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Steven Saroka
Dr. Lori Bedell
CAS 137H, Section 4
11 October 2013
Inverted: Microsoft's Recent Attempt to Defeat the iPad
In a recent video advertisement, Microsoft mounted a direct rhetorical attack on the
presumed superiority of Apple in the tablet computer market, a market which Apple has long
dominated with its iPad line of tablets. As Microsoft is attempting to break into the tablet market
with their new Surface tablet (Rodriguez), this advertisement forms part of a campaign to
establish the Surface as a viable and desirable alternative to the dominant Apple products. In
pursuit of this goal, Microsoft advertised the Surface through both T.V. and Internet video
advertising, and this commercial aired on both fronts as part of that push in the latter half of
2013. The advertisement itself takes the unusual approach of turning the distinctive elements of
Apple’s own iPad advertisements against Apple. In this video ad, Microsoft hijacks Apple’s
commercial place, style, presentation, and iconic Siri voice character in order to promote its own
Surface tablet, in a rhetorical inversion of typical Apple advertising that successfully turns
Apple’s commercial elements against the iPad they were intended to promote.
The first thing that viewers notice about this advertisement is its distinctive place. The
overarching setting of the commercial—a minimalist bright white background, gentle upbeat
music playing, and only the products in question presented—is practically identical to the place
or stage used by Apple in their advertisements to present the features of their latest product. This
familiar stronghold of Apple, which easily focuses the eye on the product at hand, is taken here
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and used to focus the viewer on the Windows Surface tablet while simultaneously minimizing
the iPad. The traditional Apple stage is thus invaded by a rival Microsoft device, which is
presented as the new center of attention. This is reinforced through the contrast of the white iPad
and the black Surface tablet on the white background, which immediately draws the eye to the
Windows tablet—a subversion of Apple’s original intent that implicitly suggests that Apple is no
longer the only option for tablet computers.
Tied into the place of this advertisement is its style of presentation. The presentation and
format of this commercial, with music playing while anonymous Caucasian hands directly
demonstrate various features of the tablets on a bright white background, is a stock Apple
presentation element. Here, though, the ubiquitous hands show off features from both iPad and
the Surface tablet simultaneously. The hand operating the Windows tablet soon reveals features
of the Surface that the iPad lacks, such as split-screen functionality, while the hand operating the
iPad simultaneously conveys helplessness and even frustration with the iPad. While trying to use
Powerpoint, the iPad hand communicates confusion and muted frustration before eventually
giving up and moving off the screen, suggesting that the iPad's apparent superiority is not enough
to make up for frustrating design flaws—while, beside it, the hand operating the Surface
modifies a Powerpoint easily. These hands deliver implicit appeals to both logos and pathos:
their logical appeal is that the Surface has greater functionality and versatility than the iPad,
while their pathetic appeal is that the Surface tablet will spare users the negative emotions of
frustration and failure associated with the iPad by the hand gestures.
A major component of the subversive argumentation used by Microsoft is the character of
Siri. Since its integration into Apple's operating system, Siri has been a consistent character used
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in Apple advertisements to promote Apple products. Siri has been the confident “voice” of Apple
products and thus of Apple itself since its launch, and is arguably the strongest rhetorical
character available to Apple. Microsoft's use of the normally confident character Siri to highlight
features lacking in the iPad thus constitutes not only an attack on the iPad’s features, but an
attack on the previous confidence of Siri, representing Apple, in its own superiority. This use of
Siri against Apple is further aided through both the voice and diction of Siri in this
advertisement. While Siri's voice is by nature flat and monotonal, this neutrality is imbued with
an air of defeat when combined with its diction, which is almost completely negative. The
repetition of the phrase “I'm sorry”, which is then paired with some variation of a negative
phrase about what iPad cannot do or can only do in a limited way, combines with Siri's flattened
tone to impress on viewers the impression that Apple's tablet has been defeated by the Surface
tablet. Siri becomes a central character with a voice of supreme irony, as the character integral to
Apple's image speaks throughout this video in a way that can only favor its rival Microsoft.
As this advertisement closes, Siri's final question is “Should we just play 'Chopsticks'?”,
in a reference to previous Apple advertisement which showcased the virtual pianos of both an
iPad and an iPad mini (Apple). Here, though, at the end of a presentation of Windows-only
capabilities that has thus far served to make the iPad look deficient, its original purpose is
inverted. The implications of the piano segment in its original context—namely, that the iPad has
a piano and the loaded implications that iPad users are creative, smart, sophisticated people who
do intelligent things like playing piano—are absent when it is placed at the end of a cascade of
Windows-exclusive features. What appeared to be a strength of iPad is made a limp counterpoint
to all of the Windows features the iPad lacks. This is the culmination of an underlying argument
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by comparison: in this video, Microsoft is not saying that Apple products do not have interesting
features like virtual pianos, but simply that the Surface tablet has more and better features.
Finally, Microsoft ends the video with their slogan: “Less Talking. More Doing.” This
effectively sums up the message of this video, finalizing the logical appeal that the Surface is
superior due to its greater array of features which allow users to accomplish more, while
simultaneously implying that all of the talking of Siri is both inefficient and unproductive.
However, the greater features are not the primary reason why this advertisement is successful. It
achieves success through its inversion of Apple's traditional advertisement place, style,
presentation, and character to present those features. As the Surface tablet, a stark black block set
against Apple's white minimalist motif, proceeds to cycle through ways in which it is superior to
the iPad, Apple's primary character Siri audibly questions the previous confidence in iPad's
dominant place in the tablet market. This helps to shake viewer confidence in Apple's
unquestionable superiority as well, helping to establish the Surface as a viable and desirable
alternative tablet computer. Due to its success in presenting the Surface tablet as a true
competitor, this short clip effectively causes its desired effect in viewers, and is a rhetorical
success for Microsoft. Unfortunately, this small-scale rhetorical success has not translated into
financial success for Microsoft. The tablet “was slow to sell” and Apple still has “a dominant
grip on the tablet market” (Rodriguez), which seems to indicate that this particular battle is far
from over. While this ad by itself is a convincing and successful presentation of the Surface
tablet at the expense of the iPad, it appears that Microsoft will need to produce many more like it
before their goal is realized.
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Works Cited
Apple. Advertisement. YouTube. YouTube, 2 Nov. 2012. Web. 8 Oct. 2013.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vM9U70HgLsQ>.
Microsoft. Advertisement. YouTube. YouTube, 22 May 2013. Web. 8 Oct. 2013.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86JMcy5OqZA>.
Rodriguez, Salvador. "Despite Early Struggles, Microsoft Pushes Ahead with Surface Tablets".
latimes.com. Tribune Newspaper, 04 Oct. 2013. Web. 08 Oct. 2013.
<http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-microsoft-surface-panos-panay20131003,0,1592228.story>.