PC in the City?

It’s an iconic scene: Carrie Bradshaw, Sarah Jessica Parker’s character in Sex and the City, sitting at her Mac computer and typing away her daily insights. Well, guess what? That Mac got ‘Carrie’d’ away and is now a PC. In fact, HP has an entire site dedicated to its Sex and the City campaign, and Sarah Jessica Parker is their latest spokesperson in HP’s latest advertisement.

In the highly anticapted summer blockbuster, Sex and the City 2, we will see the newly Mrs. Big stroking her fingers along the keys of something made by HP and powered–oh, yes–by Windows. The move is set to horrify Apple’s dedicated fans, who see the machines as the mainstay of the creative industry, web designers, artists and writers (i.e. fashionista Carrie Bradshaw) flocking to Apple’s machines. The theory, according to Apple, at least, is that Macs are for creative, arty types, while the PC is for accountants and office workers. Microsoft, desperate to change this image, has invested millions in the marketing campaign campaign for Windows 7 in a bid to make itself “cool”, while manufacturers such as HP have also attempted similar campaigns.

Now, normally product placement deals in movies wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but this is Sex and the City we’re talking about. In the original HBO television series, Carrie’s Mac was practically its own character.

In fact, for the first Sex and the City Film, Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema actually put together a promotional site called, “Carrie Bradshaw’s MacBook Pro” that let fans explore a replica desktop of Carrie’s MacBook from the film. This included e-mails, IM conversations and other novelties.

If we had to guess, we’d say it all comes down to money. And while the first Sex and the City film was a great success, the entire movie industry is in cost-cutting mode, which means exchanging product placement for funding — not to mention a larger promotional campaign — might just trump fictional consistency. HP also has a history of targeting the fashion-conscious buyer. Since 2008, HP has partnered with designer Vivienne Tam to turn the standard HP Mini netbooks into digital clutches. HP has also sponsored the Lifetime series Project Runway.

After all, even Carrie Bradshaw has to make some concessions in a rebuilding economy. If the worst thing that has to happen is that a Mac gets replaced with a very attractive Windows 7 laptop, so be it. It will be quite a shock for devotees of the series to see the noticeable set piece change. I wonder what Steve Jobs would say.

 Do you think the movie producers did the right thing ?