Sony Shuts Down Fake Blog For Good

December 18, 2006 | By Tony Hung | Filed Under New Media, News

You can file this under “Can Sony do anything right these days?” (A video download service? NOW?). As you may or may not have heard, last week Sony and their marketing firm Zapatoni were outed in creating a fake blog to promote their portable gaming device, the PSP at the slickly named site “AllIWantForXmasIsaPsp.com”. With its overly hipster talk and the fact the domain is registered by a Marketing firm, it didn’t take long for the gaming community to find that Sony was behind the blogging deception.

And today, the blog has been taken down. (Although if you’re looking for screen caps and a choice list of comments, please head over to UK Resistance who has done a nice job in cataloguing this marketing nightmare).

What truly bloggles the mind is how little Sony knows about its fans and the uber geeks which rule over this vast kingdom, for that matter.

Hmmm … are they tech savvy? Yes.

Viciously anti-establishment? Mostly.

Media literate? Undoubtedly.

How could you not think that this group of individuals, even as a “demographic”, would not find out about these kind of shennanigans? You’re not trying to fool joe blow internet surfer who might shop at Wal-Mart (Richard Edelman, I apologize, but my own memory of Edelman’s own tomfoolery will never die), but a savvy audience who literally drools at the thought of deconstructing this marketing garbage.

The jury’s still out on whether the PS3 is a lameduck product, but if one humble blogger can make a suggestion? If you’re still spending your millions on trying to turn it around, don’t go with the same firm that executed and perhaps suggested this social media masterplan. And furthermore, don’t try and deliberately decieve an audience who, in spite of your legion of fanboys, still abhores corporate hypocrisy, and would relish in the thought of pulling down the market leader in gaming.

Aside: For an industry insider’s opinion on Zipatoni’s actions go here.  Apparently they’re not returning emails from their friends anymore asking questions on this flogging debacle.


About the author: Tony Hung is the editor of the BlogHerald. He is also a physician finishing his last year of residency in General Internal Medicine, and blogs at Deep Jive Interests , where he rants, occasionally, on new media topics.

© Copyright 2006 The Blog Herald | Submit post to Blogosphere News | More articles by Tony Hung


Comments

11 Responses to “Sony Shuts Down Fake Blog For Good”

  1. Starked SF, Unforgiving News from the Bay » Blog Archive » Talk of the Town: Monday, December 18 on December 18th, 2006 11:06 am

    [...] Sony’s fake blog shut down.  Now if they’d just deep six Yodel Anecdotal. . . . [...]

  2. Sony Fake Blog … hm .. - Reaper-X .:[ ID ]:. on December 18th, 2006 11:33 am

    [...] To read the full story, head over to this post [...]

  3. Markku Seguerra on December 19th, 2006 5:19 am

    It’s sad that Sony can’t seem to do things right these days. Add to that the fact that the PS3 isn’t living up to its hype. If they weren’t as big as they are now, they could’ve folded with all the blunders committed.

    Hopefully though, they recover soon enough to fight with the new market leaders and drive innovations for the consumers’ benefit.

  4. Tony on December 19th, 2006 7:16 am

    Ah, Markku … that’s if they survive this current round of hardware and marketing follies. I understand that Sony has well and truly bet The Farm on the PS3, since it has spent so much cash on the PS3, is losing so much cash per unit, and seems to be tanking in nearly ALL of its other domains: TV’s, home theatre systems, MP3 players etc.

    Also seems like Time happens to agree that the PS3 is teh huge bust. ;)
    http://www.joystiq.com/2006/12/18/time-magazine-deems-ps3-a-bust/

    Cheers … and great to have you aboard, mate ;)
    t

  5. Markku Seguerra on December 21st, 2006 7:19 am

    Tony, too bad for Sony, but right now I just really want Gran Turismo! Unfortunately, I think the only way to get future versions of the game would be to stick with the PS3. Sucks.

    Thanks man, here’s to a fruitful TBH in the future. =)

  6. Tony on December 21st, 2006 3:07 pm

    I sympathize to a point. I’m not a driving fan, so getting GT has never been a priority for me.

    On another note, great to have you aboard, man. ;)

    t

  7. Bill Hunt on December 24th, 2006 8:09 am

    It seems fake weblogs are all the rage this holiday season. Even BMW are at it - http://www.bmwe36blog.com/ puports to be written by ‘Tony Sticks’ who “recently purchased” … “this cool addition to the BMW range”. Oh please.

    Interestingly, the domain is registered not to Tony Sticks, but to software developer ‘Bassam Jarad’ who likes posting spam to messageboards: http://www.epanorama.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=38346&sid=4726529911d08a811dcda89b8ecf6b14.

    Come on BMW, you can do better than that!

  8. PS3 Component Cable Weakness « TechMaven on January 1st, 2007 2:26 pm

    [...] Sony is doing a great job of making sure their customers feel taken advantage of and held hostage at every turn. With the fake blogging incident recently and their current standing in the console war, some customer love would go a long way to re-establishing them as a brand that people can like. [...]

  9. Tony Sticks on January 18th, 2007 5:23 am

    Bill Hunt,

    I’m amazed by your accusations. My name is Tony Sticks and I’m maintaining what I call BMW E36 Blog. So, does this mean that I’m working for BMW and that I’m doing the same trick Sony did but for BMW!!! As a matter of fact, I would love to get paid from BMW for what I’m doing but sorry to disappoint you. I’m not.

    How did you get to that? Come on … BTW, I received this question on my website here http://www.bmwe36blog.com/2007/01/13/my-bmw-e36-318is-nice-photos/

    Please read that and stop accusing me.

    Best regards,
    Tony Sticks

  10. TameBay : EU bans leaving positive feedback for yourself on February 12th, 2007 2:59 pm

    [...] While I’m all about consumer protection, I can’t help thinking that this one is going to be almost impossible to police. eBay have all sorts of criteria by which they can connect two accounts together; despite some high profile examples which have been rumbled, Trading Standards are hardly going to find it so easy. [...]

  11. Sony Walkman Project on October 25th, 2007 5:36 pm

    [...] sequence in one take. The end result justifies the means though!” Fascinating given Sony’s past history with fake blogs. Hopefully, this means that Sony have learnt a lesson and there’ll be [...]

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