Millions of people across the U.S. are preparing their jerseys, face paint and horrific nachos. Yes, football fans rejoice, the big game finally kicks off tomorrow in New Orleans — that is, Super Bowl XLVII, between the Baltimore Ravens and the San Franciso 49ers. The Super Bowl is always one of the biggest media events per year, and our inboxes have been flooded with “OMG this is going to be the… → Read More
During the lackluster moments of this year’s Super Bowl, we turned to our second screens. A study released by Flurry today shows that during great ads and the half-time show we kept our devices stowed, but returns from commercial breaks, boring ads, and waning interest in the 3rd quarter caused spikes in mobile app usage.
This means advertisers and TV producers need to get flashier, because… → Read More
Big TV events are becoming an increasingly popular catalyst of activity on social media, with sporting events being at the top of the list. Many of us can no longer enjoy a Super Bowl without checking Twitter every three seconds. Last year, there were several moments during the Super Bowl that set records for the most tweets per second during a sporting event, with a high of 4,064 TPS. The highs… → Read More
Lately, we’ve been seeing more and more big television events come with an online streaming counterpart. Big sporting and televised events are showing up online, with the 2010 Olympics seeming to be one of the first big global events where both viewers and media publicly recognized the power and potential of carrying an event like that online.
For the first time ever, the Super Bowl is being… → Read More
Want to watch the big budget Super Bowl commercials, but can’t wait till Sunday or don’t care about football? Facebook and USA Today have just launched Ad Meter, a Facebook app where you can watch many of the TV spots right now. Then from kickoff until Tuesday night you can vote for your favorites. Traditionally an offline poll done live with handheld meters, USA Today has finally brought Ad Meter… → Read More
For those of us who know nothing about football, The Super Bowl is more about what the huge brands who buy ads chose to do with their $3 million in ad dollars and prime eyeball time, paying to play with a captive audience in the hundreds of millions. And the technology industry always steps up to the plate; Last year Google debuted its “Parisian Love” ad and we had quite a few tech firsts this… → 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
When it comes to making money, Twitter’s approach right now is their group of Promoted Products. That is, the Promoted Tweets, Promoted Users, and Promoted Trending Topics that brands pay for in order to get more exposure. And now this coming Sunday, it looks like Foursquare will begin testing the same type of thing.
Specifically, during the Super Bowl, Foursquare is going to have a “Promoted… → Read More
Super Bowl is just around the corner, and that means it’s the one and only time people anticipate commercials more than the game. Motorola has released a teaser for their Super Bowl commercial and it criticizes Apple. Their message is that “2011 is [actually] a lot like 1984.” The 1984 reference dates back to Apple’s own Super Bowl… → 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
While Google is a company built on advertising, for the most part it has stayed out of advertising itself on the dominant medium: television. Yes, there have been those short ads for Chrome and a few for Android that it has been involved with. And Google is even said to have considered an ad during the Olympics, but that was killed at the last second, apparently. But now, it looks like Google may… → Read More
This may be a first: a Twitter Super Bowl party! Sirius XM’s Ron and Fez is having some sort of Twitter party celebrating The Big Game. Trivia, prizes, virtual booze, Chris Stanley passed out at a speakeasy in Long Island City—what more could you want? Oh, that’s not enough for you? Then how about a pair of knissors signed by East Side Dave McDonald, whom I interviewed last summer? → Read More
How did I miss this? Actually, I guess it’d be pretty easy. And since I didn’t watch the Super Bowl, that makes it a little easier. Ivar’s, my favorite Northwest chowder house and chippy, ran a half-second ad during the Super Bowl, which you probably didn’t even know you saw. I believe that makes it the shortest broadcast commercial ever, even with the run on virals and blipverts this year. → Read More
The Super Bowl is a major economic force and should cause 2.6 million HDTVs sold this year – or so says the CEA. After all, it is the biggest football game of the year and people love an excuse to gather. No doubt some used the digital switch or so-called liquidation sales as an excuse to plop down money on a swanky new HDTV. → Read More
Oh man. Someone is going to lose their job [life?] over this. The story goes that just after the Cardinals scored their last touchdown, Tucson, AZ Comcast viewers were interrupted with a bit of porn. We’re talking male full frontal swinging in the air nudity here and not just a brief wardrobe malfunction from a few years ago. The peep show continues on for about 10 seconds and ends halfway through… → Read More
So what didja think ’bout the 3D commercials? Monsters and Aliens looks like a sweet movie but did the 3D trailer make you wanna see it more? Oh, and how ’bout the SoBe dancing lizard one? Me? I thought they were lame.
Sound off after the jump with a quick poll. → Read More
Got to be honest, it looks great, but I’m more pumped ’bout the G.I. Joe movie after that trailer. Still, this Star Trek one looks amazing in HD. → Read More
O.M.G. Forget TF2, watch this. → Read More
You should know by now that there are going to be 3D Super Bowl Commercials. Right? Anyway, SoBe has produced a behind the scenes look at its commercial. Hopefully the real thing isn’t as craptacular as this clip; it probably will be though. Video after the break and remember, you’ve been warned. → Read More
I actually missed this commercial yesterday and I’m glad I did. Part of me expected something spectacular while the other half expected something pretty piss-poor. Looks like the latter won out. I can’t really blame Toshiba for not dishing out the extra money to produce something worth noting. After all, you’ve already wasted millions to secure a spot during the Super Bowl and… → 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
Like most nerds, I don’t follow football. However, I do follow football-shaped slow cookers and boy, is this a doozy. It has three settings — warm, cook, and off — and it only costs $39.99. Don’t let the kids at it or they’ll be throwing a metal ball full of chicken wings across the room faster than you can say Bret Farve. Hit fosfor.com for 9 more gadgets. → Read More
Hulu, I said! Hulu! Go ahead and skip the Super Bowl tomorrow, friends: Hulu will have all of the commercials on there for your streaming pleasure after the game, ensuring you don’t miss a single whimsical Monster.com ad or a Miller Lite ad involving two women who fight with a gnome of his secret goldmine of beer. I should be in advertising. Advertisers are paying $2.7 million for 30 seconds… → Read More
That is if you have a Neural-THX AV receiver. In any case, this will be the first time the Super Bowl will be available with true 5.1 surround sound, which is pretty darn hot. If you don’t have a Neural-THX receiver then you’re pretty much screwed. Heh. Not really. You can still experience the ‘game’s soundtrack’ with existing surround sound formats. Neural-THX… → Read More
Agreed to host that Super Bowl party, but forgot that you’ve got a 12-inch TV with dials for UHF and VHF? Well, go kick it at Wal-Mart. And while you’re trying to forget that you’re at Wal-Mart, buy some of their inexpensive goods. They’ve got a 32-inch LCD TV for just under $600, a Polaroid one with a built-in DVD player for $700, or if you’ve already got a tube… → Read More
The bad craziness of desperation spending has begun. I guess Toshiba had a little left over in their war chest and have decided that a final blitz is in order. The obvious place to launch it is the Super Bowl, where the ads are not only seen by millions, but also pored over and repeated for weeks afterwards. Sounds like the HD DVD group is going to down like the Spartans at Thermopylae — in a… → Read More
<img src="http://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2007/01/Beatles. Apple Inc., makers of the ubiquitous iPod, and Apple Corps, guardians of Beatles' material, today settled their longstanding trademark feud. The companies have been embroiled in litigation over rights to the name for roughly 20 years. While there was no official announcement of Beatles availability on iTunes, the… → 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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