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While Steve Wozniak was rushing to an Apple store to get some help, Lauren, a quintessential average female consumer, was heading there too--part of Microsoft's bold new attempt to show the "Apple tax" in action.aaron spelling

In the Microsoft TV spot that just assaulted me during the Pitt-Xavier game, Lauren tells us she has needs. She wants a laptop with "speed, comfortable keyboard and a 17-inch screen for under $1,000." The voiceover tells her that if she finds it (at the Apple store or elsewhere), she can keep it.

And so we follow Lauren, her fetching green scarf, and her jolly, Oregon-esque joie de vivre on her quest.

She goes to a Mac store and exits with a face that suggests the dermatologist has given her bad news. She can only get a 13-inch screen for her money. She declares she would have to "double her budget" to get what she wants from Apple.

She then offers the entirely unscripted line: "I'm just not cool enough to be a Mac person."

Oh, Lauren, what is cool these days? Yanni? The Jonas Brothers? Jimmy Kimmel? Do any of them wear a green scarf?



This shot is entitled "Settling the Mac vs PC debate".

(Credit: CC Tama Leaver)

You will feel a tickling sensation in several parts of your anatomy when you hear that Lauren succeeds in her quest for budget-conscious joy. She wanders into a place that looks remarkably like Best Buy, where the choirs are singing and the choices are plentiful. She settles on an HP that fulfills all her wishes. It even offers to drive her home. Well, not quite.

The HP is such a bargain that she pays cash. Because she happens to have around $700 in her purse, as all average female consumers do? No, because a helpful producer hands her the money.aaron spelling

This is perhaps Microsoft's most aggressive declaration of advertising war against the Mac in a long, long time. What fun that the company and its ad agency, Crispin, Porter and Bogusky, have chosen an overt price war.

It will be interesting to see just how many cash-unconscious Americans will be persuaded to accept their own lack of sidewalk credibility and venture towards the PC.

And it will be interesting whether someone might be a little upset over the clear implication that Macs cost twice as much as PCs. After all, last week Steve Ballmer suggested the Apple logo only cost $500.

And now, back to the other March Madness.