We’ve all watched Apple figure out how to simultaneously humanize and fetishize consumer electronics – and in the process open up the world’s largest market, women. We’ve also watched Sony struggle to keep up… even though they continue to release some pretty cool hardware.
To get to the point, I can’t quite figure out who this Walkman site is targeting and whether the cold, techno-fashion-porn-robo-lifestyle thing makes sense to anyone? Can you help me?
Troy
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Eww. Gross.
The images, particularly of the player on the belly button, the sound bytes and that *seductive* voice are disturbing. They’re targeting older pervies? Or worse (maybe), young tween girls who aspire to be seductive and sexy? I’m disturbed.
Is there a typo in the headline? I believe it was supposed to read “Who would you like to do?”
Ahem…
I’m with you guys. They missed “cool” and they missed “playful.” They missed.
My best guess is that they are targeting the lucrative market of “bi-curious teen girls.” The presentation rides just south of mildly creepy for the “fitness” and “buzz” sections. The imagery and presentation are a little clearer for the “bean.” For such simple/inexpensive devices, I’m surprised that the presentation raises so many questions. The Apple comparison is interesting if you look at the presentations of their products, as they have appealed to the female market without alienating guys. Sony has set these things up to be so “girly” that I would imagine they have closed some doors to a male market.
The whole thing is confusing from a marketing perspective.
Hey, it’s a Japanese thing – It’s a combo of teen envy and Japanese fascination with teen porn.
hilarious comments.. the detached faux-seductive voice (who you just KNOW looks nothing like the tween in the photo) drops an octave on some of the deeper product explanations, makes it even more weird. I don’t know if that was so they could slow it down to match the ‘rollout’ of feature explanation text, or it was supposed to be like an even MORE intimate ‘aside’ moment between you and the My Pretty Pony spokesgirls.
It’s rare when you see a creative concept so plainly wearing it’s brief on it’s sleeve, (“give our products youthful sex appeal”).
Oddly enough, I’m a big fan of Sony’s E400/E500 mp3 players. However, on a technical note, Sony’s microsite contains a number of bugs. Quite sad since I wouldn’t expect bugs from such a small brochure-style site.