Celebrity peddlers of the past, so what did they peddle? Teehehehehehe...

[Deja Q]

The golden age of consumer computing... the days when computers WERE difficult to use because they were all command-line based.

For Atari: Alan Alda


Don't you just love him? :loveya: Looks like Mr. Rogers on crank...

http://www.atarimagazines.com/v2n5/insideatari.html (Alda was given an Atari because he found his previous computer difficult to use. :eyes: I wish Atari gave the rest of us free PCs too... as for the computer everybody suspects? Here it is, and no shock from me: )

For Texas Instruments, makers of cheap technoslop: The Coz!


(sorry, couldn't find the proper pic so I had to use these farked-up ones. :cry: )

I dunno. A peddler of education who also pimped himself out to jell-o and coca-cola; sugarized junk food that is NO GOOD for children... depressing and two-faced. Still, at least the TI was (promoted as) educational stuff, though a cheap ploy by a maker who overcharged for calculators and processors, which was why they could afford to hire him...

For this obscure thing, the Fairchild Channel F System II, Milton "Louie the Lilac" Berle did the peddling.


(Sadly, no picture exists with his mug on it. :cry: :cry: )

And only ONE person in the entire universe could have been chosen to even attempt to hawk the embarrassing Commodore Vic-20 with his hammy, often OTT method-acting, that's oddly yet eminently enjoyable:




Yup, that's TJ Hooker, alias Admiral Kirk. He also looks good wearing the stuffed chipmunk on his head...

And, yes, the Vic-20 was a wonder. A wonder anybody BOUGHT it. It was a doorstop even back then. (Why not have the Kirkmeister chat up the C64 instead; a considerably superior PC for the time. Except for the Atari of course, which was a vastly superior technological breakthrough at an affordable price that actually WAS easier to use, all things considered CLI-wise... but as we all know, it's the software and not the hardware. Why else has Microsoft/Macrobloat managed to stay in business? )

And for the petty game system big work-worthy computer known as the Intellivison:



George Plimpton. Wasn't he a comedian or something? Trying to make the Intellivison look serious has got to be the ultimate joke...


And last but not least, the big attempt from Incompetent Incontinent Bowel Movement:



Charlie Chaplin. (wasn't he already dead by 1980?!)

Amazing. Big stars needed to whore computers back then. People bought them, learned them, used them, dumped them. For GUI boxes that helped dumb them down.

And if any celebs were sad enough to speak out for the garage kit known as the Apple II, please let me know. :evilgrin:

[Dr.Phool]

1. Now who is that at the bottom Giving Bush his endorsement?

:evilgrin:

[Deja Q]

2. Obviously, that is the dog of the owner who peddled the MSX...

Microsoft's paltry stab at the industry! Couldn't do it then, Gates! If it weren't for IBM you'd be on the street corner just like the IT jobs you offshored to a country where they pirate your software 74%.

[WI_DEM]

3. I remember the James Garner/ Mariette Hartley camera ads

as I recall they ran several years and were quite popular.

[lpbk2713]

4. They used The Duke (John Wayne) in a Coors commercial

years after he died. They digitalized some of his movie footage into the commercial to make it look like he was making the commercial present day.