Victory!!!! ESPN Mobile to shut down

My newspaper didn't report that Matt Leinart would start.

 

I'm one of the few pariahs here who actually reads and likes tsn, but that line is top 7 for this year. TSN Rotary.

And the stalker guy also lost an acting gig (In fact, may have committed career suicide) but sorry, I don't give a fuck. Hammer me over the head with your product enough times, I'm going to grow to despise it.

 

A couple of quick observations:

* ESPN soured me on the phone when they tried to pimp it in the most inappropriate times, like during the Kirby Puckett stroke/death. Remember that night? Someone posted a rant about it here, and every word of it was accurate and true. That's when it lost my support.

* Acquaintance of mine who works for a telecommunications marketing group in Indianapolis was part of the chain of folks who helped set up the release of this phone. He says their biggest error was that they geared the phone to higher-end customers, people with bigger incomes and such. Only problem: Most of those folks already had phones with Internet, Blackberrys, etc. ESPN Mobile set its credit standards for contracts too high for the guys who'd actually want it -- young, single, not much credit history, etc.

 

But Nike did (Dennis Hopper as burnt our/crazed ref) and it was one of the more celebrated ad campaigns ever. And Footjoy does it successfully with "Sign Boy" stalking Els, Vijay et al, if you watch golf broadcasts. Sometimes it works, other times it doesn't, but the "greasy stalker guy outsidce ESPN" concept itself wasn't flawed -- it was the fact that they forced too many damn messages into the concept (explaining the service, features, where you can buy the phone, etc.), which is what marketing "experts" do whenever sales are lagging: they feel they have to say everything, and end up saying nothing. Why was Hopper's campaign successful? Because all he did was entertain...he didn't have to talk about the advanced contstruction of the shoe or that people can buy it at Athlete's foot.

 

Um, it worked because it was Nike and Dennis Hopper, which are both pretty much failure-proof brand names.

 

Um, yes, agree...but I'm saying that it also worked because they didn't cram 17 confusing messages into it, and it was purely brand entertainment, not retail schlock.

 

Now that we know it's a faked-up picture, it should also be pointed out that there's a PETA sign in the background as well.

 

The Mouse wanted people to pay an absurdly-premium price -- for a captive audience.

If they'd been offering you a unit that featured honest-to-God widespread, practical
internet access, they might have had something.

But they figured, "We're ESPN . . . we can sell ANYTHING to morons."

Guess again, Bristol.

 

nail, meet head.

side note: anyone else getting this f'n annoying shopping center pop-up every time they type more than 3 letters? --- ttp://www.shopperssavingcenter.com/static/s109746c93513.htm

 

As well as Samsung and Kodak Digital...

 

yes

 

yes and it's pissing me off like a talk-radio Michigan State fanboy.