Fair Game: Sony's History of Sordid Publicity
Anyone for a dead goat?
Some of the resulting criticism saw one such disgruntled reactionary in San Francisco scrawling "Get out of my city" on an ad while accenting the PSP with the word "Fony" and adding a derogatory, four-line outburst to make clear their displeasure at Sony stooping to such marketing tactics. A somewhat more subtle commenter chose to spray over a series of the PSP-equipped characters and added: "Advertising directed at your counter culture."
According to a Sony spokesperson, the PSP campaign was supposed to highlight the device as a "disrupter product," aimed specifically at "urban nomads" and "people who are on the go constantly." And, while clearly rankling a certain proportion of the PSP's prospective consumer base, marketing experts were suitably impressed with Sony's outrageous bid for exposure.
Piers Fawkes, who runs the IF blog that monitors fresh marketing currents, was quick to praise the campaign, saying that it was "a cheeky wink toward a tech-savvy audience," and was "reflective of [a] modern approach to marketing."
Maintaining a focus of contention with the PlayStation Portable console, Sony's next marketing faux pas of note reared up in March of 2006 when it ran a campaign in the UK that reaped more than its fair share of negative attention via the public transport system.
Simple in aesthetic execution but seemingly cryptic in content, ads placed on buses, overland train stations and the Underground consisted of a series of plain white backgrounds punctuated by statements in a bold red font, all of which pointed indirectly to the console's individual features and functions.
However, people soon began complaining in droves concerning pop culture insinuations such as "Spend a night in Paris here," which, while perhaps highlighting the hardware's ability to search the Web for tourist information, many believed to be a sordid reference to a certain millionairess and her widely viewed sexual shenanigans - which could also be 'enjoyed' via the PSP.
Things became decidedly sticky for Sony when complaints poured in regarding the "Take a running jump here" ad that appeared on tunnel walls in the London Underground. In gaming terms, the ad was clearly referencing platform-based action, yet to those not well versed in aspects of gameplay, it was received as a tasteless and insensitive play on words regarding the long and gory history of people committing suicide beneath the thundering wheels of crowded tube trains.
Other ads in the series included: "Strong language and scenes of a sexual nature here," which was supposedly pushing the PSP's ability to run movies on UMD discs; the self-explanatory and professionally disruptive "Saucy e-mails won't get you fired here," and a massive 100-foot billboard placed outside an Anglican cathedral that said "Your girlfriend's white bits here," which was a not especially subtle way of lauding the PSP's ability to carry personal photographs while tempting male users to upload naked pictures of their partners sans swimwear.
Despite receiving a stream of complaints, the ASA ultimately dismissed calls for a ban after campaign creator TBWA London argued that its ads merely drew upon the PSP's four core features of image uploading, wireless Web browsing, software support, and movie playback. Although the ASA conceded that some people may find elements of the campaign to be "bawdy" they were "not likely to cause serious or widespread offence," or encourage people to leap into oncoming traffic.
With the dust barely settled on the UK campaign, Sony unleashed perhaps its most disgraceful PlayStation Portable marketing drive. This time aimed at Holland and the Benelux regions, July of 2006 saw the shocking emergence of an arguably racist billboard ad looking to provoke interest in Sony's new "ceramic white" PSP model.
The black and white billboard, which quickly reaped global attention via the Internet, showed an aggressive white woman gripping the jaw of a frightened-looking black woman and carried the words "White is coming," along with a small corner image of the console itself.
Unsurprisingly, given the stark use of imagery, Sony was immediately pressured to pull the ad and even attracted the attention of Rick Callender, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), who said the billboard had "sparked painful feelings in the global community." Not quite so sensitive in delivering his appraisal, Californian Assemblyman Leland Yee openly slammed the billboard as "insensitive at best and racist at worst."
Comments
What about the "Stop sniffing your sister's knickers and buy a PS3 instead." campaign ? And the Playstation roaches campaign ? remember those ? sniff.
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