Justin Long says Steve Jobs rejected some "I'm a Mac" ads because they were too funny

Apple’s old “I’m a Mac”/”I’m a PC” ads starring Justin Long and John Hodgman went a long way toward establishing Apple’s extremely hip reputation, with Long portraying Macs as cool and laidback while Hodgman’s PC guy was a stuffy dork—just like how Mac users in real life are cool and PC users are lame even though they have access to better computer games. Appearing on People’s Couch Surfing (via Entertainment Weekly), Long shared some information about what it was like making those ads, and he revealed that there are hundreds of little passive-aggressive barbs between the Mac guy and the PC guy that we’ll never get to see.

Long explained that he filmed “nearly 300" Apple ads, but only 66 of them ever made it to air. After a while, he says he began to notice that “some of the funniest ones would never air.” Apparently, the reasoning behind this was that Steve Jobs “preferred when [the ads] weren’t super funny,” because then it would “detract from the point of the commercial.” The point of the commercials, apparently, was to sell Apple products and not just create entertaining comedy routines, which is a bit of a shame. If Apple really was as cool as it wanted everyone to believe, it wouldn’t care if people actually bought its products. There’s nothing less cool than caring about something.

Anyway, here’s nearly 40 minutes of “Get A Mac” commercials.