Tell me what’s wrong with this sentence: “Users of Microsoft’s popular Xbox Kinect gaming console will soon be able to use voice and motion commands to interact with advertisements while they are playing their favorite game or watching a video.”
That’s how the New York Times starts an article revealing something called NuAds (ugh) – a brand new way to push advertising onto Xbox 360 owners, which will make considerable use of Kinect as part of the system.
There’s nothing wrong with the way the NYT describes it, of course, but the whole concept makes me shudder. “On Tuesday,” it says, “Microsoft is set to announce a new suite of advertising tools, called NuAds, short for natural user-interface ads, that will let users interact with advertising on the console dashboard or embedded in games and other video content.”
“The ads use the same voice and motion control developed for the company’s Kinect game console.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSk5DhxQHLo
“Using voice commands, gamers will be able to send messages about an ad to a social networking site like Twitter by saying ‘Xbox Tweet.’ Advertisers who want to send more information about a product or promotion associated with a campaign can prompt Xbox users to say ‘Xbox More,’ which will send users an e-mail with the information they wanted.”
It sounds absolutely horrible. And, just letting you know – anyone that Tweets an ad deserves any blocks they get.
It’s not all bad, though. If something does genuinely interest you, there’s a couple of neat ideas. Saying ‘Xbox Schedule’ will send text messages to your phone when a TV program is about to start that you’ve seen an ad for, and ‘Xbox Near Me’ will fire off a map of the nearest pizza place you’ve just seen advertised.
The new ads will start to appear next Spring, although we can imagine there’ll be a certain amount of resistance…
Crocadillian
I love how he stereotypes people in his discussion of that Coke advert. For a period of time they removed the comments, then re-enabled them. They should damn well take some criticism for this.
JesseDeya
52 likes, 1,586 dislikes
I think there’s a message in that for everyone.
JesseDeya
90 likes, 3,339 dislikes
And the ratio worsens.
JesseDeya
Go to minutes 1:33 and 2:23 – is that a web browser? If so, is it coming to the Xbox dash?
Also check out the Xbox in the background (minute 4:40 shows it well), what is on it? Watercooling? Licensed electric pencil sharpener? That guy’s lunch?
Also also check out the lack of anything but a power cable in the Xbox. Clearly it’s not outputting to the TV or running the Kinect sensor here.
Still lolz about the Sony TV.
How many other bloopers can we find in this ad ad?
JesseDeya
In answer to my own question – at least one more!
Just noticed the Kinect sensor has a flashing green light the entire clip. Thinking to myself “that can’t be normal”, I googled it.
According to Microsoft themselves – http://support.xbox.com/en-us/pages/kinect/more-topics/flashing-green-light-on-kinect-sensor.aspx
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When you turn on your Xbox 360 console, the light on the Kinect sensor normally flashes green for up to one minute. You might also see the following on-screen message:
The sensor is starting up. Please stand by.
If the light on your sensor flashes for more than 90 seconds, try these steps:
Restart your console.
Wait 90 seconds.
If the sensor light does not change to a solid green light, try updating your console software.
—————
Seriously MS, how dumb do you think we are?
Actually don’t answer that, the fact you’re making Kinect interaction for ads people don’t even want is answer enough.
The Lone Steven
I am not even going to facepalm at this news. It doesn’t deserve this. This is one of the worst ideas ever. Adverts on the internet are annoying enough but this is ten times worse. A lot of people will be annoyed if they are about to complete a game and then the Go compare ad comes up. I don’t want to watch an ad on my console. If all adverts come up and stop the games from launching then i would imagine that a lot of xboxs will be punched very hard.
Foxhound_Solid
Oh shit, that is real bad for the green team…
BrainDiver
I’m so glad I’m a PS3 guy…
Amphlett
*IF* I have a an xbox360 then the news that advertisers could then obtain my mobile phone number from the xbox service would really worry me. I get enough cold calls every day and certainly wouldn’t want legitimate companies also spamming me with texts and calls. Urgh!