I was a bit surprised to learn that Intel is ditching the Intel inside marketing slogan in favor of the meaningless “Leap ahead.” About 10 years ago, when my anti-Microsoft and anti-Intel feelings were at their height, I thought that “Intel inside” was the most brilliant marketing slogan ever conceived. Given that I thought that the PowerPC, MIPS, Sparc, and just about every other processor available at that time were superior to the old x86, I was incredibly irritated that Intel was so incredibly successful. At the time, I put that down to the fact that Intel, through one simple marketing slogan, had managed to convince people that the maker of their processor actually mattered. These days, it seems like Intel is facing more competition than ever from AMD, and they’re abandoning the branding strategy that led people to think that the maker of a completely interchangeable computer part actually mattered. It seems like bad timing to me.