http://www.hudghton.co.uk/the_nokia_-_blackwell_briggs_-_conspiracy_for_good_-_crap_viral_campaign.html
The Nokia – Blackwell Briggs – Conspiracy For Good – Crap Viral Campaign
So, this isn’t my main post for this week (I’ll post something serious tomorrow later this week), but I recently became aware of some horrible-ness on Youtube that warranted further investigation. I don’t profess to be an expert on viral marketing, but if I was going to create a viral video campaign, it would be NOTHING like this monstrosity from Nokia.
"Blackwell Briggs Revealed" [Original viral-video]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1Tr0m2gOjY
This video was supposedly leaked from “security company” Blackwell Briggs in May 2010. Nokia even set up a fake Twitter account. In fairness to Nokia, a few commenters on Youtube seemed to think it was real, but they could just be plants. Or maybe they’re just idiots, I don’t know.
I should just add, when I say “Nokia” obviously I mean whoever is running this viral campaign for them. It’s still Nokia’s responsibility though in my view, so I’m quite happy to place the blame firmly at their door.
The fake Twitter account is clearly managed by people with few moral values. For example:
That tweet links to this
story on the BBC about a Real IRA car bomb explosion. Now, call me old fashioned but tagging onto the fear created by a very real and serious incident, just for the purposes of enhancing your POS viral campaign, is an absolute disgrace in my view.
Exhibit B
"Blackwell Briggs - Conspiracy For Good Re-Edit"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdLiHWt9RDk
A few days later (or maybe even the same day?), the video was mysteriously re-edited by Conspiracy For Good; a team dedicated to stopping the horrible monsters at Blackwell Briggs from taking over whatever they were planning on taking over (sorry, I lost interest). There’s a few more Twitter accounts where you can keep up to date with which celebs are now recording. Joss Stone is such an ACE actor by the way (I wondered where she’d gone).
I guess the biggest thing that puzzled me is why Nokia would have an American-female voice over on a British targeted video? Although having said that, I think there was some research a while back showing that us Brits love American accents or something.
Exhibit C
Nokia even persuaded Tim Kring (creator of axed TV series Heros) to be a part of this crap! I assume large wads of cash were involved. I mean, really…
"endorsement [by Tim Kring]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bs8K11gV994
At the time of writing, this video had only received 562 views, so you’re getting this scoop early people!
Exhibit D
Someone else who’s evidently fallen on hard times is Trent Reznor (founder of fairly well known band Nine Inch Nails). I do hope there aren’t too many more of these….
"Trent Reznor Is Not A member"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1L7TovJxNbU
How crap is that one?! It’s like Trent has just said “yeah yeah, gimmie the $5k, I’ll mumble your damn line” and whoever is orchestrating this has gone “OK Trent!”. Utter rubbish.
Free hints for Nokia
If you really want to make this nonsense believable (that’s the idea, right?) don’t register both domains at virtually the same time and with identical whois information; any numpty can look this up nowadays:
In addition, hosting both websites with the same hosting provider probably isn’t too realistic now, is it? Greetings to the guys and girls over at Bytemark by the way (they, at least, are real).
Is this the end of this viral?
Sadly, I suspect it’s only the beginning. Maybe I’m being a bit harsh and I do appreciate the irony that I’m blogging about it now and thus creating Nokia further exposure. But I just find the whole concept offensively sh*t, sorry. You can subscribe here on Youtube to see what happens next. It even looks like Nokia have
London Events planned for the summer; oh lawdy.
What should Nokia have done?
Well personally, I would have invested the cash in a new advert, just like Nike:
"NIKE WRITE THE FUTURE - FULL LENGTH VERSION"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idLG6jh23yE
