Microsoft’s new advertising campaign starring 1990’s comedian Jerry Seinfeld debuted online overnight to a lukewarm response. Featuring founder and chairman of the Microsoft empire Bill Gates and Seinfeld shopping at a discount chain store for shoes, the advertisements show a goofy side of Gates that has fallen flat for its funny-value in the responses revealed over the internet so far.

With an absurdist quality to the humour in the advertisement, Seinfeld is walking through a mall eating churros ( a Spanish deep fried pastry snack popular in the United States), when he sees Gates trying on shoes at a cheap chain store called Shoe Circus. Seinfeld asks Gates if he ever showers with his clothes on, and helps him to pick out a pair of shoes. Upon exiting the mall, both men chewing churros, Seinfeld asks Gates if they will ever build a computer that is soft and chewy like cake that you can eat. Gates bizarrely responds with a wiggle of his butt.

Intended to lighten Microsoft’s image and increase the popularity of the brand, the advertisements are vague following the tradition of Seinfeld’s television show of the same name that was famously about “nothing”. This ad is the first in a series costing $300 million.

The idea that Gates and Seinfeld shop at discount shoe stores just like the general public is an odd choice, considering Seinfeld resides in a palatial mansion with a collection of a dozen cars, and Gates' financial position hardly means he needs to search for bargains when seeking out new footwear. The intended image is that Gates is down to earth.

Microsoft has been wanting to make its image more open, fresh and current in response to Apple’s ads where a young hipster represents Apple and a pallid overweight, miserable looking middle-aged man personifies the PC.

No matter how much money the Microsoft marketing department throws at advertising, the personal lives of Bill Gates and Apple's Steve Jobs will surely colour the publics' image of the products. Bill Gates is a Harvard-educated conservative from a wealthy family whose parents paid for his projects dabbling in computers after he showed an in interest in IBM’s products in the late 70’s. Steve Jobs of Apple was adopted and raised in San Francisco, built computers by hand with his best friend (who later helped him form Apple) since the age of 16, travelled through India on a spiritual journey and speaks openly about having taken LSD.

Microsoft still has 90% of the personal computer market, though their shares have fallen 28% in the past year since the launch of Apple’s MacBook Pro and iPhone.