Rep lady is so fired

get rummy. he's looking for a job.

The commercials are memorable, but they don't really lay out the advantages of Macs over PC's in an unbiased manner.

Just so someone can say something nice about him, I like Justing Long. I thought he was hilarious in "Galaxy Quest" and on "Ed".

Anyway, just my 2 cents.

Er... since when is the job of an ad agency to "lay out the advantages ... in an unbiased manner" ??

The problem is people eventually start rooting for the underdog. They did
too good of a job making "PC Guy" look like the underdog... and they were on the edge of having the ads backfire. Time for a change.

I saw similar commentary on macsurfer

http://www.thewhitonline.com/media/storage/paper291/news/2006/11/02/Entertainment/Mac-And.Pc.Guy.Commercial.Inspires.Ire.Hatred-2435031.shtml?norewrite200611082153&sourcedomain;=www.thewhitonline.com

I saw Justin on a talk show around June complaining that people approached him in the streets and verbally accosted him for being so smug and arrogant in the ad.
He was very negative about Apple on that show, getting defensive and claiming he isn't necessarily an Apple fan.
In the ads that have come out since then, he seems to have lost his confidence and more charming positive manner. You might notice it in the opening statements when he says "I'm a Mac", but doesn't smile anymore and seems to be saying "I want to crawl in a hole and hide."
IMO, that has affected the quality of the ads.

Gee. I like him. I don't find him smug, I find him honest and unapologetic. And the fact that he looks like what you expect a Mac enthusiast to look like...geez...we DO look like that...why is that so bad? We buck the system a little, we're casual. Why should he represent a Mac any other way?

kdavies wrote: we DO look like that...why is that so bad? We buck the system a little, we're casual. Why should he represent a Mac any other way?

Well, no. Not all Mac users (or enthusiasts) look like that. Only the iPod-wearing, non-technical, hipster music listening and clothes-wearing Mac users do. There's tons and tons of black leather-clad, Kompressor-listening uberhackers out there that love Macs for their crunchy-good BSD/unix style power, not to mention just running straight Linux on good hardware.

You buck the system... how? By wearing a hoody and jeans to work? Look, you may be able to wear an intentionally distressed Dashboard Confessional t-shirt when you go to work at your local CorporateMultiMediaConglomCo, but you're still a corporate whore. Just because they allow you to dress casual while working in your windowless cube hive doesn't mean you've somehow stuck it to the man.

Why is this all a problem? Err, hello? You "think different" because you're conforming to a stereotype so well known they use it as an icon in a TV commercial?

Thanks, braniacs. I'll remember to "think different" more often in the near future. But for now me and my homebuilt, customized, entirely warranty-free 5 year old PC are going to go bath in some real God-flesh eating weirdness.

Think different? *snarf!* Heh, most Mac users wouldn't know what "different" was even if it bit them on the inside of their ass.

Did loquacious just say uberhackers? Come on, true mac people don't use uber- anything. Except when we're talking about uberdorks. And how he was approached on the street after the ads came out has no effect on his performance in the later ads. They were all taped over a 2 week period before the first one came out.

Justin Long is the worst person of the year

Uh, DUDE! I AM a techie. And Unix and Linux aren't exactly MAINSTREAM, now, are they?

By 'buck the system' I mean that we don't cave into the pressure to get a Windows machine just because 'that's what everythings going to'.

No...I don't wear jeans and a hoodie to work. I don't think I even own a hoodie. We don't have casual day here in the public school systems. I don't work for a corporation; I work for the government and make a mere fraction of what I could if I was a corporate whore. Or even a corporate techie.

Funny how people forget these are actors getting paid to do a job and not necessarily spokespersons, but I suppose that sort of brand-identification is one of the pitfalls of such a long-running, consistent and popular campaign.

Seriously, can any single personality adequately represent what the Mac 'stands for' [it's still just a product, much as they would like you to believe it's a way of life]?

As for identifying with Mr. Long... I've been a Mac-nerd since day one, and I actually DO see more eye-to-eye with his 'smug twit' than I do Hodgman's 'suit'.

Lastly... Mac-o-philes ARE smug little twits in all sorts of garb and with all sorts of tastes. I don't find anything terribly wrong with feeling comfortable in the fact that I use a product that easily fits my way of life in more than a few ways, regardless of that product's pop-image.

I'm actually pretty disappointed. These are the most effective Mac ads to come along since the brand's inception. I saw Justin's portrayal of a Mac as neither smug nor demeaning of PCs. That complaint sounds like sour grapes from a foot-dragging PC neanderthal who still programs their VCR by using the buttons on the top of the player.

If you want smug and demeaning, just come to me. I think people (and especially companies) who don't open their mind to the advanced technology and stability of the Mac platform are the city equivalent of inbred backwoods banjo players. I'm an art director who has to deal on a daily basis with suit retards who don't even know how to open a simple pdf or jpeg file. They probably also fear the advancements of 'fire' and 'the wheel.' I suppose its no wonder that its taken so long for the Mac to start to achieve the success it deserves.

If anything, the Mac ads featuring Justin reached out to PC owners with open arms, showing them that just because the company they work for is a bunch of dimwits, they can personally break out of the suit mentality and enjoy both life and work.

What's wrong with that?

(Pasted from the later thread)
In these ads John Hodgeman does not represent the PC, he represents the PC user. The viewer says "This guy is all right; he likes music and movies and fun photographs, just like I do. He'd be way cooler than that hoodied Mac-guy, if he had the right hardware." The percieved backlash against Justin Long's character is actually the sound of the ad series working.

"...the content is the viewer." - Marshall McLuhan

Well lets face it, all of us who have converted from PC to MAC (after being die hard PC fans...) understand what Justin's character is portraying and enjoy the humour... I guess it would be perceived by a non MAC user as smug. Yeah I can understand public perception "rooting" for an underdog, have sympathy too... just not insane enough to go backwards because of an ad campaign....

i'm not a mac user, and i didn't find him smug. i actually liked the commercials. actually for one of the commercials, Long mentions how there's enough customers for both. i have to agree. i see the advantages of using mac. i talked to a friend of mine who builds and fixes computers. he told me some of the disadvantages of using macs. i really don't understand the defensiveness and anger that some people feel toward the other computer. to me it's similar to which food or color is better. there is no right or wrong. it's a matter of personal needs, desires, and tastes. just my 2 cents.

Re: loquacious and kdavies

- Well, my cents are worth just that, 2 cents. Having said that, I think loq is suggesting that to truly "buck the system", you can't accomplish it by being, dressing, acting commercial.

He's got a point, some people have convinced themselves that they're "so unique and different" by buying, wearing, acting and thinking different" - just like everyone else.

Although, your point was caustic, but I understand, I've been there, I'm known to vent too.(I know cuteness makes me rage sometimes) but, kdavies had a point too, he/she said "buck the system a little" and "we're casual".

This is true for a lot of Mac users, which is probably why they switched to Mac in the first place. So sometimes they want to "stick it" to people who don't think quite like they do. -As any person sometimes does.

Windows really does suck. I've shown friends how to create the registered trademark symbol in any text app on a Mac - it's Apple key, and R, that's it.
This is the equivalent on a Win machine: U00AE, and I think you need to hold down the alt or something too.

So people who are "anti-mac", and I know plenty, just haven't had the experiences to be qualified enought to comment in the first place.

Buying a Mac, although contributing to capitalism in every sense, is still a choice I make, because I really hate windows that much.

I won't wear a Mac t-shirt, but damn I hate when people say, "yeah, well look at all the free software I got for my windows machine that I got for 600 bucks" - Yeah, and it all sucks.

Sometimes seasoned win users have spent more time trying to figure out problems and workarounds with windows, that they somehow seem more capable or intelligent. I WAS that guy, and gave up all that BS for a Mac long ago. I'll never buy another win machine.

Most of us are media users. And the
Mac-ericanna (made that up eh)surrounding Apple appeals to a lot of people. And, guess what... that sells Apples. Apple sells media and entertainment far better than Windows ever could.

I haven't ever seen anything on the Windows side that really pushed me to run back to a Win machine. My first computer ran win. I thought it was the bomb, -until I got a Mac. And I did feel like "what were those windows people thinking when they built this heap of shit:?

There is a sense of generic identity among PC users when it comes to how they see their machines, and what their machines do for them.

It's pathetic that the camp mentality still exists, but Mac people LOVE their Macs because it makes their lives easier. And they want to impart that "casual" notion to others. It's not always a fashion statement.

Loc, you think wearing leather, and uberhacking, and listening to Kompressor really makes those people all that different? Anti-establishment?

I know some of those people, those were the people, who 10 years ago thought Linux would rule the world. Who thought I was stupid for saying "ahh no, Apple will popularize Unix". I'm not even a techie, and I figured it out back then.

Damn I love my G5!

The rumours of Justin Long's demise as "Apple guy" in the Apple Get A Mac ads are WRONG according to Justin Long:

This just in (from Justin Log himself at on his official web site[/a]), he states in a post today entitled "Just To Clarify" under the "Talkin 'bout Justin Long" forum section. Justin is quoted as saying:

"as for the mac commercials, i don't know where that report came from that said i wasn't going to do anymore - i literally setting my alarm right now to wake up for a mac shoot tomorrow - if i'm not doing anymore i guess i can sleep in on my day off - that'd be nice. but yeah, we're doing some holiday spots now which i think will be pretty funny - not nearly funny enough to justifiy the money they're paying me though, i'll be honest with you. as for the future, i really don't know what i'm going to do - i'm surprised, frankly, that the campaign hasn't become tired and they've just ended it on their own - but i try to live as much in the present as i can considering the future doesn't exist, i'm not really sure. they're easy to do, i love john (the pc guy) and working with him is so effortless and fun that i definitely wouldn't rule out doing some more - and, as i said, they pay us nicely."
- Justin Long wrote on 11/13/2006.

Corrected link to Justin Long's comments on his official web site.

If you define yourself as a "Mac Person" or "PC Person" or care about these commercials, you've fallen hopelessly into Apple's very modern advertising scheme: the defining of oneself by product usage. We don't define ourselves as "Whirlpool" nor "Frigidaire" people, yet their products have a significant prevalence in our lives. Product choice often comes down to income and necessity and not a radically different ideology.