Tale as old as time song as old as rhyme Mac and the PC

It can’t always just be about awful commercials, so with the release of three new Mac ads (Party is Over, Genius, and Choose a Vista) it is a good time to talk about a campaign I actually do like. There are a rare few of these spots I don’t love (the Flashback one is my least favorite), and the commercials are enjoyable to people who don’t use Macs, saving except diehard PC fanboys who are easily offended.

The success of these spots are obviously the result of a casting slam-dunk. The “Mac”, aka Justin Long might best be known outside these commercials as the actor from the movie Accepted. John Hodgman has worked with the Daily Show, and I’ve heard good things about his book, The Areas of my Expertise.

A nerd friend of mine pointed out that these ads are as much for PC geeks as they are Mac geeks, since computational prowess is indeed considered a virtue by some. And while Windows, the actual target of these ads, owns a fair chunk of Apple, the spots targeting Vista are no doubt especially hurtful.

Another point of discussion is the fact that buying a PC can mean a lot of things. If you buy the cheapest PC you can get, having problems running any software shouldn’t be so surprising. There’s only one way to buy a new Mac, so of course they can be mandated by Apple to be built with the quality parts and hardware to run reliably.

You can view all of the ads in the “Get a Mac” campaign from the apple website.

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