It’s no secret that TMA thinks Microsoft has the worst advertising in technology. Any company that combines projectile vomiting and Dean Cain in an ad deserves to have a bullet put into its right brain.

So the geniuses at Redmond have taken the news that college freshmen would now rather eat glass than use a PC and channeled their embarrassment into a devastating comparison: “PC vs Mac”.  From the “Simplicity” section (where the lede is “Intuitive, familiar, and easy to use, PCs do what you want: they just work” (emphasis mine):

Macs can take time to learn.

Especially when you’ve learned that something that’s always taken 12 steps only takes 2.

The computer that’s easiest to use is typically the one you already know how to use. While some may say Macs are easy, the reality is that they can come with a learning curve. PCs running Windows 7 look and work more like the computers you’re familiar with, so you can get up and running quickly.

Actually, PCs running Windows 7 should look pretty familiar: almost all of their UI elements were ripped off from the Mac, starting with Windows 3.1.

Working smoothly.

Things just don’t work the same way on Macs if you’re used to a PC. For example, the mouse works differently. And many of the shortcuts you’re familiar with don’t work the same way on a Mac.

Cntl-Alt-Del, for example.

Use Windows 7 to simplify your life.

Windows 7 was designed to make it simpler to do the tasks you do every day, with features that the Mac doesn’t have. For example, the new Snap feature makes it easy to view two documents side by side.

We think so much of this feature that we’ve made it the basis of 2 separate commercials. This one feature, which resizes a window when you put one adjacent to it = $10 million in advertising. The centerpiece of Microsoft’s major OS overhaul, the product that would save PC users from Vista, is a window resizing feature.  They should have named Windows 7 “Windows Snap”.

Touch and go.

Unlike Macs, many PCs running Windows 7 support Touch, so you can browse online newspapers, flick through photo albums, and shuffle files and folders—using nothing but your fingers. PCs with a fingerprint reader even let you log in with just a swipe of your finger.

Microsoft does have a point. The “touch” in Apple’s “Multi-Touch” is technically part of a hyphenated word, so it’s not the same as “Touch”. Otherwise, I’d think that the company that revolutionized touch-based UI was being slighted.

Usually I don’t link to retardery, but in this case, Microsoft’s hilarious attempt to differentiate its offerings deserves full linkage.

Remember Kylie?  She’s the cute four-and-a-half year-old who figured out how to download pictures from her camera to her PC, apply image correction to the photos and email them using a distribution list – all in Microsoft’s Windows Live.

Yeah, I didn’t quite buy it either.

Seems Kylie may be the next Jerry Seinfeld for the brand.  Not content to let an ad campaign stand by itself, Kylie has appeared in a crossover ad for Windows 7.  Using her legendary computer skills, she even puts together a slick slideshow with some of 7′s most positive reviews:

Advertising challenge: plot the demographic for this ad.

I honestly can’t tell if they’re leveling themselves or if they believe they’re actually targeting viewers.  That Redmond ad group is one wacky fun machine.