sra

Samada

Seriously, is there ANYONE at Sony that is actually paying attention to their PR team. You'd think they'd have to run this crap by SOMEONE and that someone might say "Woah... Uhmm this isn't going to make anyone buy our shit. We need a new strategy... and marketing firm."

I could probably sell a PSP better than these zipatoni twats. BTW, the black guy modeling the iron on t-shirt is also in the "Who is Ziptoni" video on their website. XD

Des

--------------------------------------

Registrant:
the ZIPATONI co.
Gregory Meyerkord
555 Washington Ave. 3rd Floor
St. Louis, MO 63101
US
Email: greg.meyerkord@zipatoni.com

Registrar Name....: REGISTER.COM, INC.
Registrar Whois...: whois.register.com
Registrar Homepage: www.register.com

Domain Name: alliwantforxmasisapsp.com

Created on..............: Tue, Nov 14, 2006
Expires on..............: Wed, Nov 14, 2007
Record last updated on..: Tue, Nov 14, 2006

Administrative Contact:
the ZIPATONI co.
Gregory Meyerkord
555 Washington Ave. 3rd Floor
St. Louis, MO 63101
US
Phone: +1.3142312400
Email: greg.meyerkord@zipatoni.com

------------------------------------

Who is this 'Zipatoni Co.' I wonder???
Why does he/she/it want a PSP SOOOO Badly????
I must find the anwsers... thankfully they were not hard to come by.

"Zipatoni is a promotional marketing and advertising agency." From: zipatoni.com

Weak.

ZeroMP

pecks

Sony bashing = pointing out facts.

Nintendo praise = pointing out facts.

Pretty simple.

Jack Loftus

Turken

stummies1121

I want a psp myself, and I'm going to get one, but no way would I EVER give the link to that site to anyone I knew that would be a potential source for acquiring it. Seriously, good god.

Dark-Pen

ROTT

Cosmos

http://digg.com/gaming_news/PSP_users_screwed_by_Sony_PS1_...
Check out the comment at the bottom by "Wrath66".

http://www.qj.net/index.php?&pg=49&aid=72568&page=2
A very similar comment by user "W66".

This type of stuff is all part of the marketing machine.

Schmeck

Tomorrow morning the markers skulk in from their cold winter caves, covered in the rosy dew of young children. They check their analytics and cheer as a mighty and powerful clan...

...then they read the comments.

WaterMedia

I love the idea (from the comments) that somehow the crafty viral campaign is working because a lot of people agree on the campaign's crappitude. If you want a successful viral marketing campaign, take a look at whichever P.R. firm or marketing company came up with "There's no such thing as bad publicity."

There's definitely such a thing as bad publicity. When people publically compare notes about how crappy something is, it's not a marketing coup. There's no miracle moment where critics abandon all their disgust and give up and go buy the crappy thing. If Sony was trying to get their name associated with crappiness, then I guess it's working like a charm. They're trying to sell PSPs, though, right?

thermidor

ryoshi

Cosmos

Shaun1234

I know they aren't reading this, but I think they should be taking this into consideration.

kyameron

lker

hambone

I'm supposed to believe this 30 year old guy lives in what appears to be a huge loft apartment, and cant buy his own PSP?

I hate things like this, it just shows that they think gamers are total idiots because we will eat this crap up. All that's missing is the 733t speak. FU Sony marketing.

Stormy151

Hilarious!"

Yes because there just isn't enough Sony bashing and Nintendo praise on this site!

/sarcasm

EnigmaNemesis

"Yes, this is for real. We were going to put all of the information up about it this week , but you seem to beat us to it.

Avex received an offer from Sony to create a viral marketing advertisement for Sony's PSP advertisement this Christmas.

Also, we have a new web site up.... "

Seems the whole thing is a just a sham. Now I really don't want a PSP for xmas.

cobenthegereat

Rajio

EnderX2

diversionmary

Hilarious!

lker

JR

ManekiNeko

black folks? white folks? santa's elves?
mexicans?...wtf...

anglon

Atheist Jew

No one in their right mind will be impressed by that video or seek to emulate the behavior or desires of its supposed "creators".

Even if it gets a lot of hits (which will make the ad team proclaim success), 99% of viewers are people who think it's ridiculous and stupid and a waste of their time.

I know that just 30 seconds of that video made me feel like I wasted my time... and I've spent the last 4 months bed-ridden due to an ankle injury!

I like the handful of very solid titles for my PSP... but, honestly, crap like this makes me feel almost dirty for owning a PSP.

Dyuta

Corpse Explosion

oddbalz

See, Burger King is foul, but I bought those games because of the marketing. It's like they knew what they were selling. They practically admit that, "Yeah. Big Bumpin' and Pocketbike Racer are kind-of retarded, but whadda ya want for 4 bucks?" And, they understand that The King has this whole creepy Will-Ferrell-death-mask thing going on. So, Sony needs to hire those marketing guys if they can get me to eat at the BK Lounge.

spacezombie

This particular advertisement, though, makes me go from "White guys who can't rap want the PSP because it has a big screen" to "Well, I don't care about the size of the screen, and I like neither rap nor the hip hop culture" to "I'm not the target audience, I don't think I want this product."

It doesn't help anything that, on first reading the blog, it's easy to picture the poster as a child of 13 years, tops, so seeing the video afterward makes it look bad, and seeing it vice versa makes it look even worse, because what kind of an adult can't write properly?

iwanttobeasleep

1.paying for a web host
2.paying for a "friend" to model your iron on

or forget the PSP and website and spend your money on

1.Moving the fuck out of your sisters basement

woodenturkey

Judge373

What the hell were the people at Zipatoni thinking?

Did they go and buy a bunch of booze and weed with the money Sony gave them to do their marketing and just video taped one of the F*cktards who could rhyme?

Hunter Haverstock

"We all know the PSP isn't doing numbers that the DS is, and Nintendo had the handheld market for so long. But how is the PSP suffering? Pretty impressive a first time system was able to make a 40% market dent in the handheld market owned for the past 15 years by Nintendo."

Yeah, but Sony was riding on the PlayStation name, which had owned the console sector for nearly 10 years at that point. Everyone had pinned them as being the ones who could dethrone Nintendo, and in the beginning, it looked like they would do it.

But then they started doing retarded stuff. And if you look at the situation with the PS3, you can see that it wasn't just that Nintendo had the handheld market for so long (after all, they had the console market for a long time too, and it was Sony who knocked them out with their first hardware release). It's not that people have double standards, it's that people actually have a brain to realize that Sony is messing up badly.

miniboss1232

All I want for Christmas is more controllers for my Wii.

dArk_stAr

Knowing that they are supposed to believe it's not part of a marketing campaign, I can't imagine someone watching that and not being personally insulted.

rluzinski

Lodin

It appears that the "2 is more than 1 and thus better" marketing (DS) beats the "It's shiny!" marketing (PSP). Marketers take note.

It saddens me that developers are using all that power for quick cash-ins.

Jonn

Why is it when Nintendo doesn't dominate (Gamecube, N64), and even falling 3rd behind the newcomer MSFT it is not "suffering" but a niche of fans, but when the PSP (which sold and will/has sold more market share) comparative to the Nintendo consoles, it is "suffering".

Because Nintendo doesn't lose money. They, quite literally, are not suffering.

Not that the PSP is necessarily losing money (I think it's making money, but I've been wrong before), but I think the general belief out there is that while you or other people may have a PSP, no one is using it to play games... which, shockingly, is what may matter to people that visit Kotaku.

drew.catt

It does make you wonder. Not that that I was ever wowed by their shiny toy but I thought it would do better than it actually has.

It appears that the "2 is more than 1 and thus better" marketing (DS) beats the "It's shiny!" marketing (PSP). Marketers take note.

Ninegauger

Spilt_Milk

Judge373

We all know the PSP isn't doing numbers that the DS is, and Nintendo had the handheld market for so long. But how is the PSP suffering? Pretty impressive a first time system was able to make a 40% market dent in the handheld market owned for the past 15 years by Nintendo.

Why is it when Nintendo doesn't dominate (Gamecube, N64), and even falling 3rd behind the newcomer MSFT it is not "suffering" but a niche of fans, but when the PSP (which sold and will/has sold more market share) comparative to the Nintendo consoles, it is "suffering".

I just don't get the double standards.

EnigmaNemesis

I love how, thanks to the internet, companies (and governments... though online video arrived a bit too late with respect to certain things...) are finding it harder and harder to get away with shit. And it will get better still. :)

Anaxagoras

This, since the PSP is already suffering, is more bad publicity on top of bad publicity. If this is truly a viral marketing campaign, it reeks of desperation, and shows mainstream advertisers still have no clue when it comes to the new dynamic that YouTube type viral advertising offers. A crying baby doll would have been icing on the cake.

If this is all "Good" for the hapless PSP, then I don't want to see what a "bad" day is. Oh wait, I do.

Jack Loftus

Now THAT'S an ad campaign!

TitillatedOcelot

Judge373

A shot of a priest, an imam and a rabbi, all sitting around debating over who has the one true god. All of a sudden the roof overhead opens, and a PSP comes floating down in a beam of golden light.

All three agree on their new god - PSP.

Ending tagline: "PSP - Play. Watch. Worship."

It helps if they're all awkwardly trying to look like they're having an XTREME time playing the system.

hegemonyhog

EnigmaNemesis

I said its a vile tactic. It sickens me that they think so little of their consumer. I don't admire this choice of tactics in any way, shape, or form. My point is, like it or lump it, this will bring on a fresh wave of Sony talk. Good or ill, its all Sony all the time. You have to wonder if it isn't orchestrated that way.

I also think this is a double-edged sword they're playing with. Major companies all act with the assumption that people are stupid. But you get in real trouble when you assume that your base is stupider than it actually is.

Hope I managed to provide some clarity.

TitillatedOcelot

Bonzo

Fuzz

@PaulMorel, you really think I didn't know Kotaku readers knew about the PSP? Right...

NoBullet

L_K_M

Look: you have really nice looking games on a really powerful handheld. Don't sell it by being a part of some asinine hide-and-seek game, having two vaguely ethnic scribbles talk about squirrel-humping, or having very bad actors pretend to be TEH HARDCOR GAMERZ.

Seriously, it's a shiny black game system that plays a lot of games, hosts MP3s and pictures, and plays movies. How hard is this thing to sell?

hegemonyhog

The mind boggles.

Rajio

Psychotext

now that there's metal gear solid portable ops and some other exceptions out, why don't they mention you can also play games on that device by now - or at least put up a less obvious fake-website?

hanjo

cowbean

photoboy

TheNatural

There's no guarantee that it will end up ridiculing the company or the product. It WILL however, end up being clicked by thousands, if not millions of people surfing through YouTube, the majority of which don't have a clue what viral marketing is.

The amount of people that get infuriated by this ad will much smaller than the amount of people who just don't care. The advertiser's concern is the "other" amount of people who watch the ad and enter "PSP" in their search engine at its conclusion.

Vile tactic? Yes. Effective tactic? You bet.

TitillatedOcelot

ara

http://www.kotaku.com/commenter/mrjohnstamos/"

Kotaku,
I am very dissapointed. You have allowed this asshat to comment on stories, but yet, I have been trying to comment for a couple months now and nothing. Not even a thanks for trying. I comment maybe once a day waiting and hoping that my comments would show up, but alas, nothing. This really hurts Kotaku.

highfloydelity

zealousd

This is quite possibly the saddest thing ever.

hondo

I don't have a PSP and this add doesn't make me want to get one. It makes me want to vomit.

rluzinski

They planted a virus, and we all got sick.

TitillatedOcelot

It doesn't matter that it's getting covered if all it accomplishes is makes people hate/pity Sony.

ryoshi

"Sorry, your comment contains words that are not allowed on this blog."

Add an extra i after the Z, and you are fine, just not at the end.

Fuzz

Right, because Kotaku readers have never heard of the PSP before, and we will all go out and buy one, now that we have heard of it.

This isn't NBC Nightly News; getting a link on a site where everyone is already fully aware of your product is not what viral marketing is about.

Now, if AP picked up the story based on it's appearance in multiple blogs (not sure why this would happen), then their campaign would have worked because they would be raising people's awareness of the PSP.

PaulMorel

I may never get clean again...

TitillatedOcelot

Rajio

Keeko_ca

Sony:1 Kotaku:0

NoBullet

I think they were going for that look so it would look more "homemade". Either way this isn't the first time Sony has done something like this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Manning_%28fictitious_w...

TheNatural

I like the choice of youtube comments they decide not to delete.

Pete is dope. I love when he spins his hat around. I bet he could do a thing or two with tassles.

Holy shit I better buy a PSP!

Incredible.

edgey

That would be ultimate justice.

Xagest

Easty

Yeah.... nice try. GB2/Losing Money/

DaveKap

thegogglestheydonothing

Yeh, they call out "mrjohnstamos" for being a Sony stooge:

http://www.kotaku.com/commenter/mrjohnstamos/

rluzinski

Fuzz

Field Anony-mouse

Not only does the character in that video not look like a teenager, but parts of it look like they were shot in a cheap TV studio.

So apparently, "Charlie", your average PSP user, is an unemployed 25 year old guy who still relies on his parents to buy him electronics, but nonetheless has access to a shitty TV studio. So he's that creepy guy that hangs around high school tech classes long after he has graduated.

What an image! I want to be just like him!

PaulMorel

Sinnix

I love the terrible grammar, interspersed with perfect, not to mention pretenscious grammar. I mean, come on, what kid writes "sum" but also knows the proper usage of a hyphen and an m-dash?

iwanttobeasleep

Lider

kyuzo

He can have my PSP... I'm selling it

Jabbertrack

dappya

ArchAngel080

It shouldn't make me laugh but it does, oh so very much.

aden.exe

It's even worse that they hire fucking morons.

Kuiper

dappya

Man, how old is that guy? Late 20's, early 30's and he is asking his mom for a PSP? In the words of The Offspring, "Why don't you get a job?"

Later,
Chrome...

Chrome

Jokes aside... this is shameful and awful... like one step above sweatshops.

Ninegauger

Toneman

Sony really needs to clean house with their PR and marketing firms - I mean TOTALLY clean house. Get rid of the top brass internally and wipe the vendor list clean. There's been nothing but mistakes this last year, and it's not for want of good products. It's a complete failure of PR and marketing, and somebody needs to figure that out and do something about it.

weatherman

rluzinski