Microsoft Embraces “I’m A PC”

A recent post on the Windows Vista Blog led me to a New York Times article: Echoing the Campaign of a Rival, Microsoft Aims to Redefine ‘I’m a PC’. It’s worth the read. The Microsoft ads weren’t being “cancelled” and the campaign isn’t a failure…they were just icebreakers…like they said.

About the new ads, via the NYT article:

What follows is an audacious embrace of the disdainful label that Apple, Microsoft’s rival, has gleefully — and successfully — affixed onto users of Microsoft products: “I’m a PC.”

One new Microsoft commercial even begins with a company engineer who resembles John Hodgman, the comedian portraying the loser PC character in the Apple campaign. “Hello, I’m a PC,” the engineer says, echoing Mr. Hodgman’s recurring line, “and I’ve been made into a stereotype.”

The strategy to use the Apple attack as the basis for a counterstrike is typical for the agency behind the campaign, Crispin Porter & Bogusky.

Crispin Porter, part of MDC Partners, relishes efforts to transform perceived negatives into positives. For another client, Burger King, the calorie-stuffed menu is portrayed to a target audience of young men as a rebellious personal choice to “Have it your way.”

Mr. Gates makes a cameo appearance in the new Microsoft spots, along with celebrities like the actress Eva Longoria, the author Deepak Chopra and the singer Pharrell Williams. (Mr. Seinfeld is gone, at least for now.)

But the stars are everyday PC users, from scientists and fashion designers to shark hunters and teachers, all of whom affirm, in fast-paced, upbeat vignettes, their pride in using the computers that run on Microsoft operating systems and software.

Among them are more than 60 Microsoft employees, who are accompanied in the ads by e-mail addresses — even Mr. Gates’s (bill@windows.com)

I would just like to point out that I thought the first set of ads were funny and I wasn’t afraid to say so. But you guys were absolutely off your rockers if you thought that was how they spent the $300 million. Seriously.