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There's an old saw in marketing that half your advertising dollars are wasted. You just don't know which half.

Well, now we do.

Bill Gates looks more like the PC guy than the PC guy.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:02 am Comment from: Randian

How come none of these asshat commentators ever mention Seinfeld's Mac usage? For the love of sitcomity, didn't any of them ever see the omnipresent Apple product in the corner of his apartment IN EVERY STINKING EPISODE?

P.T. Barnum was right.

The thing with Seinfeld was that it was "A show about nothing", not just a show about nothing. Those air quotes are what have been forgotten about these ads. The shows had stories, funny things happened which then paid off with funnier things later in the episode. The things in the episodes may have been the inanities of life but they weren't literally about nothing, if they had been then they'd have been incredibly dull. Like this ad.

I use a Mac, and I think the Fonz is cool. So there!

Sep 08, 08 - 10:08 am Comment from: Jay-Z

I think these commercials are a metaphor for Microsoft software; neither of them make any sense.

Wonder if Microsoft is thinking of asking for its money back....

If this is what Microsoft considers "creative" advertising, it's no wonder their entire corporate body can't seem to come up with a single original idea. I want my two minutes back!

Sep 08, 08 - 10:17 am Comment from: Buster

Its about as confusing as Vista itself (and about as stupid)

Sep 08, 08 - 10:18 am Comment from: MrMcLargeHuge

So....white guys can't be "cool" anymore...

Yessiree, this ad just continues to prove that Micros**t simply does not have the ability to produce (I hesitate to use the word "create") anything that works. This "gift" even flows down to the people they hire, apparently.

I agree that the commercial was very weak. However, as I understand, there is supposed to be a series of commercials that eventually get their message across, whatever that message may be. If that's the case, it's not really fair to judge the entire ad campaign by the first commercial. But the second one better be a giant step up or they're in trouble. For the record, I doubt if any of the other ones will be much better.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:27 am Comment from: Jamie

So I'll ask the obvious question:

Does the 'Wow' start now?

"So....white guys can't be 'cool' anymore..."

Not since James Dean died.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:29 am Comment from: silverwarloc

@Wish I Was Here:

The problem is this: with the Mac vs. PC ad, you knew right away what was being compared. However, with this MS ad, you don't know what you are getting...let alone what they are getting to.

But, you are correct, they vastly need to improve their second offering. Otherwise, they'll be ridiculed more by Apple for sending out such a lousy commercial.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:29 am Comment from: whoitis

It's almost as if they tried to hard...

The funniest thing is that the picture they used on Bill's "ID card" is his picture from when he was arrested in New Mexico.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:32 am Comment from: qka

See today's Joy of Tech for a great take on the ad:

http://www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/index.html

Sep 08, 08 - 10:36 am Comment from: obtusegoose

Crispin, Porter + Bogusky got $300 million and came up with this crap? Really?

The cleverest explanation of this ad that I have seen is found here:

http://www.extremeink.com/awtk/2008/09/explaining-seinfeld-gates-microsoft-ad.html

Microsoft just wants to remind everyone that they have the biggest dick.

This ad is more for Conquistador shoes than Windows, Microsoft, or anything else. Seinfeld and Gates even LOOK old. Heck, Gates doesn't even work for MS anymore!

I had my family watch this, and they didn't get it either. We even played it a couple of times (how did we ever watch TV without a DVR?), and it was even worse.

What a colossal waste of money.

"Crispin, Porter + Bogusky got $300 million and came up with this crap?"

They also are responsible for the creepy Burger King ads and the "Orville Deadenbacher" ads. Evidently, ConAgra was not please with the reactions to the reanimation of the deceased Orville. Perhaps creating a zombie to promote light and fluffy popcorn wasn't the best idea. Now if ConAgra had wanted to promote an instant human brains packaged product . . . just three minutes in the microwave! Mmmm, it's just like Grandma's.

s/b "was not pleased"

Please continue.

It's a good ad for Shoe Circus, I watched it twice. Not often that a small chain which sells the Conquistador shoe -they run tight- can get two retired gentlemen to tee it up one more time for a small businessman.

Just another reason I thank my lucky stars for dumping the PC in 2005 and getting my first Mac, the Mini.

I'm really shocked about Crispin, Porter + Bogusky. These guys are considered one of the best in the Ad Business. They came up w/ the Burger King commercials (wake up w/ the king etc.), All the latest great VW ads and numerous other amazing campaigns. This is very out of character for them. It makes me think that the client (MS) is doing the design by committee routine dumbing down the concept, or even worse... Dictating the concept.

I'm curious if the purpose of the commercial was actually be bad to get people buzzing and interested in seeing how dumb the next one will be. It would be an interesting strategy.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:50 am Comment from: twilightmoon

bizlaw: "What a colossal waste of money."

It was either these ads or design a new Zune. It was a tough call.

Sep 08, 08 - 10:53 am Comment from: Zune Tang®

I love these ads! This commercial energizes the Windows base. Microsoft's campaign isn't about all those namby-pamby issues you MAC dorks mistakenly hold near to your hearts like security, ease-of-use or ridiculous claims of "everything just works." Microsoft doesn't have to stoop to that level. The genius of the ads is they're about nothing, just as 'Seinfeld' was about nothing. And that's saying something.

It's time to take back computing from you elitist MAC sheep! Gates/Ballmer '08!

Your potential. Our passion.™

This isn't even an ad (or a campaign) about Vista. It's about "the next big thing." As it tells us cryptically at the end, "The Future" will be "Delicious." They're telling people to forget about Vista, they know it sucks, but just you wait, what they've got up their sleeve will really be great. Really. They're not kidding this time.

Maybe it was Crispin Glover and not Crispin, Porter.

"McDougall writes, "These guys probably still think the Fonz is cool."

LMAO!!!

Actually, once i realized i was wasting my life, I stopped it, so I never fully watched the ad. That's how bad it is. It's like having TiVo your whole life, then trying to sit thru commercials at a friends house, makes you wanna jump out a window!! lol

Sep 08, 08 - 11:25 am Comment from: tmsruge

Anyone notice they've dropped 'Microsoft' an instead are simply using 'Windows'...?

Jerry Seinfeld has managed to have his cake and eat it. His dilemna? How to take money touting Windows and yet somehow remain faithful to the Mac platform. Solution? Make nonsensical ads that completely backfire. The man is a genius!

Sep 08, 08 - 11:49 am Comment from: Buster

@0g1dnew...thanks for the url.

The ad tries to tell everyone that Bill's dick is bigger and herder than anyone else's....and that is why they named it MicroSoft??? ,

Sep 08, 08 - 11:50 am Comment from: Buster

Herder is a phonetic application of the Canadian accent to using the word harder

(You do buy that don't you?)

"How to take money touting Windows and yet somehow remain faithful to the Mac platform."

Yes, there was a whole series of Macs in Jerry's apartment on Seinfeld most likely placed there by a set designer and updated by a set designer over the years. Remember that Seinfeld promoted HP with Vista PCs in connection with his Bee Movie rollout. Is there any credible evidence that he's a Mac user?

There has to be a level of intelligence for anyone to figure out this first ad of theirs. Ironically,
Micro$oft has never made a dime on a customer base of intelligence, having released another lifelong beta of unfinished software.
Didn't Bill retire? That alone shows M$'s desperation. Jerry Seinfeld does NOT represent a new generation, funny or not.
As said before, pay off my mortgage and I'll do it much cheaper.

Sep 08, 08 - 12:00 pm Comment from: John

Ouch, baby... Very ouch!

And I'm lovin' it

Sep 08, 08 - 12:07 pm Comment from: Uncle Al

They should have let the guys from Mad Men create a commercial. It would have been topical and hip (for 1962). Oh wait.

What the hell is that ad about?

Bill Gates so down on his luck these days he has to buy cheap shoes?

Or are they aping the concept of the show 'Seinfeld', which was apparently about 'nothing'?

Sep 08, 08 - 12:21 pm Comment from: Demon

The Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld are both old and retired. They meet in an old store (see Picture on Bill Gates' Shoe Circus card), Were bill is buying stuffy old man shoes with an stuffy old name "Conquistador" and at the end they shuffle off with their backs to the camera at the end.
The Commercial's symbolism said's it all. Microsoft Windows is very old, very stuffy, for your grand father's PC, we're not going to change it so, you might as well learn to live with, Windows does not work out of the box, requires a lot of work to make it fit your system, and Microsoft thinks everyone will just shuffle off happy with buggy Windows.
I think if there are too many more boring Microsoft Jerry Seinfeld
commercials Microsoft might be a MS adverting exodus. I sure all the MS employees and MS Fanboys think it's a funny and cleaver ad and will devastating to Linux and Mac OS

Sep 08, 08 - 12:28 pm Comment from: Anonymous©

Crispin did NOT get $300M. They got an account worth $300M. They get a percentage of the ad-spend.

Sep 08, 08 - 12:29 pm Comment from: The Other Steve

The Seinfeld ad proves one thing . . .

Jerry is STILL a Mac fan!

Sep 08, 08 - 12:31 pm Comment from: The Other Steve

What the shoe ad is trying to say is that Microsoft is coming out with a shoe that works with the Zune!

Sep 08, 08 - 12:32 pm Comment from: ecrabb

@Tom V,

You said, "The Burger King commercials (wake up w/ the king etc.) <snip> and numerous other amazing campaigns. This is very out of character for them. It makes me think that the client (MS) is doing the design by committee routine dumbing down the concept, or even worse... Dictating the concept."

Dude... Are you insane? The Burger King commercials - especially "wake up w/the king" - amazing?!?!? Do you mean "amazing" as in, "Wow, that dude with the turd on his head and wearing a shirt for pants was amazing!"? Huh? Exactly. Those are the most bizarre commercials I've seen in years. I HATE seeing them, and it makes me want to avoid BK specifically because of the commercials.

It makes perfect sense though now that you've informed me that the same agency who created the BK oddity, has now created this train wreck for Microsoft. BK concept the case in point, I'm pretty sure the agency needed no assistance from Microsoft to create something that would turn people off. Come to think of it though, Microsoft would be particularly well-suited in that regard.

Sep 08, 08 - 12:33 pm Comment from: JadisOne

The article was great, but those who commented on the article defended Windows with vitriol aimed at anyone who was even the slightest bit critical of Windows and completely missed the entire point of the article. Typical. And they call Apple Macintosh users zealots. Yeah, right.

Uhm... about the ad. It's getting a lot of people talking about it. I'd say it accomplished its purpose to set up the next few ads.

well... this just goes to show what I guy with money to burn will do. Burn it, the ad is a total waste of time and will result in zero additonal M$ sales. a crap load of of poorly written code is like a 51,52, 53 automobile. See Johnny Cash song I built it once piece at a time. turns out Bill got paid a dollar for each piece of code. not much incentive to improve it.

I remember as a Mac person back in the mid- 80's that they were advertised for 'the rest of us' (with all of the c-drive, d-drive, back-slashes etc...) We Mac Users were humble enough that we needed something else that was easy to use and understand... We had no desire to be able to configure our own computers' insides... we just wanted to be able to use them.
The PC people were much more erudite, and full of their pride.

Well this Microsoft ad is right up that alley. This isn't going to appeal to everyone... only those who are so full of their pride and 'their' level of humor (that which takes a great deal of thought to 'try' to understand and appreciate) unlike the Apple commercials which are short, sweet, to the point, and ones that make a person LOL! To the 'brainiacks' they can go buy themselves another Dell... with its operating system that you have to have either 1) a doctorate in computing or 2) infinite patience and time to give up to use it...

Me... I'll just keep on being productive on my simple MacBook...

does anyone remember those bizarre zune ads (tv and web)? i'd say not enough to make a dent in the market share of that product. ah, but THIS ad — we're all talking about it! too bad for them, it also will fail to make a positive dent in the way people think about vista.

the campaign has to unfold, of course, before i say that it stinks, but i already know that the product and company does. doesn't really matter.

and i'm open-minded, too...

wouldn't it be ironic if this campaign worked and got more people to try vista only to create an entirely NEW population of people to shun microsoft and it's knock-off, mash-up products?

Too bad Michael Richards got into hot water lately, because if you're going to pull Jerry Seinfeld out of (semi) retirement for a spot like this (a typical Seinfeld-type moment) because everyone knows Kramer was the real fashionista on Seinfeld. Christ, they donated the infamous "puffy shirt" to the Smithsonian, after all.

Would've been much better with Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld as a couple semi-retired rich white guys with nothing better to do than hang out together at the mall. They cruise into the shoe store only to be interrupted by Richards, who (like Kramer would do) immediately turns their attention to the amazing Conquistadors.

Unlike this spot, the shoes could have looked goofy as hell too, but naturally would have been the most comfortable shoes they've ever worn...

...that is, until the second or third spot.