Misleading advertising, thy name is Apple. Despite portraying a bumbling PC in Apple’s “Get a Mac” campaign, John Hodgman’s computer of choice is none other than a Mac. And if Hodgman is to be believed—and can we really trust him after such a convincing performance—he’s no, er, John-come-lately. In an interview with The Boston Phoenix, Hodgman claims that his Mac roots go all the way back to 1984.
I bought the very first Mac, or convinced my father to buy it, in 1984. I used it through high school and college; it was the first computer I used outside of college, then I went though a brief period of exile during my corporate years as a professional literary agent, where I was forced to use a PC…But lest you think his PC character is nothing less than a straw man, Hodgman has this to say about his portrayal:
Mac has always gotten the design and the interface down pat. They just know it. PC’s efforts to emulate this, and its constant failing, and its self-satisfied arrogance about it being the most used platform in the world, all of that made it very easy to craft a character who, while he is a boob, and often concerned about how he comes off, at his core really feels bad for the Mac. Is really so delusional to believe he’s much cooler than the Mac. The whole reason they’re standing in that white room is because he’s trying to help the Mac out.With that truth revealed, I just don’t know if I’ll even be able to watch another PC and Mac commercial. Well, until that one with Gisele comes out.
[via Insanely Great Mac]
