We love CNBC. It's on 24/7 here in our office. So we were thrilled to get a closeup look at the CNBC TV set that dominates the floor of the New York Stock Exchange recently, when we celebrated the Silicon Alley Insider 100.
On the day we visited, we got to walk in front of the desk where Jim Cramer, Becky Quick and Carl Quintanilla do their commentary on the news. As usual, they pecked away at their sleek, gray laptops in between takes.
I've always thought that the appearance of those machines on CNBC was one of the best product placements ever: Day after day, CNBC's high-income audience is reminded that the show uses Apple Macbooks.
Later, when the show was over, we got a chance to sit behind the desk.
The anchors are not using Apple laptops, it turns out, even though it looks that way on TV. Rather, they're black Dell Latitude 2120 Netbooks — the cut-price, style-free workhorse of the laptop world.
They look like Macbooks because CNBC has disguised them by adding gray lids, along with some CNBC branding where the Apple logo might have been. There's no outright fakery, of course. But viewers might be forgiven for thinking that they're Macs, so to speak.
Here's the proof: These shots were taken (with my cellphone — apologies for the quality) during and then after the show. You can see how, from the camera's point of view, their computers look like brand new Apples, but from Becky, Jim and Karl's seats it's Windows all the way.
From the camera's POV:
From Carl Quintanilla's seat:
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