LOL! I didn't saw the ad, but I got a clear image in my mind by reading your text. You sure seem to have a facility with words. Never considered a career as a writer after your done with computers? ;)

>In prior installments of Print Advertising Wars, we discussed the blunt and direct .NET advertising message by Microsoft. In October, everything changed.
>
>Microsoft changed the tenor of their message with new print ads. As opposed to being direct ("One degree of separation between you and your future"), the message was much softer. The people in the ads are more centered and are at the reader's eye level.
>
>In this installment, we'll discuss the "Dana" ad in detail. Other installments will cover the "slacker coder" ad and the new "Monday meeting" ad.
>
>Among the new print ads, the Dana ad delivers the most messages. This advertisement is still in use today. Chances are that not only have you seen it, you'll continue to see the ad for some time in IT magazines.
>
>On the left page, a man is in the data room with his laptop. On the right is a woman sitting on a couch with her laptop. The caption reads "One degree betweeen data and Dana". The word "Dana" is on the right hand page so we assume that Dana is the name of the woman. Note, however, that Dana is also a man's name.
>
>The man on the left is pretty much the prototypical MSFT data person -- "pleasingly bland". His hair is slightly thinning but well kept. His beard is well kept. The left arm of his shirt is folded back. He wears a watch on his left wrist. His left hand lightly touches the keyboard. He is sitting in the computer room with lots of "big iron" to his left. He has wrinkles on his forehead but they have been touched up and nearly completely removed. Oddly, it appears that a wrinkle was added just to the right of the end of his mustache. Windows XP is on his laptop.
>
>The woman on the right is not your prototypical bland person. Because of that fact, she's simply more interesting to look at. She is sitting in the Lotus position looking at her laptop. She wears a baby blue sweater over what looks like a cotton undershirt or T-shirt. She wears blue jeans with a rust colored stripe around the ankles.
>
>Her physical appearance is quite angular, for lack of a better word. Her most noticeable facial feature is her rather angular jawline from her chin to her ear. She has lips and nose slightly larger than normal, but thin eyebrows. Her hair is swept from her eyes. To the right, her left hand is showing and it's a pretty large hand. (Side note: On some ads there's a foldout, making this a four page ad. In the foldout is a figure with a diffuse red glow around the ankle -- it's Dana -- and the figure is about as thin as a standing grasshopper.) She is attractive but not in a pleasingly bland manner.
>
>Back to the man's environment -- well, it's so sterile it could pass for a hospital.
>
>Now for the subliminal stuff...
>
>The woman is sitting on a long dark blue couch. There are two pieces of art on a brick wall behind her. The art is gold framed, colorful and "arty", brightening the cold white brick wall. Clearly, this is home and she is relaxed and comfortable on the couch.
>
>OK, so what is the implicit message? Use .NET so you can get to something a little nicer.
>
>As noted, the man is lightly touching the keyboard. The touch is so light that none of the keys on the keyboard are pressed. Does anyone remember Bill Gates talking about "Information at your fingertips"? You're literally seeing that statement in action.
>
>Note the detail in the brick wall behind the woman. To her right (our left), the bricks are somewhat rough. There is a lot of detail within the brick faces. To her left, the bricks are smooth, though there are some detail in the brick faces. In the US, we read from left to right. Because of that, we think that time passes from left to right within print ads. The message here -- use .NET so you can make life a little smoother.
>
>Note that there's a lot of detail in the bricks behind her, but her face is washed out. I'm not sure why that is, but it is.
>
>Here's another trick to get the reader to focus on the woman. Look at her sweater arms. Her left arm is placed behind her left knee. The sweater has a couple of wrinkles in it, indicating slack room. But the arm appears to go past the elbow (note the slight angle change of the left arm where the elbow should be) before it disappears behind the knee. The sweater arm on the right has no wrinkles but barely gets around her right elbow. Either she wore a sweater with the left arm about four inches longer than the right arm or we are being tricked. We're being tricked.
>
>Note her left elbow is extremely fuzzy. If you look really carefully, the outer edge of the sweater does not match the outer edge of her right arm. I believe this image was touched up to add a triangular piece of right forearm!
>
>Back to the man. Look at his eyes. Is he looking at his screen? In my opinion, no. To me, he is looking at the lid clip on the top of the laptop. Hmmmm. That's odd. Why would he do that?
>
>Take a straight edge and draw a line from the man's eyes to the lid clip. Follow the line of sight to the right, past the lid clip, into the right side ad...the man is looking at the woman's laptop!! He's thinking of Dana! (This brings up the silly point -- if he's thinking of Dana, what's he doing with his right hand???)
>
>Anyway, the message is softer. Use .NET and make life a little easier. However, the subliminal messages make this ad a fun study.
>
>Enjoy!
>
>
>Bill Anderson