oh apple, no not the pie...
I absolutely love the mac commercials:
http://www.apple.com/getamac/
They are so clever, they have a clear message and they are memorable.
This dude, however, calls them meanspirited and says they aren't effective:
http://www.slate.com/id/2143810/
"My problem with these ads begins with the casting. As the Mac character, Justin Long (who was in the forgettable movie Dodgeball and the forgettabler TV show Ed) is just the sort of unshaven, hoodie-wearing, hands-in-pockets hipster we've always imagined when picturing a Mac enthusiast. He's perfect. Too perfect. It's like Apple is parodying its own image while also cementing it. If the idea was to reach out to new types of consumers (the kind who aren't already evangelizing for Macs), they ought to have used a different type of actor."
Come on, first of all, we all know that everyone wants to be the cool hoodie-wearing hipster, even if they don't admit it, and second of all the person represents the mac itself not neccessarily the consumers who buy it so to pick a less perfect actor for the part would be misleading and not representative of the product, and third of all, they use the commercials to show that macs can expand their usage, like the one where he is dressed in suit and has just come from a "meeting."
And his second point:
"The final straw, for me, is that the spots make unconvincing claims. The one titled "Network" has a funny bit where "that new digital camera from Japan" is represented by a Japanese woman in a minidress. While Hodgman has trouble talking with the woman, Long speaks Japanese and shares giggles with her because "everything just kind of works with a Mac." Now, I happen to have a digital camera from Japan, and it works just fine with my PC. It did from the moment I connected it. Similarly, the spot titled "Out of the Box" (again, a very funny visual metaphor, with Hodgman and Long crouching in cardboard boxes) suggests that new PCs require tons of attention and alteration when you first fire them up. But I bought a new ThinkPad notebook just a few months ago, and it ran on all cylinders pretty much straight out of the gate. Why insult my intelligence by telling me something that I know isn't true?"
But it is true, I grew up as a PC user and was converted as a senior in high school to Macs. When I went to collge I bought my first Mac and I will never go back. No more installing drivers or oh no i lost the software to that so I can't hook it up. Not to mention that mac interfaces are a lot more intuitive and user friendy. There are fewer cords, it doesn't even all have to be color coded as PC cords are, because its all so damn easy. Basically Macs rule!!
33 Comments:
I have always loved these commercials (although I am a diehard PC gal), and your blog inspired me to revisit them. For those of you who haven't submitted to the tyranny of Mac and thus don't have quicktime, you can find some of the commercials on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=nicoleshune
Here are some of my fav parts...
Commercial 1
PC: I think I gotta crash
Mac: Okay, if you think that will help
PC: falls over
Commercial 2
Mac: There's plenty of work out there for both of us, I don't know why you're acting like this.
PC: Why go on? Just let me lie here and depreciate...
That is all.
1) i absolutely HATE my mac. it is cute, but isnt worth its weight in peanuts. it crashes allllll the time and I bought a new memory card for it. guess what? you have to get a mac technician to install it.
2)also, i really think the PC guy is more likable. he always makes me laugh.
hold it right there lemon! Yes , ibooks blow, you gotta get a powerbook!!! or a new G5! Macs are wonderful!( you just have the wrong one) and exactly you are laughing AT the PC, not WITH him. HA!
so what if i am laughing AT him or with him? hes still what makes the commericals funny.
and no, i am not going to SAVE up over a grand to buy another mac after my ibook failed me so horrendously. im not a designer, i dont need that shit.
also, christina, the fact that you called my original comment "traitoresque" only means Apple has crazy good brand loyalty & you bought into it.
heck yea i bought into it, i'm a designer, if anyone is going to buy into it, it would be me. I feel that apple should be rewarded for their genius! with my business. Actually its closer to two grand, but mac's aren't just for designers! They are for the cool kids...don't you watch the commercials? hehe, oh fine, so don't buy a mac, you still have to admit their commercials are awesome even if it is the PC guy that yo like the best, he is still IN a mac commercial.
haha two grand. yeah fucking right im going to spend two grand for another mac then (and if i hadnt gotten the first one as a gift i wouldnt be in this mess). ive spent over 400 dollars fixing my peice o'shit already, and with 500 these days you can get a decent dell. do i need the apple brand? hellll no.
goddamn blogspot. i wish i could edit my serious typos in here.
a dell? a dell? dells break all the time, do you know how many dells even last four years? as ur ibook has done? NONE. Do you remember our old roommate meghan, PC gal, who went through 4 computers in four years? all pcs?? all dead beyond repair....so you get your 500 dollar dell just remember that over the next four years you will have spent the same amount of money and will have had to go through the hassle of buying four new computers and on top of that you don't even have a cute computer with a friendly interface to look at!
ALSO, look at sara's comment.I have always loved these commercials (although I am a diehard PC gal) the guy is right, they don't sell current PC users on the brand.
i like the commercials, too, but they dont make me want another mac.
pssh-a, logan has a PC that has lasted 5 years or something, without(!) breaking like mine has. mine has needed a new harddrive, it has needed to be fixed for that silly little problem wherein it would simply shut down and not turn on again, and still crashes all the time. yes, i will find a reliable PC and my life will be complete.
ooo you could get a mini for $500
reliable and pc do not go together, and was logan's five year machine cheap? my mac only broke once and I was able to fix it myself via discussion boards and such. and that wasn't until it was 5 years old or so and I got it used!
i haven't owned a PC that cost more that $600. never any serious problems until they just get old--at which point it's time to upgrade, anyway, as technology moves too fast. my current PC is about 3 years old. never a problem.
macs suck.
SSSSUUUUUUUCCCCCCCKKKKK!
i also think those mac commericials are funny, but agree they're not selling anything to anybody but die-hard mac loyalists. all the things they claim macs do better (outside of design) are untrue. and macs simply aren't easier to use. you're either use to one or the other, so you're bound to think whichever one you do use is the easier one to operate.
AND i'm already much cooler than the hoody-wearing, hands-in-pants guy, so that doesn't sell me either.
Apples? Are you for real? Why is it that the designers use a system which only 10% of the market use? Sounds like they are only designing for themselves if you ask me (which no one did). And who says Apples are any better at design software than PCs?
As for PCs always breaking down and crashing? Complete lies. If you look at the ratio between apple and PC computers sold you'll see that it's about 1000 to 1. So it would only seem logical that you would find more crashes on a PC because they are the majority.
And on a another note, Apple would be dead in the water if they had no embraced the Linux world. That's right, Apples OS X is almost a direct port of FreeBSD aka Darwin, an open source OS based on Unix. And that Pretty OS with all the cool colors and animations? Just a lousy windows manager trying to make up for it's lack of confidence in the 'real' world. Face it, PC's are much better, why else would Apples start to use the Intel architecture? Everyone knows the PowerPC chips overheated and sucked at producing computation bandwidths any higher than 1GHz. Also anything Apple can come up with and says it's new and never been done is another lie. The open source community (Linux) is pretty much on the bleeding edgy of software design and application performance.
anyway, that's what i think.
Oh yeah, one last thing, (as Steve Jobs would say) the single application which proves my point: Safari.
oh my god, i HATE safari!
i was a pc person, before i switched to mac and I only thought pcs were easy to use because i was good at using them, a complete moron could use a mac, i cannot say the same for the pc...for the first time computer user I think macs are better.
seriously though, these days first time computer users are in kindergarten.
my favorite thing about macs, as a designer is not their ability to run design software, because yes pc's can do that too(althought transfering files from computer to computer is more difficult with stupid pcs) i like that they are designed well, they are intuitive, they are a beautiful computer with a darn pretty interface and i'm not ashamed to admit that as I designer I am a lot more likely to buy something pretty than something yucky (hi-tech term I know) and it just so happens that they are a far superior computer as well, but ya know what I don't want all you guys to buy macs anyway because then they wouldn't be special and people would start making viruses for them and such. So all of you continue to spread your evil PC propaganda and I will be chilling over here with my way cooler computer!
ok you chill with your way cooler , way more expensive computer,and ill buy a cheap good PC and some antivirus software AND a new digital camera and still have spending money leftover (compared to a mac).
my comp has been virus-free the entire time i've owned it.
boo-yeah! moted!
word.
word.
did you guys just say "word"?
wow....ur right pc users are cooler...
AHAHAHAHAAH
okay i revert to the moron factor...do you know how rare it is to never get a virus on a pc? do you know how many morons there are out there who do get tons of viruses...
Myth 1: There are no virus for macs.
Fact 1: That is entirely untrue. There are plenty of virus for the mac, they don't get passed around because of the percentages of users that use macs. besides, what's on a mac to steal with your virus? baby pictures and family albums? Please... I'd rather steal some credit card numbers.
Myth 2: Macs don't crash
Fact 1: Just recently in the news apple admitted that there was a problem with their new Mac Book Pro (or whatever you call them). What was the problem? It caused the machine to reboot, without warning and sometimes would not boot properly. They didn't admit there was a problem until they had a hardware fix for it.
all i'm saying is... Linux rules suckers! death to windows and macs! no wait, i need windows to run things on my TV... death to macs only!
well i'm glad we have all sides represented in this debate, no matter how wrong you all are. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUoQqL5qOw4
funny?
you silly pc/linux people are just jealous of our kick ass commercials! That is why you mock them! Your commercials aren't even cool enough to mock :)
When was the last time you saw a PC commercial? Maybe a few years ago with the stoner "Dude, you're gettin' a Dell!" kid? But it wasn't about switching people to an entirely different platform, it was just about the great deals that Dell has for students. So, if nobody in the PC faction is spending dollars to convert mac users to PC users, it leads one to believe that PC manufacturers don't need any new blood. They are floating fine without some expensive, although entertaining, but ultimately ineffective, campaign.
More simply, yes PCs don't have cute commercials, but that is because PCs don't need elaborate gimmicks to sell themselves.
The only reason that Mac even broke into the competition recently is because of the iPod. Yes, they do have some cutting edge technology when it comes to their MP3 players, but I am guessing that the reason most people stick to their iPods is not because they are the best player on the market, but because Apple made it impossible to use anything else. Want to buy music and movies on iTunes? Thanks to Apple's proprietary format, you can only load those songs onto an iPod. The only way they can keep customers is by forcing them to use their product instead of a competitor's product.
lets not forget that you can use itunes and an ipod with a PC and pc people are free to come up with their own program to use with their mp3 players if they want don't even get me started on all the stuff that pc people made only windows friendly back in the day...microsoft is the king of that, not apple.
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