Ian Swenson .com

I’ve been wanting to use my fantastically honed critical skills in ripping apart the dozens of commercials that annoy me weekly. I figured this was a great forum to do so: my own, personal webpage which no one visits. Perfect!

But a few things have kept from realizing this dream. Firstly is this website AwfulCommercials.com that does exactly what I propose to do. When I first found out about this site, my heart sank. I was depressed that I wouldn’t be able to publicly rip to shreds adverts that sear pockets of stupidity into my cranium. But then I noticed that they only review one or two commercials every month. Surely there is a void to be filled.

Secondly, I was worried about the legal implications of posting other companies’ advertisements on my site. (Let me quickly interject here that I do not work for any company currently, and I have no affiliations with anything at the moment.) But then I thought, “Screw it.” If a giant conglomerate wants to send me a C&D letter just for saying the advertising firms they hire suck, I’ll actually be a bit honored.

And finally, I was worried about actually getting said commercials. Many I most despise are local (Seattle/Tacoma) and not really available via the interweb. But for now I’ll be limiting myself to ones posted on company websites. Eventually I’ll get a tuner card and record the annoyances for everyone’s viewing displeasure.

For my first commercial review is actually a commercial series I am kind of entertained by: The Apple vs. PC set. You may view the commercials here:

I was inspired to do this commercial shredding by one of my favorite webcomics, CTRL+ALT+DEL. You can view that particular comic here at: ctrlaltdel-online.com. Be wary, as there is some inappropriate language *gasp* in this particular comic.

My issues with these commercials are several. As the comic points out, Apple is trying to massively influence our perceptions visually. The PC is middle-aged, pudgy, and wears glasses that only Boeing employees and Mike Holmgren still wear. That means my personal computer at home is dorky, ugly, and stupid (btw, I bought my monitor at Boeing surplus, so there!). Meanwhile the Mac is, quite simply, a movie star. He’s suave, good-looking, and still slightly geeky, because that’s cool nowadays.

Then there’s the contention that Macs don’t have viruses. Or, more specifically, OSX doesn’t have viruses. This claim is actually true mostly. Their PC emulation can obviously get viruses, plus there are a couple hundred macro viruses that affect, you guessed it, Microsoft Word, Excel, and the like. There are, according to this pro-Mac article, only 26 Mac viruses out there, all for OSs earlier than OSX.

But that’s just sad. The author of that article calls me a “naysayer” for saying that, but it’s true. (I like that: Ian Naysayer Swenson.) PCs are used the world over in homes and, more importantly, in businesses. Yep, small business to Forbes-listed business use PCs (and Unix servers). Viruses are written my nasty impish little gnomes who derive pleasure from hehe-ing over the havoc they have caused.

They would have no hehe-ing if Macs were there target. Five percent of the market, as this author claims (though he hedges that assertion by saying that’s not computers sold per annum), does not a havoc-wreaker’s wet dream make. Plus, it has been noted (in a comment here) most virus writers are teenagers or thereabouts. Most teenagers can’t afford Macs.

Apple thus protects its customers from viruses and spyware by its relative anonymity and its pricing. These commercials remind me of how silly that is.

Disclaimers: I actually like Macs. No, really, I do. It’s just that their advertising misimplies that they are somehow better because of their low-market share and pricing.

Legalese and Butt-Saving Language available here.

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