You’ve all heard stories about the infamous dot-com bubble burst of the early aughts. It wasn’t pretty, a lot of people lost a lot of money – and their livelihoods to boot. There will always be talk of whether we are close, or ever could get close, to a similar situation again. I spent some time with an early employee of everything-you-can-think-of-on-demand-delivery-service… → Read More
Is it a cognitive burden or much better than you think? While I’m going to side with both camps – I think Windows 8 is going to confuse a hell of a lot of people and make a lot of people happy – the real test is for Microsoft to sell this thing to the average consumer. → Read More
What do you do when your viral growth starts to taper off? Advertise! That strategy has seemingly been working well for the Google Chrome web browser (now with a quarter of worldwide browser market share), so Google may as well give it a shot with Google+.
Google has released a trio of new TV commercials promoting its fledging social network, featuring Hangouts with celebrities like the Muppets… → Read More
Kids send the strangest things over 3G networks! In this new commercial for Windows Phone 7, poor old pops is doing the shopping while consulting a list that has been helpfully shared via One Note. Suddenly, cola appears on this list alongside a pound of candy and some huge suckers. Who is hijacking pops’ reverie with their crude hacking? I’ll let you watch to find out. It’s hi-larious!
But… → Read More
There isn’t anything quite like Super Bowl commercials. For many of you, it’s the best part of the game. So we thought we’d show you ahead of time some of our favorites that have already come out.
Just so you know, this year is being considered The Year of the Autos, with many of the companies getting back into profits and all. The big automakers have purchased about one-third of all air time. → Read More
10. Master Rob the Video Robot This week at CrunchGear, we’re looking back at some of our favorite gadgets from the not-so-distant past — old phones, computers, media players, toys… those devices that still stand out in our memories despite their obsolescence. Feel free to contribute some of your own nostalgia. In no particular order except I present to you some of the greatest… → Read More
I’m not quite sure what this was important to someone, but Todd Bishop of TechFlash sat down with Microsoft to discuss those crazy Seinfeld ads from way back in ought-8. He essentially asked Microsoft “What were you thinking?” and got some interesting replies.
Essentially, Microsoft wanted to introduce Windows 7 in a big way but they weren’t sure how to go about it. Their marketing execs wanted… → Read More
I didn’t watch the Superbowl, so I didn’t see any of the commercials. Had I watched, I would have seen — and thoroughly enjoyed — this Old Spice body wash commercial. Leo Laporte saw it, though, and was so utterly blown away by it that he got the creative team who created it on for an interview. The interview is illuminating in several aspects, but the whole point of the discussion was to find… → Read More
Thanks to TiVo, we have a pretty good idea of what the most popular commercials from last night’s Super Bow. Survey says: that Doritos commercial with the little kid telling his mom’s date to keep his hands off his mother (fat chance!) and off his Doritos. America is a peculiar little country, isn’t it, cheese-flavored chips and light beer as far as the eye can see. → Read More
Okay so a PC is slow or has a small screen or has viruses causing you headaches. Apple’s response to the Laptop Hunters is just a little smarter than Microsoft’s ads. Or not at all. What’s more interesting is this other ad about customer care. Go check them out. → Read More
The sun has set on our day of fun in the sun as it pertains to Sprint CEO Dan Hesse appearing in any more TV commercials, according to the Wall Street Journal. As believable as it was watching a guy who cleared almost $4 million in his first year sitting in a greasy spoon diner, walking through Central Park alone at night, and working all day from a taxi cab while pitching the idea that tough… → Read More
Babies controlling our fragile world! Scary babies! Fear!
Actually, this Japanese commercial for Bioshock (click through to view it) is quite compelling. Sadly, we all know what the game is about by now so it kind of spoils the fun but I guess if you’re Japanese and don’t read the popular gaming press you’d be excited to believe that the game is something akin to Japanese horror films but, sadly… → Read More
Syke Energy Drink is looking for viral ads and Paul Robertson has whipped up a doozy. See how many of your favorite old school video games you can find referenced in the video. It’s almost nostalgia overload — which can’t be a bad thing. → Read More
We’re seeing more and more of what $300 million buys you—“you” being Microsoft and $300 million being its recently beefed up ad budget. So, to the point: what does it buy you? In addition to the unfairly panned—though we like them, for the record—Bill Gates/Jerry Seinfeld commercials, it also buys you a small kiosk outside English Apple retail stores. The kiosk… → Read More
Anybody who is considered the “geek” amongst their less tech-minded peers best look out. The BlackBerry Storm has made its way to the moving picture box, and they decided to go all Coen Brothers with the ending. For the next week or two, you get to deal with a constant stream of “Hey! Hey! You like computers! What’s on the other side of the Storm?!” from anyone who can’t use Google. → Read More
Reader DjCarbon pinged me this morning with an interesting bit of news. Above you see the first two entries for the search “i’m a PC” in Google – Apple has essentially hijacked the dialogue about personal computers, forcing Microsoft to take a stand through their new commercials. The “I’m a Mac/I’m a PC” commercials are odd and insidious but, as we… → Read More
This commercial apparently came out around this time last year, but I just saw it for the first time this morning. I wouldn’t mind watching this every year around this time. Apologies if you’ve seen it before, but it’s quite hilarious – the last second, especially. → Read More
Someone managed to get their hands on the ad spot for Sony Ericsson’s P5 Paris, and as with just about any video with “Paris” in the title, it wound up on the internet for all to see. Details about this QWERTY/NumPad combo slider have been leaking out since the beginning of April — word is it’ll be made official at Sony Ericsson’s press conference in Amsterdam… → Read More
Hey there, cool dudes. Looks like Microsoft’s fixing to jazz things up a bit with the hip and fun Johnny Knoxville. What a crazy guy, huh? Isn’t he neat? That oughta show those squares over at Apple who’s got the snazziest commercials around. An anonymous focus group participant apparently sent an e-mail to a blog called Cajun Boy in the City detailing that “Microsoft was… → Read More
Something is wrong here. TiVo grabs data from how many times the pause and rewind buttons are pressed during the Super Bowl and makes the most frequently shifted ads the “top ten” ads. If you watched the game, though, you’ll agree with me that there’s no way the Dorito’s “Mouse Trap” or the Ice Breakers “Carmen Electra” spot should be anywhere… → Read More
Here’s Apple’s latest “Get a Mac” ad, which comes only a few weeks after its Christmas-themed one. This one uses sports to parlay the fact that the Wall Street Journal called Leopard “better” and “faster” than Vista. I wonder if next week’s MacWorld will give unto us yet another one of these ads? Get a Mac [Apple via Mac Rumors → Read More
Skateboard Pete[r Ha] (yes, a delicious take-off of Pharrell’s nickname) is notorious for his hatred of recent TV adverts, but I don’t see how he could hate this one for Gran Turismo 5. It’s pretty straight forward: family walks into an electronics store, kids want TV and the game which the father thought was real life footage. He then freaks out because it’s so realistic. → Read More
If you’re a Slingbox owner who happens to be of the opinion that there just aren’t enough ads on television already, you are weird. You also might be seeing even more ads if Sling Media puts into play the technology described in a recent patent. The patent basically entails using various methods of delivering ads including video overlays, pre- and post-roll ads, pop-up windows, and… → Read More
Oh man. Nick Haley grabbed some clips from Apple’s website, mixed in some sexy-time music, and got an e-mail from Apple saying "we’ve seen what you have produced and we’d like a chat with you." The commercial has been redone "professionally" by Apple’s ad agency but is said to deviate little from the original, save for some more polished editing and a… → Read More
Readers at FlyerTalk are outraged at the new iPhone commercial featuring a pilot who uses his iPhone to check the weather and inform the control tower that things were clearing up and he should be able to fly. I’m actually getting kind of tired of these “real person” ads, actually. Not sure why, but they don’t sit right with me. Oh well. Now you’ll know what happens… → Read More
You know how it is when you wake up after having a barbecue at your place and you still feel drunk and your ears are ringing and you’re feeling pretty good — not too hung over, maybe an egg and sausage sandwich would get you back in sorts? And then you go out into the living room and something bad happened? Like your friend puked on the couch and then passed out in it or the dog ate a… → Read More
As Deleon and I waited for Entourage to come on last night, this commercial for Buy.com popped on during some channel surfing. There were five of us in the room and for a total of 30-seconds, we all sat without saying a word watching the worst commercial for a website we’ve ever seen. Buy.com, because of this commercial, you will go out of business. There is simply no way anyone can take you… → Read More
TiVo is introducing an interesting twist to the television-ratings game with a new service called Stop||Watch. Basically, the commercials that get watched and rewound the most win out over the commercials that get skipped the most. Results will be made available on a monthly basis. Categories include Top Total Viewing Commercials compared with Total Viewing of Top Programs, Time Shifted… → Read More
Spotted on Perez earlier today, Nicole Kidman is indeed doing a Nintendo DS commercial. Not only is she a terrible actress in this commercial, but the whole thing doesn’t even have an ounce of humor in it. It’s very plain. Shame she went from being such a great actress to this. Acts of De$paration [Perez Hilton] → Read More
. Hickey is sitting at the 30 yard line of the Big Game at our favorite watering hole in Seattle, the Twilight Exit. And I’m sitting in my room staring blankly at the television from bed with my broke ass Powerbook sputtering toward death. We all know that the Superbowl is chock full of the most innovative and geektastic commercials of the year, so we will be live blogging our thoughts on… → Read More
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