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May 30, 2011

Tablet advertising rant

Over the memorial day weekend, I happened to catch a couple of different commercials advertising Research In Motion's Blackberry Playbook. The two Playbook commercials respectively showed their users watching Thor and X-Men: First Class on it. Thor is only a few weeks old and still in the movie theaters. X-Men isn't even out yet. So either these commercials were telling me I could potentially watch either new or unreleased movies on this tablet, or they were telling me I could watch their trailers on the Playbook. If the first, then this is grossly misleading as I don't seem to be able to find these movies for sale or for rent anywhere other then an actual theater yet. Unless of course, RIM is suggesting I can watch pirated movies on my new tablet. If so, this is a novel advertising technique. If the latter, which is more likely, however, then now all they're telling me is I can do the same thing I can do on an ipad, smartphone, or literally ANYTHING I can get an internet connection on. My son has an old Samsung Instinct feature phone, and he can watch movie trailers on it. Not much of an advertising incentive in that case.

I seem to recall a Motorola Xoom commercial doing the same a few months back. Sadly, this seems to be a trend in advertising for devices such as these, showing media that you simply cannot obtain legally at the time of the devices' launch. The other alternative is that they're giving me a glimpse into a possible future where I MIGHT be able to one day watch Thor on my Playbook. Unfortunately, I don't buy products based on what they might offer me months down the line. Judging by the sales of the Xoom, which has been out for a while now, neither do a lot of other people. It still remains to be seen whether the same will be said of the Playbook.

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