I scanned the Microsoft ad below from a recent QBS catalogue.
click for larger image
I am still struggling to understand the underlying message. Use Team System and Microsoft will get its tentacles around you? I don’t know which is more unlikely, the basketball playing Cthonians or the athletic and good looking development team.
Successful Software 
I’ll say it: where’s the black guy? It is basketball isn’t it?
Oh, I’m going to hell. My wife hates when I make jokes like that.
The overweight overhead-type at midcourt is probably their real target.
Chuck Brooks
FutureWare SCG
At least in this one the guy looks like he’s going to score.
There’s another ad where the sword-wielding dev team is backed into a corner and surrounded by legions of crab warriors wearing armor.
That dev team is obviously toast and it’s gonna be ugly. Makes *me* want to use Microsoft’s wares for sure.
Then again, here we are talking about the ads so I guess they’re effective on some level…
Mike
It’s very clear what the message is:
We are NOT the Borg, despite all rumours to the contrary.
We are the green tentacled octopus thing.
Resistance is futile.
You guys aren’t very creative. It is really obvious.
Typical Reddit Post
Further evidence of their disconnection from their users.
Whatever they’re smoking, from marketing perspective it’s a super win:
Got you to post a Blog about it and open discussion! What else can a marketing dude want?!
Grats, Microsofties…
These message is crystal clear. If you have VSTS, you can dunk and get the girl with big jugs. Sign me up Microsoft.
>What else can a marketing dude want?!
Sales?
The word “score” is directly above the good-looking girl. This is aimed at the heart of geeks.
Having Cthultu on your team is a winner?
Or programming is like playing basketball against elder gods and winning?
And is that an iPhone peeking out of the blue badge’s pocket?
To me it looks like the octopus thingy is scoring as it’s nearly all humans in the near half of the court, so I’d assume they’re defending.
Maybe you need to have as many arms as an octopus to make Visual Studio run efficiently, in which case that rules me out.
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