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Microsoft to Respond to Apple's 'Get a Mac' Ads

They should just take a video camera in to a store and switch back and forth between showing the PC aisles and the Mac aisle. :cool:
 
I'd like to see Apple fight back with a commercial that goes something like this:

Hi, I'm a mac
and I'm a PC

Mac: Hey PC! Did you know the percetange of satisified Mac OS X Leopard users is 81%, and climbing?
PC: Really? Thats great *looks down, bummed out*
Mac: Are you OK? You look knd of down
PC: Yeah... It just that the percentage of satisifed Vista users is around 15 to 21%... and it's dropping
Mac: Well that's OK.... lots of people still like Vista
PC: Like who?! Even I don't like Vista. I "upgraded" to XP a while ago. In fact over __% have "upgraded" to XP... Some companies are even refusing to upgrade to Vista!
Mac: well m-
PC: and other companies are dumping PC's for Macs!
Mac: Well... thats ok. Mac sales a going up. That's good news for me... :)
PC: but that's bad news for me

etc. etc. etc.
 
~Shard~ said:
Too little too late I say.

Plus, won't this type of advertising have a nagetive effect? In other words, if the ads are a success and cause more people to move to Vista, won't this then result in those people realizing how horrible it is upon upgrading and thus they will switch to OS X, thereby reducing Windows' marketshare? :p :cool:

Also, I am curious as to what exactly Microsoft will focus on as being better than OS X. Bragging about better protection against viruses, spyware etc. for instance isn't really something to be proud about since those aren't even issues on OS X.

That being said, I always believe that competition is a good thing, and if Microsoft can force Mac to stay competitive and ahead of the curve with repsect to their offerings then it's win-win. :cool:
Click to expand...

Just got in and it's late. Can't be bothered to go through all these pages now but wanted to crack a little joke based on the win-win comment. Agree with the rest of the post by the way...

Anyway - win-win.
Get it?
Got it.
Goodnight.
 
Hmmm. Here is a suggestion for a Vista commercial:

Hire Triump, the Insult Comic Dog. The slogan:

"YES....give me MS Vista! .....for me to POOOP ON!!!!"
 
jragosta said:
With an infinitely better OS. For people who actually USE their computer rather than just check off component lists, that makes a huge difference.
Click to expand...
PC stands for personal computer. A Mac is a personal computer, is it not? If not, than what is it?
 
jragosta said:
With an infinitely better OS. For people who actually USE their computer rather than just check off component lists, that makes a huge difference.
Click to expand...

*Tears of laughter streams down Sesshi's face*

Back on topic, I know they're going to screw this up. They don't have a marketing department anywhere near as slick as Apple's who can get away with such brazen bull****. However I think Vista's current state will mean an increasing number of people - well, at least people who aren't so sheep-like to migrate to OS X 'because of Vista' - will just go "it works for me, I guess I'll just stick to it".
 
AidenShaw said:
You have paraphrased two different statements made at two different times by Allchin, combined them into one sentence, and put quotes around it.
Click to expand...
Your quite right, direct quotes would be both more ethical, and more effective.

"...in my view we lost our way."

"LH [Longhorn] is a pig and I don't see any solution to this problem."

"I think our teams lost sight of what bug-free means, what resilience means, what full scenarios mean, what security means, what performance means, how important current applications are, and really understanding what the most important problems are customers face are."

"If we are to rise to the challenge of Linux and Apple, we need to start taking the lessons of 'scenario, simple, fast' to heart."

"I would buy a Mac today if I was not working at Microsoft."
 
Quillz said:
The main reason is because Microsoft doesn't have to, and they know it. When you own 90% of the market, your competition will do just about anything to belittle you. Frankly, while the ads may be successful, all they've really done is further proven the stereotype that all Apple users are smug and uptight. Of course, some of the responses in this thread show that, as well.

While I have no problems with Microsoft countering (as they should, as Vista has never been plagued by major issues that people claim it has been), I just hope they try to remain tasteful, unlike Apple.
Click to expand...

It's now just over 90% and declining. Can't remember where I read it now. Sorry it's late. Anyway, this is something MS have bragged about for a while now. If people continue to move to other OSes they'll hardly want to advertise a reduction in their share of the market!
 
The XBOX 360 advertisements aren't all that good and I have never seen a TV ad for the Zune. I doubt Microsoft can make a good commercial.
 
Enough of this "Apple needs a mini tower" crap. I don't want a bunch of Cheap Geek Pikers anywhere around my platform.
 
DMann said:
Your quite right, direct quotes would be both more ethical, and more effective.
Click to expand...

They're still snippets out of context, though. I'll include Jim's explanation...

As part of one of Microsoft's on-going lawsuits, a piece of email that I sent to Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates recently became public. It was a rant encouraging a change to the way we were building Windows at the time. In the email, I made a comment for effect about buying a Mac if I was not working at Microsoft. Taken out of context, this comment could be confusing. Let me set the record straight:

  • This email is nearly 3 years old, and I was being purposefully dramatic in order to drive home a point. The point being that we needed to change and change quickly. We did: We changed dramatically the development process that was being used and we reset the Windows Vista development project in mid-2004, essentially starting over.
  • 2-and-½ years later, Windows Vista has turned into a phenomenal product, better than any other OS we've ever built and far, far better than any other software available today, in my opinion. It's going to be available to customers on Jan 30, and I suggest everyone go out and get it as soon as you can. It's that good.
The spirit of being self-critical continues to flourish at Microsoft. Within Microsoft everyone considers it their duty to always put their convictions and our product quality ahead of everything else. That was the intent of my mail to Bill and Steve, and I consider it a great example of how this company can focus and do what's right for customers.

jim
Click to expand...
 
This story was the funniest thing I've heard this week. I can imagine it coming out like the Mac/PC Apple ad where they compare movies. The PC movie is a hairy guy in a dress smoking a cigar. Or more likely it will be like the parody some MS people did showing how an iPod would be packaged by MS.
 
mambodancer said:
HDMI is not standard on any PC.

Neither is wifi. Nor firewire, gigabit ethernet, bluetooth nor a slew of other features that have been rehashed over and over again in so many different forums.
Click to expand...

:confused:

Some of these things are certainly standard on many PCs. I don't know if any notebooks without built-in wifi are sold anymore. Even the Eee PC has built-in wifi.

HDMI is standard on many newer PCs, even budget notebooks (HP Pavilion dv5z, for example). I'll give you Firewire, that's not common on a PC notebook. Bluetooth is fairly common. Ethernet is very common.
 
Quillz said:
The main reason is because Microsoft doesn't have to, and they know it. When you own 90% of the market, your competition will do just about anything to belittle you.
Click to expand...

It's an image thing. MS is the big player in PCs and if they attack Apple, they will come off like a bully. Meanwhile, Apple's 7% market share allows them to attack MS and look like the scrappy little underdogs willing to put down the man (I know that's ridiculous, but we're talking public image here.) MS really stands a good chance of this backfiring in a big way if they're not careful how they approach it. It's apt to look like a 270-lb. bully beating up a little kid.

Quillz said:
While I have no problems with Microsoft countering (as they should, as Vista has never been plagued by major issues that people claim it has been), I just hope they try to remain tasteful, unlike Apple.
Click to expand...

Tasteful? In advertising? Surely you have a much higher opinion of advertising than I have!

But regardless, Apple can get away with taking a few shots at MS for the above-mentioned image reason. They look like the little fighters going up against the status quo. Apple would be stupid to try to do that tastefully. It would be like tasteful rock music.

It amazes me that Apple takes so much crap for these ads and yet I never hear anyone talk about those Alltel ads where the big four cell phone companies are made out to be bumbling morons who can't tell their arses from a hole in the ground. At least Apple's version pays the PC a few compliments along the way.

But whatever. It's Apple so it's unacceptable. :rolleyes:
 
go ahead, micro$oft, keep throwing money at the problem that is your horrible operating system. maybe that will make it better.

example: my mom, sister and girlfriend don't know anything about computers, yet they complain to me constantly about how much vista sucks and how they want their old xp back. even my grandpa, dad and roommate who are pretty good with computers don't like it. i've never had someone tell me they enjoy using vista. they usually ask me if i can reinstall xp for them. thats when i recommend switching to mac, which they usually say will be too expensive or they just want the familiar experience with xp back and don't want to learn a new system, which isn't even really a problem at all. macs aren't even really all that more expensive anymore. i have convinced my grandpa to buy a mac mini whenever it is updated. he was blown away by the book i made him on my MBP and wants to do fun stuff like that without any problems.

i just don't think that microsoft has the right stuff anymore. they really need to get young. their approach is so outdated, especially when it comes to the internet.
 
In other news Apple announced today that they would stop their famous "get a mac" ads and move on to a new campaign. :p

Way to take your time M$.
 
phakebrill said:
It's now just over 90% and declining. Can't remember where I read it now. Sorry it's late. Anyway, this is something MS have bragged about for a while now. If people continue to move to other OSes they'll hardly want to advertise a reduction in their share of the market!
Click to expand...
And so what if it's declining by a small amount? Apple will never hold a majority, and they know this. Therefore, the best they can do is belittle the competition over and over again. And it's nothing new. They've been doing this since the early 90s. Frankly, the only tasteful ad campaign Apple ever had (imo) was "Think Different." But then they threw it all away for more garbage campaigns that again only strengthened the image of an arrogant, smug Apple fanboy.

And do remember that those who do not like Vista are part of a very vocal minority. Sales would show that most people are either neutral on Vista or like the OS. Corporations delaying Vista or skipping it has little to do with the OS itself; it has nearly everything to do with financial feasibility. There are corporations today who jumped directly from Win95 to WinXP. It didn't mean 98 sucked, it simply wasn't economically viable to switch. With Windows 7 being slated for 2009/2010, some corporations are delaying or skipping Vista only because then they'd have to switch to 7 again.
 
mambodancer said:
Regardless of your anecdotal experience, Apple continues to garner the highest scores in terms of customer satisfaction, reliability, usability, security and customer service according to Consumer Reports, PC Magazine and other publications.

HDMI is not standard on any PC.

Neither is wifi. Nor firewire, gigabit ethernet, bluetooth nor a slew of other features that have been rehashed over and over again in so many different forums.
Click to expand...

Actually, you couldn't be more wrong if you tried.

HDMI is part of the Santa Rosa spec on the Windows side of things. So any Santa Rosa based Windows notebook has HDMI. nVidia and ATI/AMD started including HDMI as part of their spec around the same time.

Dedicated GPUs have had HDMI for years now.

If you go over to newegg, walmart, Fry's, Best Buy, etc. you'd be hard pressed to find a notebook above $600 that does NOT have HDMI output.

Every HP I have owned over the last several years has had Firewire. Every other manufacturer includes Firewire as well. But Firewire is pretty much dead. Don't give me this "speed" crap either. If you're using a modern ATI/AMD, nVidia, or Intel USB controller and a high quality external controller, the speed is every bit as fast as Firewire. It's only slower when you use cheap USB devices. Everything is moving towards eSATA which is faster than all USB and Firewire standards. Guess what? Many PC manufacturers, including HP, already include eSATA connectors. Wheres Apple with this?

Gigabit ethernet? That has been standard for the last couple of years now. Before that, routers and switches and such that were gigabit capable were prohibitively expensive, so there was no point in including it. But now that its cheap, its there. But now that gigabit ethernet is widely available, everything is wireless!

Bluetooth? Please. Other than mice, keyboards, and ear pieces, what is it good for? Back in the day, Apple used to flaunt controlling applications with a bluetooth enabled cellphone. Now their own cellphone doesn't even support that and neither do the vast majority of phones on the market.

So, again, let's look at the true facts. Things that are standard on Dell, HP, Gateway, Acer, etc.: HDMI, VGA, S-Video all in separate jacks, no expensive adapters needed. Memory card readers. Full size ExpressCard slots even on "ultraportables". User serviceable parts like optical drives. Fingerprint readers. Dedicated graphics. System wide hardware acceleration for video. Hardware switches to disable wifi. Proper cooling systems, etc.

I would like to see these statistics on reliability. Reading this forum, the Apple forums, and other Apple related forums over the last couple of years certainly leads me to believe that hardware reliability is definitely not a selling point for Macs.
 
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