One sentence says it all: In a world without walls who needs windows???

Hey Joe, try to Think Different, for real ;-)

@PW: in a hypotetical sentence who is so naive to find any real value?

It's all part of the cunning plan. It's truly diabolical in its subtlety: make Microsoft look like a company floundering in its attempts to regain dominance in a market moving in new directions outside its control--which is what everybody already thinks they know. The company spends millions on what looks like an expensive, ineffective ad campaign, yet is only deceptively so.

All part of a clever scheme best described as "post-ironic anti-reverse-psychology". It works by not working. You'll see.

"Microsoft is the second-place brand"

Erm, I'm pretty sure the earnings figures and market share figures and most other figures you can get hold of prove that to be total nonsense.

IrvTheSwirv: He is talking about brand value not company performance. The best way to explain it is take the MICROSOFT Zune, rebrand it as the APPLE iPod and see the sales soar. That's the value of the brand.

Microsoft should just make a simple ad which explains the benefits of their offerings. Their biggest selling point that I can see is that it runs most Windows apps. Why are people mad to not use all Microsoft products? I am desperate to find out. Apple did this very well with the I'm a Mac ads.

MS is trying everything except actually giving the customer what they want. This is a totally sick attitude from a sick company. And then comes Windows 7. More of the same stuff.

MS has lost their charm. The user has become too educated to be forced fed by MS any longer. Their approach needs to change.

Microsoft has now created its version of Vista for the advertising/marketing field.

@billybob
you are 100% right, the point is: Apple is selling the idea that is cool to use its products.
That's very dangerous, because it's like fashion: one day you are at the top of people desires and the next day nobody cares about you.
And Bill Brock is the perfect example: he just talks about nothing, he thinks that Apple gives him what he needs, but as I said, it's quite dangerous because he might wake up one day and realize that he should start thinking with his head and not simple repeat what the TV ads say.

Looking at your title I thought I would find some news on Microsoft not a garbage disposal for your opinions.

There is actually some good sources about the ad agency, their history as well as background information that people might want to look at if they really want Microsoft news.

If only somehow Google could blacklist false news sites like this to not show up in my searches

Jesse wrote: "There is actually some good sources about the ad agency, their history as well as background information that people might want to look at if they really want Microsoft news."

You're right, Jesse,

This post is marked "commentary." I covered the ad agency's history in several previous posts, which is why there are "related" links at the bottom of this post. For the benefit of regular readers, I don't rehash the same material post after post.

Joe

Someone said:

"Apple is selling the idea that is [sic] cool to use its products."

No, Apple is selling the idea that its products are better than its competitors. It's got nothing to do with cool.

Someone else said that if the existing Zune product was branded with an Apple logo, it'd sell. Bullshit. Apple's brand has become synonymous with quality. Folks that prefer Apple's products won't accept poor quality and poor usability.

Then I suggest you post this on a forum designed for commentary. This should be a comment to a news article not posted on a ""News"" site. Unfortunately your site somehow got listed as News although I am having trouble actually finding any and search engines return results based on what you write which is misleading. Sure it may be an issue with the Search Engines and how they are run, but all the same it is giving real news blogs a bad name and taking away from a medium that could be very powerful.

Maybe if you changed your metatags to show this as a personal blog instead of news it would help.

Microsoft Ads Featuring Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld Not Canceled
http://www.engadget.com/2008/09/18/htcs-touch-hd-makes-its-video-debut/

Correction: Microsoft Ads Featuring Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld Not Canceled

http://gizmodo.com/5051682/microsoft-ads-featuring-bill-gates-and-jerry-seinfeld-not-canceled

One thing with Apple and the iPods is that they are very good at doing more with less. They understand that people want simplicity. They want to do one thing and do it well. MS's idea of making a better Zune by piling on features is wrong. Maybe analysts that compare feature sheets think it looks better, but consumers are just annoyed by all the extra stuff that just gets in the way. Apple is really good at releasing successful products by taking things away rather than adding them. Take the MacBook Air, it takes away the DVD drive. Understanding people would rather have less (ie a lighter laptop) rather than more stuff in their laptop making it heavier.

Same thing with the commercials. The Apple commercials are simple and easy to understand. Simple message brought home clearly and cleverly. Compared to the esoteric, cluttered, hard to understand commercials from M$.

It is truly hilarious to see all of the technogeeks turning into 'experts' on advertising. The mere fact that we're all blogging and trolling on this topic means Microsoft is doing the right thing? Are the techno-geeks the primary target for this campaign? If you think that I have a bridge to nowhere to sell you.

I haven't seen the new ads but from what I'm reading it sounds smart. Apple has been successful in essentially smearing PC users - creating a caricature of the supposedly typical PC users in the form of John Hodgeman. Well, the truth is that PC users are incredibly diverse – almost certainly much more so than Mac users because there are billions of them. The “Windows, Not Walls” idea is very democratic…the PC and the PC ecosystem is open to anybody…hundreds of PC vendors, 10’s of thousands of manufacturers of hardware peripherals and software applications.

And a great bonus for this is that it essentially turns Apple’s whole Mac/PC campaign into a bit of joke. Can Apple realistically continue to run the PC/Mac campaign for much longer when Microsoft will essentially change the debate. People will see that there are some PC users who are like John Hodgeman but there are literally billions of others…artists, scientists, mom’s, dad’s, kids, business people etc. who “are PC’s.”

The idea “Windows. Life without walls.” might be brilliant. But to be honest, the first thing that crossed my mind was a washroom without walls. Maybe Seinfeld presence induced this. Anyway, as long as Vista has more firewalls than any other Windows they should change it to “Windows. Life without walls…but more firewalls.”

Life without Windows

A future Linux commercial.

"Free yourself from the bloat, come taste freedom and stick it to the man. The future is Linux, and the future is now here. Close the Windows and open the source"

Re: "creating a caricature of the supposedly typical PC users in the form of John Hodgeman"

Bzzzzt! Wrong!

If you actually pay close attention, you will notice that the actors introduce themselves as human forms of their respective machines, NOT of the users of those machines. "Hi, I'm a Mac. And I'm a PC". It's not "I'm a Mac User" nor "I'm a PC User".

Of course, I admit to being equally clueless about the Gates and Seinfeld ads. I never watched a complete Seinfeld episode and probably have viewed no more than a total of 20 minutes across all episodes. To me, it was a few funny moments wrapped in garbage. But that's just me. Fortunately for Jerry's career, people who think like me do not represent a significant share of his market.

And so the Microsoft ads might very well be successful, but I can't see it. I view the ads the same as I viewed the Seinfeld show: as a pathetic waste of time. Again, I make no claims to be a marketing expert. Only that when it comes to Seinfeld and humor, I am apparently quite blind.

But don't confuse being talked about with success. People talk about train wrecks and the Titantic and the fall of the Roman Empire with equally diverse and spirited opinions, and yet none of them view the outcomes of those topics as describing success.

this post and the comments just goes to show how brilliant this campaign really is.
- it makes people talk about it (a lot)
- it makes people not change the channel
- it makes people wonder what't next
- it created a million self-proclaimed blogging experts in MS advertizing

Now that they have thrown in some hyped confusion about the spots being cancelled or not, they've got you all warmed up and ready to "analyze" and blog about the next spots, those where the actual messanging starts.

> The canceled ad campaign leaves behind so many unanswered questions. We simply have to know!

Do you need to get a life. Today I changed my wife's mouse to a wireless mouse. I asked her if she noticed anything about her computer and she sat there surfing and reading email and using the mouse and she couldn't see it. It was completely different. Smaller, wireless, felt completely different. She simply didn't notice.

It was a reminder that most people didn't choose and don't care about the details of their computers. Firefox? Chrome? IE? Who cares? This inertia has made a fortune for Microsoft c/o network effects. Well, it's unraveling now, with Apple's share of the PC market at over 11% and rising.

If you really think people care about Microsoft for anything other than financial reasons in some cases, I think you're misguided.

The ads were a complete fiasco. Microsoft needs no excuses at all for pulling them. The simplest explanation is mostly likely correct: they had no meaningful impact at all.

Micrsoft may be many bad things, but it isn't totally stupid.

A campaign tag line of "windows. Life without walls", may be aspirational, but is it any better than "where do you want to go today?" Is it better than "wow"? Those were both catchphrase campaigns that did NOT stand the test of time. No one remembers any of the details of those campaigns. In many ways, how is "where do you want to go today?" any different to "windows. Life without walls" Isn't the meaning the same?

And, is the problem for MS, the public awareness of Windows, or is it the awareness of Vista? How does this latest campaign address the fiasco of Vista?

Thanks Joe for reporting on the Bill & Jerry ad. Actually I'm just surfing to bridge over the time until Seinfeld starts (23:30 on FOX) which, although kinda weired ot characters I now find quite enjoyable to watch (if it wouldn't be interrupted by these lame Mojave Ads!). For what the M$ campaign is aiming for, this is probably a somewhat reverse effect but I was not around when it initially aired in the US. Personally one of the rare moments I'm thankful to Microsoft - to point out a gem in American Comedy for me.

I'll keep watching. I still don't get that Elaine character - and how they are all connected, apart from the hairy dude being the neighbor.

Cheers,

Frankly, I didn't get the Bill & Jerry commercials. I'm glad they are over.

they're ad people - why would you expect anything but spin?