Apple's new ad isn't so subtle, and Intel isn't too pleased
By Paul Miller 
posted Jan 12th 2006 7:00AM
posted Jan 12th 2006 7:00AM
We must admit we found ourselves chuckling at Apple's new ad for their Intel iMac, which states that they'll be setting Intel's chips free from "dull little boxes, dutifully performing dull little tasks." But Intel isn't chuckling, and maybe it's because the ad is a not so subtle slam on their last few decades of existence, and a straight out dissing of all their current partners in the PC world. Intel didn't even know what was going on with this ad, despite allowing it to be shot in their facilities, and saw it for the first time right before the keynote. Kind of reminds us of another little surprise that Apple dropped on a recent keynote partner: a little thing Stevie likes to call the iPod nano. At least Intel is putting on a good face about it; Intel VP Deborah Conrad says that "it's probably a good thing that we didn't see them earlier," but if Steve Jobs starts wearing a baseball cap to the keynotes and flipping through slides about Q2 punking effectiveness, we'll know something has gone horribly wrong.
ahh a great little ad. Intel needs to lighten up. check it out at http://www.apple.com/intel/ads
One of my favorites in a long time. Not because it's making fun, I just think it's well done.
If you really want to bring the best out of a CPU than build your own system.
Yeah, as a mac user, I thought it was kinda funny, but for Apple's introducory intel TV commercials? it's a little too agressive for the intel using general public.
Although, it might rile them enough to actually investigate the software side of Apple, which of course makes the biggest diffrence.
well, wasnt the curtain call ad a sorta "failure" too? a successful, bright innovative company downright siding with a conservative swearing offensive artist. (i'm over embellishing, and this isnt an attack on eminem but i'm just bringing this up for the sake of commenting) since i've heard some people boycotting apple because of the ad.
i love that ad, i agree #1, Intel needs to lighten up!
While there's no doubt this advert is quite arrogant, Apple are putting out some damn fine products, so I think they can afford to boast.
But more to the point, this is a rather flattering ad for intel, if anything. I mean, the only think it has a go at is intel's previous business partner. It's Apple's ad, not Intel's, and I think the business partners shouldn't be to surprised that apple would make an ad like this. I mean, they're obviously not going to go off saying "Here's the new Mac. We put an intel chip in it, now it's just like every other damn computer out there."
For humour's sake, intel should produce a similar advert with footage of a mac being assembled and the following narrative:
"The mac computer.
For years it's been trapped with a PPC,
Holding it in a dull white boxes,
Dutifully performing dull little tasks,
When it could have been doing so much more...
Starting today, the Mac computer will be set free
And get to live life, with an Intel Chip inside it.
Imagine the possibilities."
I think that would be fair.
basically it says that Intel before apple always sucked.
shutttt upppp stevieeeee.
#3 What does that mean? Most logic boards are designed by Intel, the same company who makes the CPU. I'd think they know how to bring the best out of a CPU.
.. and finally.. ladies and getlement.. from cupertino california... our new products...
the intel-mac-funboys.
APPLAUSE
Ok so I was watching the video on my dull little box and just as the intel logo zoomed out my browser crashed.
coincidental?
Am I the only one who thinks this ad looks a lot like the video Such Great Heights from The Postal Service? Check it out here: http://youtube.com/index?v=33WfhhG7gsI
It's a great ad for a great product! Intels creative services are a complete pile of rubish - but then again they're a hardware company. If anything this ad compliments intel - apple are complementing intel on a great product and saying this new partnership is moving intel forward. Apple are giving intel a good image!
Ad's need to be a bit 'edgey' - there is nothing worse than mediocre - Apple's creative team know this, the whole of apple know this and that's why they're such a great company. This ad is from a creative mind rather than a boadroom.
Intel should leave the creative decisions to the people who know about them and keep their boring executive views to themselves.
There's an article on Wired (cult of mac section) about the video's similarities with The Postal Service video (even using the same actors and same shots). No news yet but guessing it's licensed.
Might even be that The Postal Service will do a U2 and play at the next music event (probably when a proper iPod video is released, along with a more video centric iTunes, new app maybe, movie downloads and probably a new Intel Mac Mini with iPod dock as previously rumoured).
man some people here need to learn about advertising. 'The Postal Service" video is filmed in a silicon-chip-factory: wow! The point in an ad is that it says something. You can't license the idea of filming in a factory.
And it's a damn boring song!
If Intel is upset about this, wait until Dell starts using AMD chips.
I find it funny that for years we had to deal with Apple stating how powerful their 'dual CPU' systems were...the US Governement bans it from going outside the US, remember those commercials...and now the Intel boxes are 2-5x faster...so essentially they were blowing smoke up Apple user's butts for 30 years...us PC people knew that but Apple users wouldn't trust the results. Obviously, it's true, huh.
what's that tune in theis ad?
basically it says that Intel before apple always sucked.
shutttt upppp stevieeeee.
no it is saying that windows sucks. pay attention more carefully
Reading between the lines a little, this ad is essentially saying that the real difference between Macs and "everyone else" is marketing. Which is mostly true.
(Now, I'd be the last person to defend Windows, but there's a lot more you can do with a PC than run Windows on it.)
Ok, maybe it's just me, but umm, that ad, was boring. It didn't even seem somewhat funny. It's not a bad ad, just not funny.
How stupid does Apple think PC users are? This is so lame. A computer is a computer, and they both can do the same think. It just comes down to personal preference. Anyway AMD are the best chips on the market today anyway (for non mobile machines). I hate arrogance more than anything, and I wish companies didn't feel like they need to put on this false front of superiority. Apple and PC's can live in harmony.
Have you actually seen the video or the ad (tip - you need to see both). You can't re-record someone's shoot. Maybe the production company that made the ad owns the copyright and apple used them too. Maybe they didn't and whoever the copyright owner of the music video is will be pissed off with apple?
BTW, I work in advertising so know a thing or two about it (albeit in the UK).
Since most consumers have no clue whether their computer has an Intel or AMD processor (processor, whats that?) in it, only techies or Apple fans will get this ad.
And I think that if you put 10 different manufacturers "dull box" laptops out and hid any logos on them that the average person could not pick out which company made which computer. Sony? Acer? Toshiba? Apple? NEC? HP?
So the ad is basically wasted on the general public.
What the ad says to me is that Apple computers look cool, not dull, and that is why one should buy an Apple. People make their buying decisions of a computer on how un-dull it looks??? I doubt it. Price and power/speed for the $$$$ is what counts.
#3: knock-knock, helloooooo! can you hear?
What it clearly says is that "it could have been doing so much more".
Net, the Intel chip has been unexploited for years by the PC makers.
You may or may not agree, but that's what the advertising clearly says.
Quoting from a buddies blog, responding to #17 (Erik):
"Apple's performance claims. I read a lot of complaining about Apple now claiming Intel chips are faster than the PowerPC after years of saying the opposite. Although Apple is certainly guilty of finding and then emphasizing the most extreme cases in such performance claims, this is not a total snow job. When the PowerPC came on the scene, it really was a better architecture with more legs. It offered higher clock rates and great performance-per-clock. It was relatively free of legacy ISA to hold it back when compared to x86. Over the years, the performance crown passed back and forth between the PowerPC and the x86 family. These days, the future is clear. The PowerPC is moving towards goals other than mainstream computing. Intel is very much focused on the mainstream desktop computing market. They make a logical partner for Apple as a result. Apple will switch horses in each product family when it makes sense to do so based on overall performance and power consumption. With all that said, Apple-like all companies-will never clearly communicate and downsides to its products in it's marketing. When you combine this with Apple's desire to simplify everything as much as possible, you can end up with some pretty outrageous claims. They may be true in some cases, but certainly not in all."
I had never seen the Postal Service video before, but now I would say the similarity between it and the Apple ad extends WAY beyond coincedence. There's a lot more to the comparison than just that both "happened" to be filmed in processor factories.
The color scheme is nearly identical in both. Not just that both have a lot of white and gray, but the specific shades are spot-on, evidently shot through the same filter or using the same postproduction techniques. Both are equally saturated and bright.
Both focus on expressive people making eye contact and looking away from people in slow motion. They even both have a man gazing at a woman as he hands her a component (sorry, I'm not familiar enough with the tech to know what the big shiny disc is called).
Both have a shot that shows the finished CPU up close, then zooms out through the machine to show its surprizing location ("woah, it's in a satellite" or "woah, it's in a Mac").
Both show the workers watching the chip assembly through a window, and focus heavily on the factory robots at work.
This comment I'm writing is a stupid one, I guess. Was it really necessary to point out all the similarities between the music video and the ad? I'm sure they were obvious to most people who watched them. Rest assured that Apple knew exactly what it was doing by copying the Postal Service. What that signifies for the company's future involvement with the band is left for the speculators, but I wouldn't be surprized if we saw more from our musical friends at a later date.
sorry, i meant #8
Yes, Apple are being arrogant, and yes, they're poking a little fun, but only in the way you wind your friends up. They're not damning Intel AT ALL. They're saying: "Here's this great chip that's being throttled by dull computers and dull OSs, and we're here to EMBRACE a quality chip on the market, and take it to the next level."
No need to fight people.
The best part about the ad is the fact that Jack Bauer (aka Kiefer Sutherland in real life) narrates it. Don't mess with Jack.
#17 - The only way to find that out would be to compare the Pentium III and Pentium 4, the chips that they boasted that the G4 and G5 beat, against those G4 and G5 chips.
It's been done, the G4 and G5 won. The Intel Core Duo, however, is a different chip all together.
#3 - Are you insinuating that you are a better engineer than Apple and Intel (who designed the motherboard?). If so, go try out for a position, I am sure they both pay quite well for that level of skill. If you are talking about building a better CONFIGURED computer for a certain task, certainly you could, but about a better engineered box, I don't think you're doing that with your plexiglass windows and 3 color LCD fans with manual temperature controls on the front. Not exactly industrial design or innovation.
Nice "The Postal Service" ad knock off.
Think Different.
It's a cool add that is moving. You can't say that about dell's ads anymore. Dell's ads suck and have for a long time. Intel should be glad that the coolest company on the block(right now) is taking their great marketing and putting intel's name in there! Think about it, the iPod commercials are extremely successful, this one probably will be too. I dunno, I guess it seems to be silly for Intel to complain about millions of advertising dollars spent on the Intel + Mac transition. It's free advertising for crying out loud!
The video ad crashed Firefox, Flock, and IE. Triple threat!
"The video ad crashed Firefox, Flock, and IE. Triple threat!"
I have found that quicktime isn't all that stable.
a few people i've shown it to think they are saying "inside DELL little boxes, doing DELL little tasks"...certainly double meaning was intended. Love it!
Well it got attention beyond 15 seconds so that makes it a success in the add world.
My guess is that it is the Dell's etc. of the world that are complaining, and that Intel really is pretty pumped to be working with such a forward edge company that will showcase and make sexy it's latest chips.
I think this Ad only highlights why it is I don't use Macs and generally can't abide being around Mac-fanboys for very long. For some reason (And Linux people get this sometimes as well) you Mac people seem to think that the Mac is perfect. (what version of OS are we on? Oh yeah 10.4.4, not 1.perfect.O) I use windows, not because I imagine it's perfect, but I don't want to be viewed as some elitest who has way too much money to spend on a computer. Anything designed by humans (OSx, Linux, Windows) is going to have some serious flaws. OSX might have "less" of them, but that's only because the stuff you can do with OSx is limited to only things that apple wants in the box. So that said, my view is that while Macs might be more stable, I want the freedom to put whatever I want in my box, at a decent price, and not find myself boasting about the 3,000 dollars I just spent on a laptop that I could have gotten at half the price if I went with a windows machine.
Dang it people, how did you get me on my soap-box?!
*Picks up box and goes home*
In my last trip I went to visit the CNN in atlanta.
They all used DELL.
Yes!
OMG!!! APPLE IS THE FIRST COMPANY TO COMPETE WITH DELL... EVARRRRRRR!!!!
:p
Dell -- and others -- will NOT bail on Intel because of this ad, or others. They see competetition from HP, Sony, Gateway, Toshiba, etc.,etc.,etc. And in THOSE cases, it's direct competition -- same OS. Apple is a totally different product, just using the same CPU.
And please, please recall economics. Dell uses Intel because they see a better value:price ratio. If AMD starts giving them better CPUs at a lower overall price (remember, this means different motherboards too), THAT is what will tempt Dell away from Intel.
Not some silly Apple ad.
Sheesh.
-Pie
They're trying to do a new version of that old 80s ad of Big Brother. I'm not saying the new ad is all Big Brotherish, but it's like, they're trying to do this kinda space age futuristic, revolutionary thing. I'm not taking a pick at it, im just saying it reminded me of the 1984 ad.
#40
Most people think that what they do/use is perfect (or at least the best choice), but obviously that can't always be true. I am an MCP(working on my MCSE and CCNA) who works help desk at a company that uses Windows, my main PC is a Windows machine. But I still feel that MacOSX is by far the best OS for the average user. It is designed to allow you to easily and quickly do the things that users want to do. Windows and Linux are currently more about features than usability. It seems like when Apple designs an app they say "Ok, we need to put a button on here to do 'foo', where would be the best place to put it to make it easy for users?", when MS designs an app it seems more like "Hey, throw a button on there somewhere that does 'foo'."
This is obviously an over-simpification of the situation, but I think it shows the spirit of the types of differences you see between the two OSs.
BTW, you choose your OS based on not wanting "to be viewed as some elitest who has way too much money to spend on a computer."? I personally just choose the best tool available to me for the job at hand.
Everyone is entitled to thier own opinions though...
They're trying to do a new version of that old 80s ad of Big Brother. I'm not saying the new ad is all Big Brotherish, but it's like, they're trying to do this kinda space age futuristic, revolutionary thing. I'm not taking a pick at it, im just saying it reminded me of the 1984 ad.
listen closely and you'll hear the sound of 30 million mac users putting up a middle finger to Dell...
Apple about to surpass Dell in market cap.. enjoy the show
Does that ad also tell you that previous Apple computers sucked because they had an IBM chip in them? So all of you who own Macs are left behind....with slow processors. Sad.....
hey jon, comment #5, you are an idiot. That is the stupidest post I've ever read.
eminem hates gays because he is a bigot, not a conservative, and eminem is far from a conservative.
conservative does not equal bigot.
but jon? jon equals fucking stupid a$$ h*le stereo typer...
CNN is a lame corp (in ref to #41) and they dont know any better but to buy Dell comps, Dell uses a sweet system called "you can be a retard and buy a computer" Look at their commercials they claim you need no technical knowledge, than they sell you computer that dont come with the drivers required to run all the hardware that they sold you! THEN you need to go and download wind(ers) update 40003.20303.203034.1211 to get your machine to run, than you have a bunch of people who call tech support wondering why their brand new computer is so slow, which happens to be because dell has installed about 80 pieces of useless demoware. pffff Im sticking with my mac thankyou!!
well they are both reminiscent of the Massive Attack Special Cases video, which came out long before (except it is shot in a pharma / genetic engineering setting)
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewVideo?id=81752358&s=143455
Anyway, there are loads of ads that are 'inspired' by other material - look how many car ads show the cars splitting into more cars (cobalt, LR3, matrix) all on the air right now.
okay here are two reasons why macs are better: When flying any airplane with a highspeed internet connection, look at the instructions it will say "step one: shut down comp, Step two: plug in ethernet cable, Step three restart (if you are using a mac skip to step 14)" Secondly, I want my computer to run like my car, everytime I turn it on, it works, no bullshit. If cars ran like PCs first of all half the population wouldnt own one because it would be f*king dangerous and secondly the people who could handle putting up with one and all the shit that it gave them would probably run into something at high speed because the car froze on them... giving a more litteral meaning to the "blue screen of death"
Reposting, since my first attempt at this post didn't seem to make it in.
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The ad is not just a slam at Intel's corporate partners, it's a slam at PC users and programmers: an obviously uncreative, untalented, and altogether boring pile of hoi polloi who just didn't "get" Intel well enough to understand their chips' need to be pushed beyond the bounds of our little glass-paned worlds. I'm glad I made the switch to AMD a while ago--I'd hate to think that my "dull little tasks"
were bringing down Apple's cool factor by my continued use of Intel processors.
Pompous jerks.
Oh, and regarding the video: yeah, very likely plagiarism. Sharing location and/or theme is one thing, but matching shots with the level of similarity that they did can hardly be coincidental.