Sunday, December 4, 2011

Apple Mac Advert





The link above, is an animated Christmas TV advert, advertising the Apple Mac featuring the Mac’s rival, the pc. Two people are representing each, computer, the Mac represented by a a man who looks to be in his early twenties who is interested in putting his differences aside for the holiday season, and the PC who is represented by a much older man who displays bitterness towards the Mac in the advert.
In the advert both ‘PC’ and ‘Mac’stand either side of Santa Claus, which appeals to the public as it is a festive advert. They are also singing a rendition of ‘Santa Claus is coming to town’ however ‘PC’ spoils the song by slipping in a sales pitch towards the end. The key intention I got from this was to portray the PC as only being interested in selling, whereas the Mac is portrayed as possessing Christmas spirit, through wanting to get along with PC and not mentioning his product, representing the image of a happy community who are interested in the ‘real’ meaning of Christmas and not the consumer side.
I think the significance of the PC being represented as an older figure is interesting, as it enhances the Mac character as young and vibrant, introducing the image of the Mac being the ‘ultimate upgrade’ a newer and exciting product. The fact that PC is bitter towards the Mac and feels the need to deliver a sales pitch, suggests perhaps the financial worry the PC possesses of the Mac overtaking it, in the consumer world. Apple tries to appeal to the public in a clever way, as it at no point promotes itself having a better product but instead uses the PC’s supposed arrogance and bitterness to portray itself as the better and most honest party.




Another advert I came across was this alternative advert in which PC asks Mac “Do you know why I love this time of year?” to which Mac replies “Because it’s the season of peace on earth?”, which ties in with the Mac representing the true meaning of Christmas to appeal to the public. PC instead replies “No it’s because we can be animated, and we can do anything”, and he proceeds to show Mac what he can do which could represent the arrogance of the company. Towards the end of the advert, a rabbit says he is going to the apple store to pick up some last minute gifts, to which PC pushes a snowman on to the rabbit. This could represent how the company wish to sabotage Apple, and don’t believe in an honest way of selling which in result gives Mac a honest and reliable image which the public would prefer.
I think the advert is effective as its main value is to promote its own product to sell, which it achieves. It does this in a clever way as through the PC character trying to promote itself at every opportunity we instead are attracted to the MAC who appears to value the public as people, rather than just for their money. This is ironic as the Apple Company have created this perhaps untrue bitter and money obsessed image for the PC, to shift opinions in their own favour. Through the portrayal of the PC character, Mac have managed to make all PC users into a stereotype, by using an old business man in a brown suit, which also creates the image of a mundane, everyday product. This contrasted against the Mac character who is described in the Mac vs. PC article as an '20-something, self satisfied hipster' poses the question who would you most want to be like?'.

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