A story running through the Interwebs today has us just a little more paranoid.
Security researchers Charlie Miller and Collin Mulliner discovered a bug that can render an iPhone useless within minutes. They even showed off the attack to quiet any would-be naysayers.
The researchers showed a live attack on a demo iPhone. They can use the trick to instigate a denial of service attack, where they send the crash messages every 10 seconds and essentially keep the targeted phone off the network. Miller notified Apple of the bug about six weeks ago, but there is no patch yet. Apple has yet to make a comment.
Not only does it affect the iPhone, but it can take down Google Android and Palm Pre phones too.
Our video of the day comes from the streets of Santa Monica and advertises an upcoming music-based game. Which one? We have no idea.
And it’s not because we re distracted. Okay, maybe a little.
The video just advertises a Facebook page for one of the, ahem, models, and we expect all to be revealed soon. Our best guess is Microsoft’s Lips 2 for the holiday season, but does it really matter
From Ad Age: {link no longer active}
“For brands taking the initiative, it’s paying off. We’re seeing that in the buzz numbers,” he said, citing much-talked-about campaigns such as Microsoft’s “Laptop Hunters” series and KFC’s promotion with Oprah Winfrey. “[The numbers] indicate that those people who are being risk takers have the potential for a big payoff.”
What is the common theme between those two campaigns and other successful ones from brands such as Best Buy? Value, value, value.
These campaigns were initially criticized for focusing too much on the bargains consumers were told they would get with these brands, but it seems like it s paying off.
Evony is a free-to-play browser-based MMO with a banner campaign that harkens back to the ubiquity of those annoying X10 webcam ads of yesteryear.
The ads, analyzed recently by Jeff Atwood, have a very particular style, and one that’s become a bit more, shall we say, male-targeted in recent months.
Now the folks at PopCap are taking the bet that you ve seen these ads, and will get the joke they’re making with a new web advert for Plants Versus Zombies.
If you’ve seen Evony before, this is very funny. If not, you can at least appreciate the long shot laugh they’re going for. Reminds us of that Slap Chop video we posted yesterday.
After generations of trying to regain the magic it had as the number one console maker with the Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo placed its remaining hope on a 5-in-1 sports game. Who would have thought that, without a Mario hat in sight, Wii Sports would not only save the company from irrelevance, but make Nintendo a market leader once again.
Now that Wii Sports has sold over 45 million copies, Nintendo has the unenviable task of trying to follow it up with Wii Sports Resort, a sequel that isn t packed in with every Nintendo Wii. Not only that, but the game requires use of (yet another) Wii accessory, the Wii Motion Plus (included with every game).
Potential brand confusion coupled with recent consumer apathy in video games make this a bit of an uphill climb, but Nintendo started earlier this year laying the groundwork at E3 2009.
Introducing Wii Motion Plus
Nintendo has never held itself to be a high-tech company. The cutting edge tech behind the Nintendo Wii is at least several years old, and the surprising acceptance and adoption of the Wii had competitors Microsoft and Sony introduce their own motion peripherals, some of which are leap-years ahead of Nintendo.
So Nintendo headed off that concern at this year s E3 with the introduction of Wii Motion Plus and the new Wii Sports Resort. Here is the promotional video they showed to press in attendance.
What you see there is Nintendo trying to flip the tables and remove the notion that it was not interested in being on the cutting edge. The slick production and association with several of the games featured in Wii Sports Resort laid the foundation for consumer acceptance. It showed the new peripheral, it showed how people used it, and it showed how games were more sensitive with it. Most importantly? It looked like a lot of fun!
This led to long queues in front of the Wii Sports Resort portion of Nintendo’s booth, with thousands of players getting a chance to play the new basketball, archery and table tennis mini-games. Nintendo’s instructors calmly led journalists and other attendees in how to use the Wii Motion Plus effectively, including how to calibrate it and use it with other peripherals (like the nunchaku). Of course, it helped that the game was a lot of fun in action, and Nintendo allowed attendees to spend ample time at their booth getting acclimated to the action.So the initial formula was simple: cool, high-tech introduction video, lots of play time with a fun game, and thousands of excited bloggers writing about the awesome new Wii Sports Resort.
Beachlife In Times Square
Now that Nintendo had the gaming blogosphere atwitter with news about Wii Sports Resort, it was time for a big mainstream push, and Nintendo executed their next move beautifully. They took over the center of the universe, Times Square, and turned Military Island into its own personal beach. Wii Sports Resort branding and kiosks were everywhere, and fans and tourists came around to see what the fuss was all about. Again, here was Nintendo, engaging its consumers face-to-face by allowing them time in front of the fun, new Wii Sports Resort. Throw in a little celebrity action (Chace Crawford), invite a bunch of press and voila, you’re today’s top story.
Long Summer Days
Wii Sports Resort’s timing is as important as its initial launch period, and Nintendo is benefiting from a dearth of notable games in the first half of the year. With summer upon us, you now have lots of bored kids out of school, itching for something to do.
This makes Nintendo’s follow up television commercial perfect, both for the season and the demographic. It shows the familiar Mii characters in Wii Sports Resort events, along with people having fun (Wii Motion Plus in hand). The summer theme is in full effect here and, coupled with a familiar brand in Wii Sports, makes this a perfect introduction for those players who have a few bones to spend.
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And for that demo that just doesn’t watch television anymore, Nintendo has an Internet campaign that strikes the same chord.
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Already A Hit
A game like Wii Sports Resort benefits from having a long tail, much like Wii Play, a game that has racked up 23 million units sold (largely thanks to a Wii remote being packed-in).
So far, the early education of Wii Motion Plus and how it relates to Wii Sports Resort is paying off. Before Wii Sports Resort release on July 26, Nintendo had already moved almost 400,000 units of the Wii Motion Plus peripheral (169,000 alone, 205,000 with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10).
As for the game itself, NPD data for July should show a very strong introduction for Wii Sports Resort, but Japanese sales already place Wii Sports Resort as the third-fastest selling Wii game ever (only Mario Kart Wii and Super Smash Bros. Brawl raked in more unit sales in its first four days). Analysts expect Wii Sports Resort to top sales of 18 million by the end of the year.
Wii Sports Resort and Nintendo’s marketing machine show the importance of a good introduction along with tailoring your message to the season, demographic and mainstream consumer that has led to its dominance in the current generation. Now who’s up for a quick game of table tennis?
If you’re marketing something, anything, it s still important to know from where that product originates.
News.com.au recently took a tour of a major Blu-Ray creation plant owned and run by Sony, and has a very interesting gallery on how these high-definition movie and game discs are made.
Put on your nerd hats, it s time for the factory tour.
Pepsi and Coca-Cola have been competitors since the late 1800s, with Coca-Cola dominating the soft drink market for over a century now. This image shows at least one reason why: consistency through the years.
Just because something is hip today, doesn’t mean you have to change your entire strategy to center on that (Facebook apps and Twitter, anyone?).
While doing the daily rounds, we came across this YouTube video promoting the new Colgate Wisp, a mini brush and toothpick.
It should be pretty tough to market something as mundane as a portable toothbrush, but Colgate tapped Black20 Studios to create a spoof based on those popular Slap Chop informercials.
This is a smart way to tap into an Internet meme and get some viral promotion, but also to quickly create an advertisement since most of the creative brainstorming is done except for identifying what should be spoofed.
Take a look at the ad here, and place your bets on what s up next: Keyboard Cat or Santa Cruz lady {links no longer active}.
Twitter is all the rage, and we’re fine with it. Even if you throw up an RSS feed on a Twitter account, it’s just another delivery method for content to your readers.
For businesses wanting to take the next step up in the Twittersphere, the Twitter 101 for Businesses site is worth a read. The folks at Twitter know that engaging business (and eventually upselling them) will be key to any future revenue plans they have, and this initial engagement hits the right notes. Some key excerpts:
But if you’re new to Twitter and still wondering what all the fuss is about, hang around the site (or a good third-party client) for a week or two and give it a few minutes a day. Twitter almost always delivers Aha! moments for people, but it can take some getting used to before you have your moment of enlightenment.
And if you see a few people spending a bit too much time in the office using Twitter, you may want to show them this:
In fact, Twitter works best for businesses when you start slow, devoting a few minutes a day to see whether and how it s valuable to you.
Get into this microsite this weekend, see how it applies to your business and clients, and come back on Monday, ready to go!
