Firefox Promo Videos

sebFlyte writes "Last week Mozilla Europe launched some extremely funny promotional videos for Firefox and ZDNet is reporting that they're spreading across the net like wildfire." From the article: "This is just the beginning -- I only posted it on my personal blog and it's already spreading nicely...We wanted to start small as we were concerned that servers wouldn't be able to handle the load."

Comments

Can't handle the load?

[jobeus]

"we were concerned that servers wouldn't be able to handle the load" -> Slashdotted already. :(

Re:Can't handle the load?

[Curtman]

Posted right in the middle of the US lunch hours no less.

Some of us are in different time zones you insensitive clod.

(Sorry, it's been a while since I've seen an insensitive clod accusation)

Re:Can't handle the load?

[ReverendLoki]

Some of us are in different time zones you insensitive clod.

Some of us are insensitive clods you... er... yeah

(That should help hold you over)

Re:Can't handle the load?

[Curtman]

so why the hell didn't they make it a bittorrent link?

Why the hell didn't they update the bittorrent link you mean.

Re:Can't handle the load?

[ZB Mowrey]

You mean there are women on slashdot?

This is slashdot so...

[Minwee]

I can't be the only one who read that as "Firefox Porno Videos".

Wasn't porn the whole reason that people wanted a better web browser in the first place?

Re:This is slashdot so...

[Auckerman]

"Wasn't porn the whole reason that people wanted a better web browser in the first place?"

Yes, actaully.

Way back in the day, what got me on the web was the fact that Netscape included a USENET reader that could handle inline UUEncoded files. More specifically JPEG. Had I gotten on the Internet any later than I did (91), I wouldn't know anywhere near as much about Unix as I do now. Having to figure out how to make PINE to launch a shell so I could compile tintin and have less limited access to USENET (their default reader had no subscribe feature and only "approved" groups) ended up being the major foundations of a later career.

Who says porn is bad for you.

Wildfire

[hotdiggitydawg]

We wanted to start small as we were concerned that servers wouldn't be able to handle the load.

Welcome to slashdot. Now it's spreading like the fire inside the case of your webserver.

Re:Wildfire

[COMON$]

thanks to the mineral oil PCs discussed yesterday we can now refer to the slashdot effect as the deep fry effect. break out the batter, fish, beer, invite some friends, and submit your website to slashdot.

Got my father switched today

[BronxBomber]

Which got me thinking - I wonder if its possible to push more marketing toward the older generation who are too afraid to switch from "tried and true" MSIE/Outlook?

A lot of the older generation has no idea what ActiveX is, how harmful it can be... it would be swell to see Firefox maybe try to get the attention of more casual, not-so-savvy PC users.

Re:Got my father switched today

[L0neW0lf]

I agree...however, I think Firefox still has some minor hurdles to overcome in this department.

Not in usability, Firefox certainly has that. However, you cannot install Firefox over another copy of Firefox without having two versions in "Add/Remove Programs" in Windows. You can't get an upgrade patch for Firefox just a whole new version (Though admittedly the download is far smaller than IE). I've also found that if you have Auto-Update on it may take several days to inform you of an update, which concerns me if 0-day exploits with the browser become a problem (I also think "Check For Updates" should be an option off the Help drop-down menu).

I think Firefox is great, and it's my browser of choice...but I think they could polish it just a little more for the average user.

Re:Got my father switched today

[BronxBomber]

Why is easy bad?

This is a common misconception. If Firefox expects to make any serious inroads, then they must address the casual user. Word of mouth is powerful, but not that powerful. Saying it would mean everything would have to be too easy is, to me, a copout.

Strictly speaking this has little to do with security. It has to do with prevention of scripts and executables being launched without user permission. This is one of the many things FF does well. IE does not. All a casual user has to do is install FF - default settings work fine for 99% of their surfing requirements. Cant get much easier than that.

Starting small...

[CajunElder]

"We wanted to start small as we were concerned that servers wouldn't be able to handle the load."

I'm sure a post to Slashdot is going to help.

ugh

[AIX-Hood]

Mentioning "video" without the subsequent "torrent link" is asking for trouble.

404

[Anonymous Coward]

404 - Funny not found

the ultimate irony

[gmr2048]

I couldn't get the videos to work in Firefox 1.0.4 (with Flashblock installed). I clicked on the Flashblock "play" button, but then got only audio, no video. I had to open the page in IE to see them. Oh the humanity.

-gary

Re:the ultimate irony

[stanleypane]

There is an executable flag for running Firefox without any third party add-ons activated. Simply add -safe-mode to the end of the executable that starts firefox:

firefox.exe -safe-mode
or...
./firefox -safe-mode
or...
./firefox-bin -safe-mode

Depending on your operating system, one of those will work.

Cool ads, but I don't think they promote Firefox

[norfolkboy]

The adverts are certainly cool, I enjoyed watching them.

BUT, although they mention FireFox, they don't give much clue as to what it does, other than "it's something to do with computers".

I can't see this converting anyone.

Sure, there is a link to download FF at the end, but users these days really should be discouraged from downloading something just because "the advertiser says so". Aren't we working against that culture?

I really think the adverts need to make more noise about what firefox is and does.

Anyone got a torrent up?

[gte910h]

This is screaming at the top of its lungs for a bittorrent

Re:Cool ads, but I don't think they promote Firefo

[norfolkboy]

sorry - that sounded a bit harsh. I think it's great that people are trying to promote FF.

I just don't feel the "blank and mysterious" adverts of the dot-com-bubble era are the right way to do it.

This is why its good to be a nerd

[PopeAlien]

See - this just goes to show: popularity is bad!
I always knew it was best to toil in obscurity!

Re:This is why its good to be a nerd

[TheSHAD0W]

That's what a BitTorrent link is for.

Coral cache ... ?

[Z-MaxX]

You can try the Coral cached version:

http://funnyfox.org.nyud.net:8090/

Which loads fine for me, but the Flash animations just show "-21474..." or something in the middle of a black empty rectangle. I wonder if the .swf file is trying to request another resource on the funnyfox.org server? Instead of using a relative URL?

Not funny?

[AaronD12]

Um... am I the only one that thought those were not funny? Good special effects but special effects don't make things funny. Content makes things funny.

Yawn.

/Firefox user on PC; Safari on Mac

For or against FireFox?

[skoda]

I watched these movies a few days back, and found them amusing, but I didn't understand their message. Are they suggesting that using e.g. IE is so devastating to the user that his head will pop off? Or is using Firefox so horrible that he scream in horror? Or are these good things, to show how remarkably different Firefox is from the competition?

Cute videos, but I have no idea what they're trying to communicate.

Re:For or against FireFox?

[Dracolytch]

The problem is, you're trying to recieve a consise message from an advertisement that does not have one. There is no underlying message, and they are suggesting very little.

The whole idea of this kind of advertising is to get your attention, and then show you a brand name. It's called brand exposure, and it's surprisingly effective. That's it, nothing more.

~D

url for actual swf files

[Anonymous Coward]

http://mozilla.mirrors.tds.net/mozilla-video//port able1.swf

http://mozilla.mirrors.tds.net/mozilla-video//jeun e1.swf

http://mozilla.mirrors.tds.net/mozilla-video//bure au1.swf

Re:Cool ads, but I don't think they promote Firefo

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see the hype. They were vaguely amusing at best, certainly not the hilarity people are talking about. I suspect it's just the novelty of seeing a fairly polished video advert for an open-source project that is impressing people. Really, if they were promoting any other product, would people even bother talking about it?

How did they author the videos?

[bogaboga]

I have watched the video...my question is how they authored it. Was it a Java "thing" similar to what was at http://mirror.fluendo.com/cortado/? Was it a Windows Media embeded file, or RealPlayer? Quicktime? The browser URL does not say much. I have not tried it on Linux so I do not know.

Overall, I was impressed. Technical slashdotters, please elaborate. Thanx.

Re:How did they author the videos?

[justforaday]

They're Flash files with video as the content. Go check out the trial copy of Sorenson Squeeze for an idea of what options you have for this sort of compression. Aside from it being evil evil Flash, it's really not bad...

You're thinking of

[crush]

FirefoXXX

Totally offtopic....

[XMyth]

Ahh yes...the things porn leads us to learn about computers....

- Mastering file/directory filesystems.
- Encryption
- Clearing recently used documents
- Splitting partitions (What's this K: drive, Jimmy?)
- Writing filename obfusactors (using a password as an encryption seed no-less!)
- Wiping all trails of browsing for a day, cookies, cache, history, etc..
- Keyboard shortcuts like Alt+Tab, Alt+Space, N, Win+D, Alt+F4.
- Tabbed browsing, sweet sweet tabbed browsing.
- Popup blockers, minimizing your pr0n is useless when HOT YOUNG TEEN VIRGINS banners popup afterwards!
- Back when those XXX password sites actually WORKED! (AdultChecks/AdultBouncers were easy to come by!)
- Going on IRC to find those FTP servers and/or DCC bots with 5 to 1 ratios ! 4300 cps baby!

This is just off the top of my head too...seriously.

Re:Totally offtopic....

[IceAgeComing]

Keyboard shortcuts like Alt+Tab, Alt+Space, N, Win+D, Alt+F4.

Funny how they're all for the left hand.

Coincidence? More discrimination against left-handers? Or...something else?

Re:Totally offtopic....

[Laxitive]

I'll add one to that: writing your first serious application.

I annotated my entire collection which I traded on IRC. Since many fserves wanted certain things, and not others (no low-qual pics, no b&w pics, only lesbians, etc.).

I wrote an app in python that parsed a manifest file that described all the files in a particular directory, and then let you trawl it using arbitrary boolean queries over boolean, integer, and string fields.

The exact usage of the app went like this:
reset (reset the set of working files to all files)
men = 0 (remove any pic with men)
women >= 2 (remove any pic with less than 2 women)
hc = true (remove softcore pics)
dump (dump working set to screen and pipe it through more)

That's how you searched for HC lesbian pics :) You could also use 'or' to delimit multiple queries on the same line. No 'and's, though, since you could just simulate that by typing out the queries on successive lines.

Oh man. I was so proud of myself when I got that written. I was 15 years old, just learning python. It was the first time I had programmed something that was of actual use to me.. that helped me in some real, tangible, immediate way. My IRC fserve efficiency went up an order of magnitude after that. Porn is a more powerful motivator than you can ever imagine. Especially for 15 year old boys with a lot of time on their hands. Ah, good times... good times.

-Laxitive

Re:Totally offtopic....

[snorklewacker]

I'm a right-hander but .. hey wait, I am not going to have this discussion...

Re:Cool ads, but I don't think they promote Firefo

[alienw]

Looks like you don't know much about marketing. You don't want to give the viewer much clue as to what something does. If you say up front "It's a web browser", people will think "oh ok i already have one, goodbye". If you make them think "what the hell is firefox?", they will click on the link and read the sales pitch on firefox.org (and quite likely download and try it). Much more effective.

They're awful

[PickyH3D]

Maybe I do not get the humor of a person screaming, or a persons head falling off (I guess I grew out of that when I passed my teenage years??).

Stupid modern marketing and going for shock value instead of features. The notebook and office ones do not even show Firefox, aside from the link at the end. Oh ya, some rediculously stupid ad for it is going to intrigue me into downloading something.

Feel/Taste/See the difference? TASTE? These are some of the worst "ads" I have ever seen.

Re:They're awful

[The-Bus]

I would have to agree. They are atrocious. Whoever is helping promote Firefox/Mozilla doesn't know what they are talking about. First, a full-page ad in the New York Times won't be read by that many people. That money could've been used to get some stories or PR to be run in AP and a thousand small local papers in the "technology" section. The NYT ad was a waste of money.

These ads, on the other hand, are even worse. They don't explain what Firefox is, they don't talk about it's advantages, and are therefore completely irrelevant. (Compare this to the AOL with Spamblocker buffet line ad, which is a lot better, even if the product isn't). Worse, they're not even funny. And then to top it all off, you try "viral marketing" them on a bunch of blogs --- these are people that already know about Firefox.

I can guarantee that infomercials running in the morning advertising Firefox for $4.95 would be loads more succesful than this crap.

Mirror

[Anonymous Coward]

Ive setup a mirror here, with the actual .swf files.
http://www.kore-net.com/funnyfox/

Not funny.

[itomato]

"Extremely funny". Who checks this crap?

Extremely lame. It's like they thought, "Hey, let's get CRAZY!!" then they forgot where they were going with it.

Let's get CRAZY!! WHOO! now we're all CRAZY!! Now what? Oh I know! Let's end here!

Hey! Know what'll *really* slay 'em? She takes a BITE out of her CELL PHONE, and DOESN'T EVEN REALIZE!! How CRAZY is that?! Whoo!

torrent link

[TheSHAD0W]

You mean like this one?

N is left handed?

[lullabud]

Only a pr0n surfer would say that the letter N is a left-handed keystroke.

or...

[rbochan]

Pornzilla ;o)

Re:Cool ads, but I don't think they promote Firefo

[milimetric]

You know, I totally agree. The promised "funny"-ness of the videos also left to be desired. For example, I watched the videos while at work and I didn't laugh once. However, listening to a sound bite from Cadyshack (specifically when the groundskeeper tells Bill Murray to kill all the golfers) made me blow chunks of candy shell and chocolate along with water on my laptop screen in the middle of a serious database discussion.

Now, more to your point sir, I think these would be more informative:

Show a split screen: Internet Explorer on the Right and Firefox on the left. pan back to show the users: A grandma on the left and a geeky bill gates look-alike on the right. Put a big word on the screen (like volcano) and a countdown 3... 2... 1... GO! Then the grandma and the geek start browsing the web for volcanos using their respective browsers. Show how easily Control Click and tab navigation coupled with the smooth popup blocker and the search engine at the top right lead to results. Also show how the internet explorer user is stuck in a sea of popups and gets malware installed on his computer so it runs slower and has to go to the task bar to navigate through all the pages he's opened and keeps having to install search bar helpers or go to different websites to search for everything. Grandma wins, and a firefox pounces in between them and puts her hand up boxing style. Now that's entertainment.

Classic problem with bad advertising

[RomulusNR]

These guys clearly either haven't really done much work in advertising... or else they have, and failed miserably.

What must be the number one problem with a lot of advertisements over the past couple of years, especially for new products, is that the advertisers spend too much time being weird, funky, shocking, and funny, and COMPLETELY FORGET ABOUT THE FRICKIN' PRODUCT.

At any given moment I can rattle off a commercial I've seen whose content really stuck with me, but I couldn't for the life of me tell you what the hell they were advertising.

Like that Dodge Ram commercial where the middle aged guy is making the two salespeople turn the truck back and forth.

Wait a minute, that's not a Dodge Ram commercial at all, it's a Vehix commercial. Well, at least we were close with this one, it's car related somehow.

Or what about those commercials about the company with the tech support department that is so good it can tell you if something is funny? Wait, that's for TBS. Who doesn't actually provide that service at all.

And these ones are for that website thats so crazy and shocking that it makes your head explode. Right?

These ads don't say anything - I mean, nothing at all - about what's good about Firefox. All they say is that it'll make you scream, or decapitate you. A little balance with some message of benefit might help.