Gateway TV Ad Features iMac, With Its PC Mimicking iMac Movements

by , 5:15 PM EDT, August 27th, 2002

Gateway officially announced its new Profile PC yesterday, along with marketing info that compares it to the iMac (read TMO's full coverage on that story for more info). Today, the company began showing its TV ads for the new PC, and the company has gone so far as to feature the iMac in those ads.

The commercial shows the new Profile sitting next to an iMac, as a voice over explains that the Profile has the same features, which is not true in that DVD-R is not offered, and the low-end model doesn't even feature a CD-RW drive. The voice over then tells us that the Profile is faster than the iMac, which is true from a MHz standpoint. At that point in the spot, the Profile leaps over the iMac in a leapfrog metaphor. The movements of the Profile are similar to the ones Apple used in the iMac Window ad. In that commercial, a man watches the iMac in a window as it moves about as if alive, including a moment when it seems as if the iMac is sticking its tongue out at the man.

Gateway's commercial also plays upon a perceived weakness of the Mac platform when the commercial says that the Profile can run "thousands more software titles" than the iMac. The Profile leapfrogs the iMac again at this point.

At the end of the commercial, the voice over asks, "Oh, and did we mention that the Profile is cheaper than the iMac?" The Profile emphasizes this by sticking its CD-ROM "tongue" out in a CG animated raspberry.

We were unable to find the commercial on Gateway's Web site. If you know of an online showing of the spot, let us know, or drop a notes in the comments below.

The Mac Observer Spin:

As many Observers have pointed out, it seems that Gateway is intent on placing Apple's iMac in the spot as the Computer-to-Beat. The online material relating to this campaign has certainly done so, and this TV commercial does so even more. It's an interesting strategy from the company, and one that frankly helps out Apple from our viewpoint. We won't bother offering comment on the untrue claims that the Profile has more features than the iMac, except to say that Gateway's Profile is actually priced very similarly to the iMac except on the low-end model that only comes with a CD-ROM drive (read our original coverage on this for more commentary).

We are also tempted to jump on the "runs thousands more software titles" claim, but we'll limit ourselves to pointing out that the Mac platform has all of the best software with the exceptions of the gaming market. Even the gaming market has never been better for the Mac than it is right now. Indeed, the Windows world is welcome to the thousands of worthless, poorly made, and ill-conceived software titles that are available to it.

Lastly, we were a bit surprised by the petulant nature of the Profile's raspberry. The whole thing really is just a tad bizarre.

Gateway