Moronic Commercials

The new advertising campaign by Microsoft strikes me as one of the stupidest ideas for an ad campaign that I have ever seen. The ads portray people in an office setting, celebrating as if they had won the Super Bowl. There are scenes in which the water cooler is dumped over someone sitting at his computer. There are scenes where officemates give each other high-fives, while other officemates cheer wildly. And in these ads, the announcers voice is vaguely reminiscent of the former voice of NFL Films, John Facenda.

I find all of this pathetic. I realize the ads impose a football-like metaphor on the office environment, that its all exaggeration. But please ... when was the last time you jumped up and down because your software had a new useful feature? In fact, when was the last time you were in an office and saw high-fives or cheering? Could these ads be more unrealistic? Wouldn’t it be better to promote your product using realistic advertising? I find myself very much turned off by these ads and somewhat offended.

As long as I’m on the subject, allow me to complain about New York State Lottery advertisement. These insult my intelligence. They imply that everyone who purchases a lottery ticket will be a winner. “All you need is a dollar and a dream”. Great slogan, if you have a dollar and a dream, and you go out and buy a lottery ticket, now you have a dream, and New York State has your dollar.