A couple of weeks back, when David Biedny joined me on The Tech Night Owl LIVE, we were laughing up a storm about Microsoft’s pathetic house parties campaign to boost the launch of Windows 7. It seemed a pathetic or desperate act to want to promote an operating system upgrade with a series of events that had, at best, only a peripheral connection with personal computers.
Indeed, this wasn’t just a case of a couple of Mac fans ranting about Microsoft. Even the tech publications that you just know would be on Microsoft’s side were busy attacking most of the promotional efforts, and the house parties were just a small part of their objections.
Consider most everything Microsoft has done to make Windows warm and fuzzy. There were those meaningless ads featuring Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld, for example. The latter reportedly received $10 million for his miniscule efforts and the campaign was halted when everyone realized they made no sense whatever.
More recently, there are the TV spots in which a little girl, maybe six years of age, is trying to show you just how easy it is for her to edit and upload photos on her PC. All right, she’s cute and all, but does that make anyone want to buy a Windows PC? Really?