Seinfeld and celebrity computer endorsements

At Global Nerdy, Joey deVilla comments on Microsoft's decision to use Jerry Seinfeld as its new spokesman. The best part of Joey's post is the collection of YouTube videos of celebrity computer endorsements over the last 25 years.

Above, Bill Cosby pretending to be excited about a $100 rebate for the TI 99/4.

Seinfeld and Celebrity Computer Endorsements

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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crimeshark

OK. The latest wave of Apple TV spots are way amusing. But everybody I know still uses a PC at home. And all the computers in the government offices here are Dell. And did I mention all the computers over at the local courthouse? Dell.

I’d be a little more convinced Apple made great computers if I just once ran into somebody who actually HAD one.
jathomas

The Matthew Perry/Jennifer Aniston Windows 95 training is really worth checking out. The writing is terrible, it makes you remember how limiting 95 was, and the jokes are TRULY cringeworthy.

The humor is also obviously Sienfeldesque (complete with the musical riffs). It was like the writers tried to combine their two favorite sitcoms.
Narual

@#12 Maybe, but he has a JoCo song!

http://www.jonathancoulton.com/2006/03/03/thing-a-week-23-a-talk-with-george/
PFlint

Seinfeld for Microsoft? Who are the ad wizards who came up with this one?
Symphonix

I seem to remember that Jerry Seinfeld was actually in one of the “Here’s to the Crazy Ones” Apple Computer ads, long before “Seinfeld” hit the air.

He looked a little out of place alongside Amelia Earhart, Einstien, Picasso and Ghandi, though.
papercup mixmaster

Wow, that’s just…special. Good job Microsoft. I’m sure this will move a whole lot of Vista boxes.
grimc

@#18

Crispin Porter Bogusky, formerly of Miami and currently of Boulder. Brought you Burger King, early Mini work, a brief period of VW stuff among other things. Personally, I think they’re a bit overrated as the latest darling of adworld, and this Microsoft thing signals the first warning bell of their 15 minutes.
buddy66

Who’s the bald cat in the diapers standing next to Jerry?
kattw

Hey, the 99/4 was an awesome computer. For certain definitions of awesome anyways. Besides, back then, $100 was a lot of money!
V

Jerry who?
LogrusZed

I prefer the Costanza sales pitch for personal computers:

“It’s got porn.”
grimc

I read how using Seinfeld was an effort by Microsoft to break from it’s “…old and stodgy…” image.

I don’t think I’ve even come across a Seinfeld rerun in years. What was the last thing he did, “A Bee Movie”? Didn’t the hp co-op commercials for that run longer than the actual flick?
janai

My favorite bizarre celebrity computer endorsement: Kevin Costner and the Apple Lisa.
JackCastile

It’s always weird, confusing and then just plain sad when celebrities do these commercials. It shows how out of touch they are with us commoners. I mean doesn’t Martin Scorsese know what a money grubbing, progress squelching monopoly AT&T is? Same for Jerry and Microsoft and Dinero and American Express. Don’t they understand to mostly everyone else in the country (i.e. their fans), big, rich, greedy companies = bad?
EH

The best part about this is that the computer in the background of Jerry’s apartment in the show was always an Apple.
EH

GrimC: How this works.
AccordionGuy

Hey, Mark, thanks for the link!

I’ve since fattened up the entry with more celebrity ads including the Nintendo DS (with Patrick Stewart, Liv Tyler, Nicole Kidman and Carrie Underwood, among others), Tom “Doctor Who” Baker’s ads for Prime Computer and a whole whack of John Cleese’s ads for Compaq.
andykatz360

Aren’t you all being a little too critical given that the ads have not even been released yet?

Andy
Narual

Aww, that was my first computer. :)
luketheobscure

@ #19

For the uninitiated, they also did the “subservient chicken” site for Burger King.
Shawn Wolfe

Maybe Microsoft can hire Industrial Light and Magic to do Special Editions of the entire run of Seinfeld where they CGI out the Mac sitting on the desk in his apartment and replace it with a PC.

Actually, Apple should hire the guy who played Banya, and Kathy Griffin, and Newman to do parody counter-ads of the new Seinfeld Microsoft ads.

“That’s GOLD, Jerry. GOLD.”
bwcbwc

@#20: My favorite is Asimov’s endorsement of the TRS-80. Not so much his association with the product, but that the company thought his name recognition with the general public was good enough to make it worthwhile.
rockcruze

hell that ruins the day
:P what is texas trying to prove

Best PTC
DecaturHeel

I prefer to buy my PCs from Lloyd Braun. Now, THERE was a salesman! Oh, that Jerry Seinfeld…he’s a phony. A BIG phony! Now, if Vandelay Industries were to hire him to pitch latex, that would be another thing altogether!
rarrr

*pronk* because i cant be bothered..

but I dont know what I laughed at more:

The comparison of two games that were obviously completely different in their time but look equally rubbish in our modern eyes

or the fact that my web browser crashed trying to view the videos and I had to do a killall -9 to get any usability back.

*sigh*
jimh

Oh I hate that George Plimpton!
He’s just so SMUG!
Guysmiley

To Microsoft: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9tjK_nvOtA
ivan256

#6:

This shows me how *in* touch with us commoners he is… After all, he’s already loaded, and he’ll still sell out a bit of what integrity he has to do a 30 second ad spot for $10 million. Just like any of us would. (Oh, you would. Be honest with yourself.)
zandar

“Maybe Microsoft can hire Industrial Light and Magic to do Special Editions of the entire run of Seinfeld where they CGI out the Mac sitting on the desk in his apartment and replace it with a PC.”

Crap, that made me spill my morning cuppa.

I came to say something snarky about Jessica. Something like Jerry needs some capital, quick, in the wake of that fiasco. Or something.

But instead I have to go hang my keyboard out to dry for a few hours. Thanks. a lot. really.