Songdog.net

OK. I run Windows at home and at work, but I don't get uptight about it. I've used various of Unix and Mac OSes and have been quite happy with those too. I've just chosen to receive the bulk of my computer annoyances from Microsoft rather than from Apple or the open source community.

As you may know, Microsoft has embarrassed itself plenty recently with its awful attempt to respond to Apple's clever "Switch" ads. But now, right now, at this very moment Microsoft is embarrassing themselves again out in Bryant Park. There to promote the incipient media version of Windows XP they are actually doing so from within a glass house. No kidding.

I didn't watch for long. I couldn't. But I fail to understand why they're presenting this tripe to the general public. It's one thing to do it at a trade show, where it's part of the kitschy experience, and where there is a very low standard of excellence. But it's another thing altogether to do this for the average buyer who's only seen Microsoft's more conventional advertising.

In the glass house, wearing wireless microphones, are a family of actors describing how "cool" this new Windows edition is. How it's revolutionizing their lives. How it's making the world livable once more. The father in his glass den describing his home theater fetish is creepy. But the two college girls in their glass bunk-bedded bedroom are downright unsettling. The actors are perfectly competent, but the voyeuristic appeal of watching them wander around their Habitrail home is shattered by their painful copy. They actually praise a software feature as "tight."

Tight.

That's all I have to say.

Update (one more thing to say after all): I went by again and took another look. What I saw was a rehearsal for an event tomorrow (October 29). So don't go by the park today looking for Big Brother: Microsoft (insert joke here).