Whatever flavor of eggnog
Sony's marketing gurus are sipping, we'd like a few cartons sent to Engadget HQ. While the
PlayStation 3 ads were, um, interesting to say the least, and though the
Bravia commercials are somewhat understandable, trying to
rip an Apple mainstay isn't likely to
catch fire (in a good way). But beyond all that, Sony's PSP advertisements have bordered on zany and
offensive for some time, with everything building up to the "all i want for xmas is a psp" campaign. While we noticed something was a tad
off kilter with the childishly-worded site, all it took was a few hundred detectives to spoil the company's fun. Unfortunately for Sony, the firm was busted in an attempt to construct an undercover website urging folks to urge their parents to pick up a PSP this December. This most certainly isn't the first time this year that the firm has started a "quasi-official"
weblog, but trying to fool all those eagle-eyed readers out there didn't quite work out as planned. Nevertheless, the site remains up to provide "nothing but the facts on the
PSP" from here on out, but that just makes you wonder what all the other propaganda before this was.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
posted December 13th 2006 5:54PM
This reminds me of a 40 year old trying to put on a baseball hat backwards to *pass as a teenager.*
normally that story ends in sexual assault.
Well I'm pretty sure at least a few people feel violated.
"but that just makes you wonder what all the other propaganda before this was."
lol, I'm gonna go out on a crazy limb here and say...propaganda...maybe?
;p
Be sure to watch the new expose by Dateline NBC - "To catch an Internet Marketing Predator" this Saturday night!
Quit hatin' on Sony, man! Why, Engaget, why must you run negative story after negative story about Sony?
Why, Sony, why must you make so stupid commercials and bad hardware ?
it causes negative story after negative story.
its called reality.
I did actually like the way they just came out and said "damn it! you got us" on the site now, I would have expected it to get shut down.
Sony's marketing department should be rounded up, taken outside, and summarily executed by firing squad.
Seriously, the PS3 ads suck. Unlike the Wii ads, which show people, you know, having fun playing games, they are just bizarre. I think the last one I saw was a baby doll in an empty room crying at a TV (WTF?). Terrible, just terrible.
Wii ads: Make you want to buy a Wii.
PS3 ads: Make you want to run away screaming.
A couple of them I saw were trying to show how powerful the machine is. I personally don't care to much about performance, I just like games for fun. I cant stand how they never show people having fun. I want a Wii, not because of performance, because it looks fun and I can see myself having a great time playing it.
where are the comments on that site? they removed 'em, eh?
nevermind the 'stop bashing sony' and fanboy wars, this must be the third time the same 'sony holiday marketing' story has been on engadget in the past week... is there really nothing else going on in the gadget industry?
WOW! have you guys run out of things to bash sony with? BIG fn deal so they made a fake web blog to promote there product , what about xbox thay did that hole love bee's shit, and i remember you guys posted something about that clothing designer who faked paint air force one, put i don't remember it getting negative press, all this sony bashing on here is really getting sad and tasteless. something changed after you guys got bought out. get back to what this website was meant for reporting on gadgets, thats why its called "enGADGET" not "enRUMORs"
Hey buddy. FYI. Rumors are false
So.....
People (engadget and the ensuing engadgeteers) keep talking about how bad the ads are.....They keep talking about Sony.....PSP.....PS3....PSP.....
Ads must be working.
Did all of you see the note from Ziptoni's management head leaked by an employee to SomethingAwful?
"Dear Zippers Everywhere,
Remember last Friday when we talked about great work and how that work is often polarizing? Guess what, we were right! As many of you know by now, our PSP site is receiving a great deal of criticism as is Zipatoni. This is a good thing...it is not beige!
Our clients are aware and unfazed. Their response, "you have to take the good with the bad." We are discussing potential future direction or lack thereof. Please know, we did NOT try to hide the fact that we created it...we purchased the domain name outright. Also, please know that we approached the client initially with this scenario and they said "who cares if people find out? As long as it is funny, we do this stuff all of the time."
Don't dismay...when was the last time people were blogging about Zipatoni? I'm confident Dawn will turn this into one helluva a case study in the months to come. K
Here is how the leaked memo should be read-
Dear Zippers Everywhere,
"Our clients are aware and unfazed." = Sony is unapologetic, could not care any less about their
gamers and have decided to continue acting like arrogant a-holes.
"Their (Sony's) response, "you have to take the good with the bad." = sorry swelled heads but Sony's days of getting "good" press have blatantly come to an end.
"Please know, we did NOT try to hide the fact that we created it...we purchased the domain name outright."
= All those who thought their might possibly have been a tongue in cheek aspect to their site (where the readers would know full well the premise was a farce) are proven wrong, Zipadumbass did not intend for the website's visitors to know this was not a genuine kids fan site, it was intended to be viewed as for real.
"Also, please know that we approached the client initially with this scenario and they said "who cares if people find out? As long as it is funny, WE DO THIS STUFF ALL THE TIME." = This is not the first time Sony has attempted to trick consumers into purchasing their product.
Karen Sauder
President
ZIPATONI
Thanks for last weeks news. . .besides this is just more Sony hate-mongering.
Honestly, it doesn't take a genius to figure out its an ad, from the wording its pretty straight forward advertising. Sorry folks, companies advertise their products.
Ha ha this is viral marketing at its very best. YOU BUNCH OF SUCKERS have all been taken in. Great work Sony
Haha yeah, you're exactly right!! Dude you're so smart. I bet two or three more people want to buy a psp now!! That more than triple the amount of projected sales!
Does anyone have a link to the video? It seems to have disappeared from youtube. I heard it makes your eyes and ears bleed, and I kinda want in on that.
They used to say that there's no such thing as bad publicity, but I'm not sure that's true anymore. Gadgets these days are being sold as fashion items, and this is a major faux pas.
It's sad because SCIE used to be the masters at creating product lust. They need to go back to their roots and realize that it's games that sell gaming systems. Games. Games games games games games. 'I like the big screen?' Sheesh. You can almost see the powerpoint that came from.
The iPod hasn't cleaned up in its niche because it's an excellent product. There are plenty of excellent products that fizzle. IPod does awesome because they've been selling the music, rather than the gadget. Lookign at those original iPod ads, I couldn't tell you a single thing that distinguishes the product, other than that it rocks.
Mr Pants said:
"So.....
People (engadget and the ensuing engadgeteers) keep talking about how bad the ads are.....They keep talking about Sony.....PSP.....PS3....PSP.....
Ads must be working."
You are truly clueless. To paraphrase one of the commenters from Kotaku (I believe), if Sony put up a website with videos of their employees killing children, people sure as hell would be talking about it. Wouldn't sell a damn single PSP though. Guess what, the "any publicity is good publicity" adage is untrue. Some damned bad publicist made it up to cover up for his awful work.
I can never understand the Playstation ads. The PSP ads with those fuzzy balls of hair or something, stupid. There was one fuzzy PSP ad where they showed Killzone Liberation, so the PSP does play games.
I've seen the Wii ads. I am thinking is it wise to show the games the people are playing? Let's be honest here, those familey fun games is not what people wanna do. maybe for an hour but there is no game on the Wii that is any good and that you can go to your room and play the single player campaign for hours. Zelda is this game but you have to be a Nintendo fan to wanna buy the Wii for that game.
scottwh, I think it is shut down. It used to work, but going to the website lately gets a blank white page. Maybe they took it down after all the controversy.