All Things Digital

Here are videos of three of the new “I’m a PC” ads from Microsoft’s next phase of its Vista-doesn’t-bite advertising campaign.

You can decide if you like them or not. But BoomTown is declaring them a vast improvement on the quirky initial commercials that featured Microsoft Founder Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfeld.

Microsoft has insisted that those three ads, which attracted a chorus of critics, were just a “teaser” to this second phase of a $300 million ad campaign, in which the software giant seems to be returning from its short visit in hipville to a more normal marketing message.

And these new Microsoft (MSFT) ads are definitely normal and more clear, having an it’s-a-small-world-after-all panoply of people declare that they are all PCs.

The message is aimed at attacking the more elitist message of Apple (AAPL) ads, which have effectively mocked PC guy relentlessly over the years as an oaf.

In Microsoft’s ads, its own PC guy complains at the start of each that “I’ve been made into a stereotype.”

The ads proceed to show regular folk with some celebrities mixed in (including Gates, TV hottie Eva Longoria and feel-good author Deepak Chopra), all proudly declaring their PC affiliation.

While the ads feel like they are tapping a little too much into that uneasy red-state-blue-state vibe–as if we need more of that–they’re also nicely done, thankfully, although not particularly new or innovative.

Which, after the Gates/Seinfeld oddity, is a good thing.

Here are three of the new ads (click them all at once for an even better experience!):

While the very quirky ads recently rolled out by Microsoft to tout itself–starring Microsoft Founder Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfeld–got a ton of hype, it turns out there will be no more than than the three already released for now.

It seems the churros have gone cold.

According to a Microsoft (MSFT) spokesman, the Seinfeld advertisements were apparently just a warmup for more to come tomorrow, though the new ones will not use Seinfeld in any significant way.

But they might still feature Gates and Seinfeld could return.

But the main Seinfeld/Gates pairing was, said Microsoft, just a “teaser” for the next phase of the $300 million campaign to tout its beleaguered Windows Vista operating system.

[UPDATE] Said Microsoft in an official statement: “We will be executing the second phase of our advertising campaign tomorrow, as planned from the start.”

The company said upcoming personalities in the new ads will include feel-good author Deepak Chopra, television star Eva Longoria and musician Pharrell Williams, and they will also use Microsoft’s own version of the dumpy PC guy character to attack Apple’s hugely successful Mac/PC ads.

BoomTown is dubious, to say the least, that Microsoft can be more clever than Apple (AAPL) in the marketing arena. And by dubious, I mean its chances are as good as Lehman Bros. rising from its financial grave.

News of the development was first reported by Valleywag, which said in its post title that the ads were canceled, which is untrue.

But Microsoft’s rep stresses that this was the plan all along, to jump-start the marketing conversation, even though the ads have, in fact, not gotten a lot of praise.

You be the judge. Here are the three ads. The first with the churros joke and the second and third visit with a family, combined:

First off, as Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski pointed out to me today, you have to give Yahoo props for using Gogol Bordello as the soundtrack and–more to the point–actually knowing about Gogol Bordello in the first place.

“Since when does [Yahoo CEO Jerry] Yang listen to gypsy punk?” asked Paczkowski in an email to me today.

Since Bill Gates started eating churros with Jerry Seinfeld and adjusting his skivvies hands-free, that’s when!

Oh dear, Yahoo (YHOO) has succumbed to the hipster, ironic thing–an unfortunate marketing virus that has hit Microsoft (MSFT) of late too–in an under-the-covers “Start Wearing Purple” online marketing campaign.

The Internet company is now out with a Web site touting itself, advocating that people “celebrate purple.”

Purple and yellow have always been Yahoo’s colors–even while Google (GOOG) just up-and-grabbed the whole spectrum and emerged victorious.

Nonetheless, Yahoo is going to town on the purple idea, using a lot of its tools and products in the process to show itself off.

The effort starts with a video of multiracial hipsters doing wacky stuff, including a yodeling Yang (see at top), which makes it look like a very alternative version of “High School Musical.”

Also on the site: See purple-inspired photos from Flickr; view videos of “Purple Pranks” (first up, of course, ringers singing the purple song in an elevator to unsuspecting folks); peruse profiles of “Purple Picks” (like the cool crafts site Etsy and artist Clarence Lee) and “Purple Pioneers” (a mix of do-gooders and more hipsters, so far); and even search the word “purple” on Yahoo to fun-filled results.

There’s also a bunch of purple bikes apparently traveling the globe and taking pictures that will be uploaded to a Flickr map. And, natch, you can buy purple clothes.

After trolling the site for a bit, I can tell you I live in the dead center of San Francisco’s Castro neighborhood and we don’t get that purple here ever!

In other words, it’s all very high-concept, much like the dancing guy video that Yahoo did recently (see that very sweet morale-building video at the very bottom).

But to really resonate with the mass of users Yahoo needs to hold onto, as dull as this sounds, I would just like a simple explanation of why I should use Yahoo in my daily life.

The legendary Apple (AAPL) Mac-PC ads that Yahoo and Microsoft are clearly trying to mimic are good primarily because they have a message in each funny exchange about why you need to own a Mac.

Not so much with this quirky Yahoo effort, which is laudable, but a waste of time.

In the main “celebrate purple” video on the site, part of the tag line is: “Deep inside everyone is a Yahoo! waiting to come out. Set yourself free with a little purple.”

Actually, deep inside Yahoo is a Yahoo waiting to come out. And it is going to take more than purple to coax that magical creature out into the light again.

In a tempest-in-a-teapot political scandalette, Republican Presidential candidate Sen. John McCain used images of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears in a television ad attacking his Democratic opponent, Sen. Barack Obama, as a celebrity.

It was tasteless and also offensive to Hilton and Spears, which seems an almost impossible task–way to go!

Now, wasting no time in taking advantage of the brouhaha and drawing attention just where it should be–to herself, of course–Hilton did this clever video spoof for the Funny or Die comedy Web site.

Wearing a killer swimsuit, she does manage to make a good suggestion about a sensible energy policy and an even better one to have Rihanna as VP.

Also, Hilton calls McCain “white-haired dude.” That’s hot. Well, warm.

In any case, here’s the Hilton video and the original humorless McCain ad just below it:

Microsoft took out a full-page ad in the San Jose Mercury News today, in an attempt to highlight its recruiting efforts in Silicon Valley.

Of course, BoomTown is not sure the crack engineers that Microsoft (MSFT) is seeking actually read newspapers.

But we like the software giant’s spunk at a little creative Google-smacking and Yahoo-employee-baiting.

With the headline: “Microsoft Has Search Jobs in the Valley,” the ad goes on to tout Microsoft’s commitment to search and online advertising in a come-on to join the company’s 2,000 other employees in Mountain View, Calif.

Also highlighted, Microsoft’s partnerships with Facebook (and also, inexplicably, Dow Jones, the owner of this site).

“We have a long way to go. It will be an exciting journey.”

As the search and online ad wars heat up now that Google (GOOG) has seemingly snatched Microsoft’s Yahoo (YHOO) prize, you can say that again.

Here’s the ad (click on it to make it larger):

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

It’s an open secret in Silicon Valley that search giant Google grabbed YouTube from Yahoo at the last minute in a deal-making frenzy.

I didn’t mean in my last update posted earlier today to leave out that possibility happening again with regard to Facebook’s current round of funding discussions.

While Yahoo and Microsoft have been most aggressive in courting the hot social-networking site, sources close to Facebook said that Google is also part of the ongoing discussions about a new round of funding for Facebook, although it might not take the form of a large investment.

What’s of interest to Google, as well as Yahoo and Microsoft, is Facebook’s potentially large international ad-sales business, which all three would like to have.

Under a different kind of scenario, Facebook would take an investment from a range of private equity investors, do an international ad deal with Google (which might or might not make an investment in the company) and still have its U.S. ad sales served by longtime partner Microsoft.

Such an arrangement would be a blow to Microsoft, which has been seeking to get closer to Facebook, partly out of paranoia of Google and its own lack of innovation in the Web 2.0 space.

But, according to sources, that’s just what might happen given that Facebook execs are wary of linking themselves too closely with Microsoft. Plus, a stronger relationship with Google would burnish its independent credentials, which many think is critical in the next phase of Facebook’s development.

Who’s to say what’s going to happen, but it could happen rather quickly, even within the next 24 hours.

And that’s a good thing, because to my mind, Facebook’s got to get this funding roundelay behind it and get busy making its service bigger and more powerful.

It’s easy to get sucked up into the Silicon Valley reality-distortion field, and Facebook would do well to get the giant bag of cash it thinks it needs and move on.

It is no secret that Microsoft has a serious case of Google envy when it comes to the online ad business, after the typically dominating tech giant has continued to lag behind the search king in the lucrative business.

But it should also have become crystal clear by now that Microsoft–and especially its famously aggressive CEO Steve Ballmer–is going to do anything to change that equation.

Case in point: its recent deal to be the exclusive company for Digg’s display and search advertising.

“This move gives us an advertising partner with a larger organization and a more scalable technology platform to keep pace with Digg’s growth,” Digg founder Kevin Rose wrote yesterday in his blog. “It’s important to say that we’re as focused as ever on a great user experience. So, no dancing-monkey ads, and the design will remain uncluttered.”

No dancing monkeys perhaps, but perhaps a little celebratory jig at the news site for the opportunity to play Google and Microsoft off each other and reap the rewards.

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Will this be the last shoe to drop–at least this month–at Yahoo?

Tomorrow, the struggling Internet search giant will announce its second quarter earnings at 5 p.m. EDT (2 p.m. PDT).

The company is expected to have no gain in profit year to year. That translates to 11 cents a share for the quarter on $1.24 billion in net sales, the same earnings as the second quarter last year.

Newly installed CEO and Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang will have to power through the call with new President Sue Decker. Its former CEO Terry Semel left the company days after the annual meeting last month, when the current weak quarter’s results were obviously going to become a bone of contention.

Having Semel make more excuses to investors would have been problematic, to say the least.

Here’s a video from MarketWatch about analyst expectations on the quarter for the Web giants:

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