or: get a microsoft.
… is the Apple advertisement that just started running. I saw it twice over the weekend. It’s like watching an infant bleed to death (sorry, I’m trying to censor myself; the real vision is much worse and, for some reason, involves alagorious farm animals).
I get it, Microsoft spends a shitton of money on advertising while producing a shitty product. Or something. I’ve no problems with Vista and like my HP more than work’s macbook pro. I think Macs are new-user machines that do what they need to while looking cool and being over-priced (and yes, I’m in a field that’s very mac-centric).
Why are Microsoft and Apple in competition anyway? Apple has cool looking machines with Genius support that are cool looking. (how many college freshman do you know that begged their parents for a MacBook because they wanted drag-and-drop installs?) Microsoft doesn’t make machines.
Conversely, Apple has to go after Microsoft because there are too many PC manufacturers. Or maybe because they have over 75% of the OS market share. Apple has a relatively pathetic product line (six, wow… consider the market flooded; thankfully, they all look alike too) and can only manage about 10% of the market with OSX (but it’s growing; screams all you reading on your cool looking Mac).
Microsoft is wasting its energy competing with Apple (like punching that bleeding infant mentioned earlier). They should be absorbing consumer criticism and creating smarter, more intuitive products. Apple’s “bean counter” ad is just a desperate attempt to sell the masses on the obvious.
We learn about drugs (with worse side-effects than what they’re curing) from commercials, see 5,000 promotions daily and have a pathetically unreliable media (not to mention more credit debt, more stress and less overall enjoyment). It’s just another example of marketing and message prioritized over progress and cooperation. Which is why Japan is laughing at us. (Though, not directly. They prefer doing it through text messages and emotocons from their superior devices, which is far more awkward.)
Tags: advertising, corporations