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Best Of the Internal Deep Focus Blog: Poor Microsoft!

Check out this post on Deep Focus' internal blog by Associate Creative Director Nick Braccia:

So you've probably all seen this student-made spot from the UK for iPod Touch, featuring Cansei de ser Sexy's "Music is my Hot, Hot Sex.

It's a fine piece of editing, but when I saw it, I thought, heck, all he REALLY did was pick an awesome song and time some animations. Big deal, right?

Here's the irony: a year ago, Microsoft had a ZUNE spot running with the SAME SONG.

What's the moral of this story? Well, the amateur kid kept it simple: Music = HERO. Interface = Easiest way ever to hang with HERO. In the Zune spot, the song is part of a schizophrenic execution that's trying to: a) be irreverent with stylized, anthropomorphized illustrated animals b) cycle through a list features (music, wireless, tuner, community) c) bring it all back to music and "social" by building a narrative.

Wow, that's a lot. Just listening to a Brazilian girl sing "Music is my Boyfriend, Music is my Girlfriend" seems to sum all that up, with like, 1/1000th of the work. It's just an ironic slap in the face that they had the perfect weapon (the song) and didn't know how to use it properly.

Just found more assessments of the two spots.

Exactly right, Nick. Consumers realize that a better product is a better product -- and if you believe in your product, simply showing its points of differentiation can help someone (consciously or subconsciously) make their purchasing decision. And including your biggest fans in the creation of your advertising -- NOT through solicitation, but discovery -- is priceless.

The Odds on the iPhone Failing.

Nothing is ever really culturally important until it has a betting line.

Well, you can now consider the iPhone officially culturally important.

As reported by LiveScience, BetUS.com has given the odds on the iPhone's failure:


* Consumers are reported camping out waiting for an iPhone—3/1 (IS: it's already happened)
* Initial iPhones get recalled—30/1 (IS: I wouldn't really be surprised if there was a partial recall. I was a victim of a faulty early Xbox 360)
* iPhone sells at least 12 Million units in 2008—5/6 (IS: 10 million is apple's goal.)
* Apple’s stock jumps at least 10% in value in regards to the price on 6/30/07—1/2 (IS: Bet it will, just because.)
* Consumers pay at least three times the original price ($1,500) on ebay—2/1 (IS: Oh yes, it will happen.)
* The screen breaks/cracks like Apple’s first-generation nano (iPod)—150/1 (IS: Apple's always had display issues. Odds are, it will continue here.)
* There are mass reports of the battery life being less than the promised 8 hours—10/1 (IS: Of course this will happen.)
* Someone is trampled while trying to get an iPhone—20/1 (IS: Maybe not a trampling, but someone will hurt someone else.)
* iPhone spontaneously combusts—150/1 (IS: It would be cooler if the "Mac guy" combusted, but hey, the odds are probably the same of that happening.)

iPassion

We've seen user-generated Apple-inspired commercials before (for the iPod), but really, none of them are as professional-looking as this.

Wake Up, Hollywood.

Kara Swisher at WSJ's new blog area (blogorrhea?) All Things Digital (which has some real good potential) covers the EconSM Conference put on by PaidContent -- specifically a dinner panel featuring Variety Editor Peter Bart and longtime producer Peter Guber, both of whom host AMC's Sunday Morning Shootout.

Kara heard something that floored her, and frankly, I'm even floored-er.

But I nearly fell off my well-upholstered chair when Bart said, in an off-the-cuff remark, that YouTube might be history within four years. He came out with this particular nugget in the midst of a discussion about the nature of the audience and its desires, which Bart said did not change that much from era to era. He noted that great love stories always were going to do well (he actually used “Love Story” as the example) and that basic tastes don’t really vary.

I could agree with that, until he also noted that today’s youth could be compared to that from the 1950s. Well, except for those iPods and mashups, except for MySpace and video games, except for cellphones and blogs and, most of all, except for the fact that they have complete comfort in a highly interactive universe and, in fact, are not ever going to allow the kind of top-down control that Hollywood has wielded for so long.

When I piped up that kids today really seemed to have a lot more digital tools at their disposal and also seemed to like the whole Internet thing a lot, with all its social networking and user-generated content and interactivity, both Bart and Guber said that that kind of media was still not very compelling and has not produced the kind of hits that Hollywood was famous for. I am not sure they were exactly calling the current digital era a fad, but it was telling to me that Hollywood attitudes still center on the unshakable belief that their businesses will outlast all comers.

Have you seen this last weekend's box office? Disturbia, #1 for the third week in a row, led the box office with a whopping 9.1 million. Several other films followed ranging from $2.5 to $7 million. Moviegoers did not turn out this weekend. You can blame it on the weak films, you can blame it on some nice weather, but you can also blame it on the fact that there are just more media choices than ever out there. Choices that compete with physically going to the movies.

Bart's and Guber's point just re-highlight the problems Hollywood is having with today's consumer. Unless Hollywood adapts to an evolving use of media by consumers, limits the amount of content it produces to better content, and embraces digital distribution while not over-relying on over-used DRM, they are going to be dinosaurs. Not only does an industry leader (on the inside of the studio system) need to step up and set a precedent by changing things for the better (think EMI's non-DRM deal with Apple's iTunes multiplied exponentially), but the MPAA needs to change its draconian stance on content sharing, selling, and distribution.

Consumers' habits, tastes, and technologies are all changing. Wake up, and step up, Hollywood.

**UPDATE**
More fuel for the fire from GigaOm.

A New Wireless Player Hopes to Challenge iPod - WSJ.com

The WSJ reports that Yahoo! and SanDisk are taking on the iPod.

In reality, Yahoo! and SanDisk are putting out a portable music listening device with the following features:

* Subscription-based music listening (has NEVER succeeded)

* Wi-fi access to music (roaming Wi-fi access friggin' stinks -- everyone wants you to pay)

* $250 price tag (too expensive for a new, unproven product, with new, unproven features)

* Share music recommendations with friends via Yahoo! Messenger (your friend doesn’t even need the Sansa Connect, but they sure as hell need Yahoo! Messenger. Do you Yahoo! Messenger?)

* Photos from Flickr (a nice feature)

Good luck with this one.

(via GigaOm, who gets kudos for mentioning David Wright on this glorious [and cold] day, the Mets home opener at Shea Stadium. Lets go Mets.)

Dvorak Hates on the iPhone

In a column over at Marketwatch, John Dvorak explains that Apple should not take a chance on the iPhone because they've done everything right to date. He essentially wants Apple to settle on calling the iPhone a 'reference design', and let someone like Samsung do it. What they did with the iPod was enter a middling market with a killer device. The handset market, on the other hand, is ultra-competitive, with many chances to fail.

It's actually a rather convincing argument.

But until or unless the device gets panned by critics and peers, I'm still willing to give Apple the benefit of the doubt here.

But I swear, I'm going to call shenanigans if all that phone does is attempt to get more people to buy things through iTunes, ala the AppleTV.