Here are the three new Apple (AAPL) commercials trying to take a smack at the launch of Windows 7 (MSFT), the new operating system software from Microsoft.

The “Get a Mac” advertising features the PC and Mac guys, as usual, but are quite a bit meaner than usual.

The first, titled “Broken Promises,” is a series of flashbacks to promises made about earlier Windows versions, complete with flip sunglasses.

The second, “Teeter Tottering,” has a Windows user switching over to Mac instead of upgrading from Windows XP. “I could stick with what I know, but what I know is pain and frustration,” she says. Ouch!

The third commercial, called “PC News,” has the PC guy as a television anchor, talking to a reporter at the Windows 7 launch, to disastrous results.

Here are the new videos (and you can see all the Apple ads here):

OK, the Lauren commercial was a little too cute for its own good, and BoomTown has no interest in Giampaulo’s “really big hands.”

But the latest installment of Microsoft’s real-people advertising Internet and television ad campaign, called “Laptop Hunters”–this time a mother and son named Lisa and Jackson looking to score a computer–is pretty funny and sweet.

Deftly lacing in baseball and playing to cute but tired clichés (did you hear–boys don’t like the color pink!), the main theme of heft value over too-thin hipness is really starting to kick in: That a person can get more computer for the money by buying a PC over a Mac.

Again, this segment slyly insults Apple (AAPL) as overpriced and undersized–”It’s a little too small,” says Jackson, while Lisa calls the Macs “pretty.”

The pair finally walk out of the store with a Sony (SNE) Vaio.

While I cannot blame Microsoft (MSFT) for sticking to the Apple-Is-for-Value-Ignorant-Elites meme, I still wish that the messaging would move on from price to more important things such as how the software and hardware perform together.

Cuz, frankly, I like pretty.

Here are Lisa and Jackson, as well the Lauren and Giampaulo, below:

Even without Apple CEO Steve Jobs, there will be copious amounts of live coverage of Macworld’s keynote by Apple SVP Phil “No-Black-Turtleneck” Schiller all over the tech sites online in T-minus nine hours and counting.

And, guess what? All Things Digital will be there too, with the intrepid reporting duo of Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski on text and our Webmaster (and not-so-secret Mac fanboy) Adam Tow on photos.

They and many others are hoping the not-prone-yet Jobs will make a surprise appearance, even by iChat, to greet the Apple (AAPL) faithful crowd gathered in San Francisco.

One can hope for His Digital Holiness, but the event might be more about Mac minis and 17-inch Macbook Pros, as most expect.

Until then, enjoy this very funny spoof video from The Onion about a new Apple sensation that almost seems like it could be made and sold: The Macbook Wheel.

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

BoomTown extends apologies to the late Francis P. Church, who penned the original “Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus” editorial in the New York Sun on Sept. 21, 1897.

But with just a little rejiggering, his eloquent words work perfectly as a translation for Apple’s press release about its withdrawal from San Francisco’s Macworld and no keynote speech from Apple CEO Steve Jobs yesterday, which doubtlessly shook the Apple (AAPL) faithful to the core.

Oddly enough, it matches up surprisingly–and a little disturbingly–well.

Thus, here’s a little holiday inspiration to help those poor souls make it through these darkest of days:

Dear Editor:

I am 28 years old. Some of my little fanboys say there is no Steve Jobs at Macworld. My imaginary friend at AppleInsider says, ‘If you see it on BoomTown, it’s so.’ Please tell me the truth, is there a Steve Jobs?

–O’Hanlon, a geek in Virginia”

Apple wrote: CUPERTINO, California—December 16, 2008—Apple today announced that this year is the last year the company will exhibit at Macworld Expo. Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, will deliver the opening keynote for this year’s Macworld Conference & Expo, and it will be Apple’s last keynote at the show. The keynote address will be held at Moscone West on Tuesday, January 6, 2009 at 9:00 a.m. Macworld will be held at San Francisco’s Moscone Center January 5-9, 2009.

Translation: Virginia geek, your little friends are wrong (and they also have no life, which is self-evident). They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia geek, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. Not as elegantly tiny as the iPod Nano, but little nonetheless. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Apple wrote: Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.

Translation: Yes, Virginia geek, there is a Steve Jobs. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion and the fabled touchscreen tablet Mac exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Steve Jobs! It would be as dreary as if there were no amazingly great iPhones. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance, no Pull My Finger app to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Apple wrote: Apple has been steadily scaling back on trade shows in recent years, including NAB, Macworld New York, Macworld Tokyo and Apple Expo in Paris.

Translation: Not believe in Steve Jobs! You might as well not believe in those admittedly freaky iPod shadow dancers. You might get your other pretend friend at MacRumors to hire men to watch in all the Chinese manufacturing factories on Christmas eve to catch Steve Jobs, but even if you did not see Steve Jobs ordering up new Mini desktop computers, what would that prove? Nobody sees Steve Jobs, but that is no sign that there is no Steve Jobs. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see the iPod dancers dancing bizarrely on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

Apple wrote: Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications.

Translation: You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, and the fact that the Mac guy vs. PC guy ads are pure genius can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia geek, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

Apple wrote: Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.

Translation: No Steve Jobs! Thank God! he lives and lives forever, despite Henry Blodget-fueled health rumors to the contrary. A thousand years from now, Virginia geek, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of Mac fanboyhood.

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.

But–as many readers have requested–they will all be available in their entirety in this column.

In the less contentious spirit of DEMOfall and TechCrunch50, two demo conferences taking place simultaneously this week, we’re happy to bring you all the demos we had onstage at D6.

First up is TransMedia’s Glide, an operating system that cuts across all operating systems.

There are two videos showing the whole demo below.

In the first one, TransMedia Chairman and CEO Donald Leka walks Walt and Kara through Glide on Mac OSX, Windows and the iPhone.

In the second, Leka demos the engaging kids’ version of Glide, shows how the OS runs in a browser on an iPhone and talks about the company’s business model.

As usual before yet another big Apple event, the psychic friends network is in overdrive in anticipation of the iconic computer company’s “Let’s Rock” media gathering in San Francisco tomorrow.

At this point, I think Apple could announce a change in the color of its bathrooms at its Cupertino HQ and it would be mayhem among the Mac faithful.

Nonetheless, even though what will be announced is likely to be a series of incremental improvements for Apple’s line of music-playing products–iTunes, iTouch and, of course, the iPod–and even the possibility of a revamped design, it’s astonishing how striking the hype is around the event.

Of course, that kind of passion from core users is a blessing for any tech company, and it is hard to quibble with Apple’s stellar ability to market every jog and tittle of its product development as if it was the second coming.

But the most intense focus will more likely be on Apple’s leader, CEO Steve Jobs, whose gaunt appearance at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June set off a flurry of discussion about the exact state of his health.

That talk has since been less frantic, despite the fact that there actually has been no clear announcement from Apple (AAPL) on the delicate subject (and Jobs’s colorful off-the-record chat with the New York Times’s Joe Nocera does not count, folks).

In any case, because AllThingsD.com cannot resist either, Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski will be there liveblogging “Let’s Rock” from the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, with all the news that’s fit to post.

And, of course, everything else too.

As was reported earlier this morning by BoomTown, Google has confirmed on its blog that it will launch its new Chrome browser tomorrow.

Google (GOOG) said it would be launching Chrome in 100 countries, but it will only be in beta in Windows (Google said Mac and Linux versions were coming soon).

The move by the search giant, although the blog does not say so, is clearly a direct shot over the bow of Microsoft (MSFT), which dominates the browser market with 74 percent share.

Here is the blog post in full:

A fresh take on the browser

Posted by Sundar Pichai, VP Product Management, and Linus Upson, Engineering Director

Also, here is the entire comic book Google is using to explain the technical aspects of Chrome, and here is Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski with a CliffNotes version of the comic (believe me, you’ll need it).

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

And, even if sales are soaring, iPod sales don’t slow as much as expected and the 3G iPhone looks tasty, the stock still might not get a bounce.

Well, worry not by watching this funny Mac-related spoof by iJustine of Madonna’s latest pretentious song: