The Wacky World of John Hodgman

Thanks to a new series of TV commercials for Apple computers, John Hodgman has become a household face, if not a name. He's the nerd who represents the clunky PC, as compared to the hip guy playing a Mac. It turns out that, once again, art is imitating life, and that Hodgman really is something of a professional nerd and all-around oddball. Here in this interview with Robert Siegel (9/5/06 - 8:15) we learn that Hodgman is also a master humorist.

Classroom thoughts

• Slate magazine's media critic Seth Stevenson takes a look at the new Mac ads (6/21/06 - 4:03). You can view the original ads at the Apple site. Most of us are not used to such focused ad criticism--what do you think of Stevenson's remarks.
  
  
• Apple is clearly trying to sell its computers because they hip, cool, or generally sexy in a special kind of male way. Exactly what is it that the Mac guy has that the PC guy doesn't? Who or what else is society is like the Mac guy, the PC guy?
  
  
• Hodgman's humor is best described as deadpan, described this way by Mark Twain: "The humorous story is told gravely; the teller does his best to conceal the fact that he even dimly suspects that there is anything funny about it." (Read more at Wikipedia.com.) Discuss your experience with deadpan wits.