicious pizza over there?
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
I'm a Mac and I found it to be pretty decent, for a commercial about an operating system.
You know, I was about to say how the worst thing about that ad was the way it failed to create the idea that the people shown are really computers, and instead shows a bunch of people rabidly obsessed with their particular kind of computer. "Who the hell calls themselves a computer?", I thought. I found it creepy.
I'm a PC best Quote (Score:3, Funny)
"I'm a PC and I turn #2* into energy!"
I dunno, it just seems so appropriate for the Microsoft Ad.
*#2 = shit.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
better != good
With one-liners like that, you should become a consultant.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
much better than the Seinfeld ones, anyway.
So is stepping into a bathtub full of agitated electric eels, but I wouldn't recommend Microsoft use that as a marketting strategy either.
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Operating systems need to stop being argued like a religion, I'm getting tired of it.
Blasphemy....burn the witch!
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
much better than the Seinfeld ones, anyway.
So is stepping into a bathtub full of agitated electric eels, but I wouldn't recommend Microsoft use that as a marketting strategy either.
Actually that might work.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Operating systems need to stop being argued like a religion, I'm getting tired of it.
If you don't like your OS being like a religion, maybe you should get out of the Cathedral and visit the Bazaar.
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Guh. (Score:3, Funny)
Windows users can have their "PC," I'll just call my Linux boxes a workstation, a set-top-box, a home server, etc. "PC" just sounds so bland anyway.
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
Operating systems need to stop being argued like a religion, I'm getting tired of it.
Yeah, it's taking the focus away from the KDE vs. Gnome and vi vs. emacs arguments.
Re:New ads (Score:5, Funny)
"the representation wasn't any more absurd that the right-wing characterization"
Did you really expect the impossible?
Re:You miss the point (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Weakness (Score:1, Funny)
My father was in advertising, and he always spoke, as if it were a rule, that you NEVER respond to criticism in an advertisement
My father used to say "never quote your father"
Re:New ads (Score:4, Funny)
Windows is bloated, dim witted, and isn't nimble.
There is a difference between stereotyping and accuracy.
Re:Microsoft just don't get it (Score:3, Funny)
PC [Hodgman] sitting in his king chair, surrounded by windows that have no apparent walls holding them up. Mac [Long] walks up.
Mac: What's up PC?
PC: Enjoying life without walls. I'm still the king, and all my subjects are PCs.
(Strangers come up behind PC, carry off some of his stuff)
PC: Hey! These guys are stealing all my stuff! (disgustedly sitting back down) Maybe going without walls was a bad idea.
Mac: Could be, but I have to ask. If you don't want walls, why do you have Windows?
PC: (long pause) I banish you... again.
Re:New ads (Score:3, Funny)
The purpose of John Hodgman was not to "stereotype" PC users. The purpose was to provide a boring image of PCs themselves through the comedy of John Hodgman.
No, John Hodgman is supposed to be boring Bill Gates, while the other guy represents hip, creative Steve Jobs. That's why they piss off Bill so much.
I know this because at an Apple developers conference, they showed a tape of John Hodgman (in the same suit and using the same whiny voice) announce that he had been talking to Steve Jobs recently, and that Steve had told him that "all Mac developers should immediately stop innovating and go help Bill with Vista."
Then he added "we need a lot of help with that."