You can file this under “Can Sony do anything right these days?” (A video download service? NOW?). As you may or may not have heard, last week Sony and their marketing firm Zapatoni were outed in creating a fake blog to promote their portable gaming device, the PSP at the slickly named site “AllIWantForXmasIsaPsp.com”. With its overly hipster talk and the fact the domain is registered by a Marketing firm, it didn’t take long for the gaming community to find that Sony was behind the blogging deception.
And today, the blog has been taken down. (Although if you’re looking for screen caps and a choice list of comments, please head over to UK Resistance who has done a nice job in cataloguing this marketing nightmare).
What truly bloggles the mind is how little Sony knows about its fans and the uber geeks which rule over this vast kingdom, for that matter.
Hmmm … are they tech savvy? Yes.
Viciously anti-establishment? Mostly.
Media literate? Undoubtedly.
How could you not think that this group of individuals, even as a “demographic”, would not find out about these kind of shennanigans? You’re not trying to fool joe blow internet surfer who might shop at Wal-Mart (Richard Edelman, I apologize, but my own memory of Edelman’s own tomfoolery will never die), but a savvy audience who literally drools at the thought of deconstructing this marketing garbage.
The jury’s still out on whether the PS3 is a lameduck product, but if one humble blogger can make a suggestion? If you’re still spending your millions on trying to turn it around, don’t go with the same firm that executed and perhaps suggested this social media masterplan. And furthermore, don’t try and deliberately decieve an audience who, in spite of your legion of fanboys, still abhores corporate hypocrisy, and would relish in the thought of pulling down the market leader in gaming.
Aside: For an industry insider’s opinion on Zipatoni’s actions go here. Apparently they’re not returning emails from their friends anymore asking questions on this flogging debacle.
