"I'm a PC" suffers Mac attack!!!

I know this is going to upset wankers like "Anonymous Observer," but there's a very funny piece in today's "PC World," about how some parts of the Microsoft "I'm a PC" campaign were produced on Macs... Just like the farrago a few weeks ago about how Enfatico's Austin office was awash in Macs. Let's get this straight... I don't give a fuck if the work is produced on Klingon Kryptonite Mesa Bula Super Computers... It's OK if you are doing fucking soap, or condom ads... But, if you are producing the work using technology that is in direct competition with your client... You are a major fucking douchenozzle and deserve all the shit that's going to be heaped on you... When are people going to realize than today everything is ultimately transparent. You can hide fuck all. Remember, dear old David made a point of always buying and using his clients products. That's why he drove a Rolls Royce. But I'll bet if they had had the fucking Skoda account, he would have driven one. We are, without a doubt, a bunch of festering hypocrites.  

Welcome to Madison Avenue!

Comments

[popgoestheweasel]

George,

"if you are producing the work using technology that is in direct competition with your client" Agreed, and it relates to my point from yesterday about Hodgson's use of Macs.

Several years ago there was a center page press ad for Apple with little red rings around the staples in the center page. The headline read something along the lines of "The only part of this magazine not produced with a Mac".

The point was well made.

But no doubt there will be further distain heaped upon this opinion too.

[the brit]

why? are microsoft or dell selling specifically to art directors? or to the majority of people who use their boxes for data entry, accounting and other artless uses. there is a reason why art directors and designers ON THE WHOLE like to use Macs and it might be more pertinent for Microsoft and Dell to address that if it bothers them. There is never a reason to defend mediocrity. And while we're at it, no, I don't believe David Ogilvy would have driven a Skoda.

[popgoestheweasel]

Brit, quite agree on the issue of defending mediocrity. It waters down everything, which is bad all round.

Not sure about DELL and MICROSOFT selling directly to A.D.s. As you say, probably just aiming at the gaming, surfing, word processing, spreadsheet masses. Macs appear better designed in an aesthetic sense whihc could be reason enough for the hook for creatives.

I think many people would like to see Microsoft et al aim at a particular (or different) niche. An act that could do much to target their sales a little better, and with it, their advertising? We can all live in hope.

[the lower depths]

Dell makes boxes that house MS software. nowhere in their sell sheets do MS or Dell claim to have any sway over the creative end of things.

i don't get the point. who really cares which brand of power tool you used as long as the house gets built? it's the not building of the house that's the issue.

and there is the aesthetics to consider when dealing with the visually creative circle. hell, i've even had sr. suits ask me about getting mac laptops when we're working on IBM and they were forced to hoist thinkpads to meetings.

as for what D.O. drove and wore, that's his business. i worked on both Ford and Jaguar and never received either! he drove a Rolls because he could afford a Rolls and it was a very proper thing for a successful british gent to drive.

[pat smith]

I love it. While Hodgmann using Apple products is amusing to see, it of course makes sense because he's being paid by Apple.

Using Macs to create Windows ads, that's fucking priceless. I'll always remember the advice one professor gave me: "Always use the client's product."

She illustrated with an example of an agency working on a tampon account. During a meeting client went to the restroom and discovered the competitor's product stocked. That was the end of that relationship.

My agency just won a bank account. Soon as our ads hit we'll all be signing up for new accounts. Quite simple really.

[esbandido]

It's just a golden opportunity for some very, very bad PR.

[oy]

I do not agree that we should necessarily be using our client's products.

We should understand the products and the people who use them. During the golden age of advertising in the 60s, most of America had products and services sold to them by people living in lofts in Manhattan, and riding subways, and having other people do their laundry-a far cry from the life of suburbanites who P&G targetted.

Today we try and peddle this myth that we have to be marketed to by people like us and governed by people like us, by people who we'd like to have a beer with. This myth is exploded when you see that of the 535 Congressmen, only 7 are not millionaires.

Hell this country was founded by the wealthiest elitists who were educated in England and France and in IVY league colleges from the East Coast. Take a look around and see where it got us to give it up to rednecks. Today, an elitist is anyone who can pronounce nuclear.

I have never been a farmer. yet I have worked on agrichemical accounts that have successfully sold tons and tons of farm chemicals.

That said, a man on a Mac should be able to grok what a man using a PC needs.

It really is not rocket science.

[the lower depths]

well put, oy, i grok you... i would ask anyone who totes that line (use your clients products), what are your accounts? how many of those products do you actually use or own?

all of you out there working on Porsche, Mercedes or BMW... how many in your driveways? all of you working on Bud and Miller... how many do you drink when out away from agency eyes?

i've worked on IBM, had clients walk through the offices and see the Apples and not bat an eyelash, even when the topic came up. the agency still has the account.

this is a topic where there's lots of room for armchair speculation, but in the end, people will use what they're comfortable with to accomplish their work. any smart client knows that. and pat? you're really going to switch banks because your shop got a new account? as for your professor, you know what they say about teachers....

[the brit]

I'm with oy and lower depths. I honestly do not believe that clients are so naive in 2008 as to think that their work will be better because the agency uses their stuff. ( god, can you imagine having the account for that toilet paper brits use in public loos, the tracing paper stuff? ) Does the Ogilvy cafeteria only sell Kraft stuff ? It would be nice to think that the business is run on slightly less obviously crawly-lick-bum lines than that.

[slowmo]

the brit, it's not a question of being naive. It's a question of effort, loyalty and belief in a client's brand for an agency.

My agency does work for HP and everyone uses a HP notebook. We also do work for MSN-Windows Live and we set our default page to www.msn.com

Every bit matters because clients can see passion reek from agency people who think and do it that way. It's not somthing only done by David Ogilvy but it is something done by people who truly lives and breathes their client's brand.

As an agency on record, you are your client's most important brand advocate. When you use your competitor's product, you have become your client's worse advocate i.e. their own agency don't even want to use the client's stuff.

How can you convince other people of using your client's product and services when you don't use them yourself? When you don't believe in them and when you have no idea what is the user experience?

This is so straightforward and I have no idea why George has to explain this to you all 3-4 times.

No wonder agencies keep losing accounts these days...

[the lower depths]

george keeps posting on it to get frequent flyer points...

and brand advocacy and passion is not about toadyism. D.O. drove a Rolls. did his art director? or account sup?

no.

neither did they wear JC Penney suits.

he didn't fire any of them and neither did the client.

[cloud2810]

Then where do you stand on Alex Bogusky, not only quietly disregarding his brands behind closed doors, but so blatantly attacking his key clients Burger King & Dominos by writing a dieting book? (If it, indeed, is not part of a campaign) Does CP+B deserve the boot?

[cloud2810]

Then where do you stand on Alex Bogusky, not only quietly disregarding his brands behind closed doors, but so blatantly attacking his key clients Burger King & Dominos by writing a dieting book? (If it, indeed, is not part of a campaign) Does CP+B deserve the boot?