Comments on: New Palm Pre Commercial Continues Theme

Palm has begun to air another new TV commercial for the Palm Pre. This new 30 second spot features the same actress (Tamara Hope) and "creepy" delivery style as the previous commercial, which elicited some interesting reactions. This time around the delivery is centered around a juggler in what seems to be an allegory for how great multitasking is with webOS.

This ad makes use of the song, "Tunnel" by The Dining Rooms, an Italian avant garde jazz group. You can watch the video embed after the break.

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Porn!!

abosco @ 7/18/2009 4:20:17 PM #

Seriously? This was full of sexual tension and innuendo with a mild case of depression.

Am I the only one who thinks the marketing department is off their rocker!?

-Bosco
m105 -> NX70v -> NX80v -> iPhone -> iPhone 3G

RE: Porn!!

jca666us @ 7/18/2009 6:09:33 PM #

Dude, you are 100% right!!!!

LMAO! What a bad use of advertising monies - what a piece of crap ad!

Shouldn't the objective of this ad be to get you to think about how cool the Pre is - instead all I remember about the ad was that the juggler "was. very. good." and that the girl in the ad was unusually fixated on her.

For the third ad in the series, maybe we can have the blonde and the juggler strip down to their bra and panties and make out while the blonde extolls the virtues of the Pre in her drug-induced delivery.

While it won't help sell any more Pre's (neither will this ad), it would be highly entertaining!

RE: Porn!!

twrock @ 7/19/2009 1:54:30 AM #

Umm, seriously? I'm thinking maybe the "interpretation" says more about the poster than the advert.

I hated the ad, but "porn", "sexual tension and innuendo", the two ladies stripping down and making out in the next of the series? Ok then.....

Hey Palm! Where's my PDA with Wifi and phone capabilities?

RE: Porn!!

SeldomVisitor @ 7/19/2009 4:00:22 AM #

> ...Am I the only one who thinks the marketing department is off their rocker!?

No, the CEO of Palm apparently thought so, too.

The SVP of Marketing was terminated after this series of ads was made.

RE: Porn!!

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 4:53:17 AM #

Palm should have terminated the ads and started over.

The fact that they had the brains to fire the SVP of marketing is great, but go all the way and trash the ads too.

Palm needs a consistent message that's good. They also need to control the message (scrap the shitty Sprint commercials too),

RE: Porn!!

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 5:26:08 AM #

twrock,

you must not get out much; I was being sarcastic in my post.

>Umm, seriously? I'm thinking maybe the "interpretation" says more about the
>poster than the advert.

When the only thing the girl in the ad is talking about enthusiastically (in a commercial about a phone) is another girl juggling balls...could it be...sexual tension?!?!

She might also have wanted to kill the juggler and chop her up into pieces - the girl in the ad was awfully unusual and creepy!

>I hated the ad, but "porn", "sexual tension and innuendo", the two ladies
>stripping down and making out in the next of the series? Ok then...

As I said, that would be an improvement of this trainwreck of an ad - this one was laughably bad. juggling balls!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Instead of displaying the Pre in a positive light - it shows a creepy girl who took too much of her psych medications obsessing over a female juggler.

"she was very good"

RE: Porn!!

twrock @ 7/19/2009 7:32:46 AM #

Thanks jca666us. Your explanation really helped clear things up. I rest my case.

Hey Palm! Where's my PDA with Wifi and phone capabilities?

RE: Porn!!

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 7:43:16 AM #

When an ad company produces a shitty ad that doesn't clearly and properly *advertise* the product - people are bound to interpret it whatever way they want.

Says more about the lack of work put into the ad, then it does people's commentary.

I feel sorry for the actress in the ad - I hope her career doesn't suffer for it.

RE: Porn!!

freakout @ 7/19/2009 4:22:36 PM #

Palm needs a consistent message that's good.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA

WOW!!

You're so insightful, jca666us! I cannot BELIEVE that Palm hasn't simply outright hired you to run the company, when you give out gems like that for free.

RE: Porn!!

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 6:29:07 PM #

Obviously it is advice Palm needs - because their current message sucks - even harder than this ad does!

The juggler may have been very good, but palm's advertising efforts aren't even adequate!

ewwww

HelloNNNewman @ 7/18/2009 7:13:04 PM #

So far, ALL none of the Pre ads have been very good, but they keep getting worse and worse. I soooo much want to support Palm, but their decision making abilities seem destined to doom everything they do. These commercials just reflect their self-destructive nature. Horrible commercials like this will do nothing but destroy interest. I was excited about the Pre when it came out, but after this marketing campaign have lost almost all of my excitement (not to mention desire for this phone). Sad.

RE: ewwww

SeldomVisitor @ 7/19/2009 4:02:25 AM #

Actually, I thought THIS ad was better than the the "bing, bing bing" ad because at least you, the person who has never heard of the Pre before, are getting closer to seeing that the Pre is actually a phone.

The "bing etc" ad easily could have confused the naive viewer into thinking the Pre was a GPS unit.

The Borg Queen

freakout @ 7/18/2009 7:54:26 PM #

That's who she reminds me of.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNwTwzNzvBQ

RE: The Borg Queen

jca666us @ 7/18/2009 10:57:59 PM #

Hey Freak,

I actually like the Borg Queen - the girl in this commercial sounds too spaced out - acts like she escaped from a mental institution.

This ad does raise an interesting question; how many balls do you think she can juggle in her mouth - LOL!!!

RE: The Borg Queen

freakout @ 7/19/2009 12:53:39 AM #

You are as funny as a plane crash. Please go away and die already.

RE: The Borg Queen

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 4:57:31 AM #

Freak, don't tell me you thought this ad was great? Then again - being the Palm apologist that you are - you've probably got it memorized word for word.

"She was very good" - duh!!!! The real plane crash was the shitty ad.

Poor Ruby!

jca666us @ 7/18/2009 8:21:16 PM #

For an ex-apple guy he obviously didn't learn much about marketing from Jobs.

Juggling Balls? They really need better branding and a clear message that can easily resonate in a commercial.

Back to square one!

RE: Poor Ruby!

SeldomVisitor @ 7/19/2009 4:13:38 AM #

I sincerely believe this series of ads was conceived, approved, created, AND paid for well before "Ruby" was CEO and, to his credit, the top Marketing person for Palm was terminated as soon as he became CEO.

We'll see how well a hardware product manager can run a company that is basing its future off of software. This minor step, however, seems to be the right one.

RE: Poor Ruby!

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 5:05:33 AM #

seldom - these ads should have been discarded along with the marketing bozo they terminated - and never seen the light of day.

Also, it's not like Ruby never saw these craptastic ads.

He should have pilfered a few marketing execs at Apple.

C'mon, it's just an advert

G M Fude @ 7/18/2009 9:53:49 PM #

Better than the plethora of half-truths in Apple advertising, surely.

RE: C'mon, it's just an advert

jca666us @ 7/18/2009 10:34:45 PM #

Please - this ad is worse than those Jerry Seinfeld Microsoft ads.

And those ads were *putrid*

OMG!! Pre Claus?!!?

mikecane @ 7/19/2009 4:54:13 PM #

That's it. Kill the company through ads that look like they came out of a pot-smoke-filled room.

Next we'll have The Return of Claus.

RE: OMG!! Pre Claus?!!?

jca666us @ 7/19/2009 6:18:44 PM #

From the results of the ads, the pot must have been pretty good :)

RE: OMG!! Pre Claus?!!?

freakout @ 7/19/2009 11:55:44 PM #

Hey Cane - you were complaining about the Demo software on the display Pre's? Prethinking says the next update will wipe it out:

http://www.prethinking.com/home/2009/7/19/webos-next-firmware-update-on-or-around-722.html

Demo phones on display:
* Steps are being taken to remove the demo software.
* The demo software will automatically be removed with the next OTA SWupdate (available on or near 7/22/09).

RE: OMG!! Pre Claus?!!?

mikecane @ 7/20/2009 10:39:27 AM #

Damn. That's good news. Then all I'd have to do is hunt down a working model that's free of a hovering salesdroid. Local Sprint Store still does not have the earlier two demo models out. Has had none for weeks!