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Microsoft Quickly Revises "Sexting" Ad For Kin Phone
theodp writes "Microsoft's Kin mobile phone project came under fire as Consumer Reports and others pointed out that a promotional video looked like an inappropriate endorsement of 'sexting,' prompting a quick edit and an apologetic tweet. 'The video,' observed Consumer Reports, 'includes a downright creepy sequence [beginning around 0:33] in which a young man is shown putting a Kin under his shirt and apparently snapping a picture of one of his naked breasts. The breast is then shown on the phone's screen, just before the guy apparently sends it to someone. Next we see the face of a young woman, seemingly the recipient, with an amused expression...'"
Okay, I could see a problem if it were a female breast ... but who the fuck thinks that sending a picture of a male breast is "sexting"?
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Oh good lord, how uptight does our society need to be?
It's a contradiction too, because sexualized youth seems to be perfectly acceptable as long as it's from a Mickey Mouse Club alumni that promises abstinence.
People have bodies.. get over it.
Sexting is a "phenomena" of prudes having to face the fact that not everyone experiences the same reservations as them about nudity. No-one is forcing them to participate.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Seriously? Is people who think like this a large enough fraction of their market base that they actually feel like they have to appease them?
Emotions! In your brain!
Never mind the MOOBS this commercial is worse than the one with Bill wiggling his ass. You can tell some 70's Microsoft Hippie Chick manager wrote and produced it, total fail.
Got Code?
I mean it wouldnt be something I do, but both persons involved seem to be grown-ups, in a perfectly concious state, and it seems to be funny to both (for whatever reason). To me the complete scene is as cryptic as the idea why i would buy a phone from Microsoft; maybe this is just to show that the phone does not have real features going beyond an arbitrary cameraphone from 5years ago (but *with touch*). Overall the video seems to aim at people around 25 i would say.
So i dont understand if that is "sexting", i dont understand what the word exactly means (it seems diffuse), i dont see why i would complain about adults (male or female) sending pictures of breasts to other adults (as long as both sides are fine with it). But i think nodoby should complain by depicting seemingly funny things in an advertisement, even if the people in it act highly irrational.
I am actually more annoyed by advertisments still exhibiting old gender role models.
Just because society B is far more ridiculous than society A, does not mean society A is not itself ridiculous.
Toward the end of the video (ad) there is a black man and white woman kissing.
Back when I was young that would have been the controversy, not a white dudes nipple.
So from that point of view I think we are making progress.
Creepy? Really? What exactly is 'creepy' about it?
Unless you mean 'likely to make a large section of the population feel uneasy because they've been cowed into a pathetic state of guilt and self-censorship in the face of a narrow-minded and hypocritical moral hysteria of a small minority'. Yeh you're right, that is creepy.
Sure, but those prudes aren't hypocrites who act like the only bastion of freedom in the world.
I am sure that it is part of the advertising plan to be "forced" to withdraw sensational ads as a way of gaining extra publicity. I have never seen this ad, and only once heard about the Kin phone, but now I have been exposed (oh dear) to the campaign as a news item.
That's exactly what I thought. As far as I can tell it was ONE blogger who only said that there was something a bit creepy about the ad. Nobody would have noticed or cared until MS publicly withdrew the ad and apologized, at which point every single news outlet picked up the story in a way that's mostly sympathetic to MS and its new phone. Whether it was accidental or deliberate it worked out pretty well for Microsoft.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
prompting a quick edit and an apologetic tweet.
How quick was it? Was it so quick, that you'd think they had the edit prepared in advance, just waiting for the "outrage"?
Come on guys, those are old, old tricks.
So, anyway, Microsoft have a new mobile device again with a hip ad again, awkward name again, that's trying to compete with a similar device from Apple again. Best of luck to them.
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein
I.. hope you're joking.
If not, I have news for you. Every phone that has ever advertised that it is easy to take pictures is a phone that has advertised the exact same thing. Unless, of course, the process of sending those pictures has been some arcane ritual that can only take place on the third minute of the seventh hour the day after your first born takes its first breath. Which is probably not the case.
What you take pictures of and how easy it is to take them are separate issues. If it is easy to take a picture of your dog, it is also easy to take a picture of a naked person. But I don't see any outrage over the iPhone's photo taking process, which is also pretty simple. Ditto the lack of outrage over Android, Motorola, LG, Samsung ...
If it is the content of the advert in question, where is the outrage for the endless commercials (read: porn) depicting bare chested men pushing beer, beach vacation spots, travel reservations, antiperspirants, body wash, exercise or diet programs, or whatever else. The damage such lewd imagery does to the children!
I don't expect morality, equality, consistency, or justice from the law. I expect only legality.
Really, what Consumer Reports _should_ have been attacking is the misleading suggestion that the Kin's camera has advanced low-light capabilities that allow it to take a clear picture of a breast while shrouded by a shirt in a dark club.
Otherwise, as a firm believer in the literal honesty of all marketing, I might be horribly disappointed when my new Kin (purchased for that express purpose, based on watching the commercial) failed to snap crystal clear naked photos of my neighbor when I held it up to her darkened bedroom window in the middle of the night.
This is clearly grounds for a class action suit on behalf of peeping toms everywhere.
Why the moral panic? So what if people see some breasts? Male or female. I don't get why this is even an issue.
Move sig!
While the ad only showed a mans chest, that is not the point of the controversy.
The point is that the ad was basically advocating sexting.
I am pretty sure no one was mad about the ad containing a males chest.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.