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Feb 14 2010

How Low Can Crazy Eddie Go? Flat Panel TVs: Race to the Bottom

Category: about me,ho-dad parenting,lifestreaming,tech opinion — jmacofearth @ 2:03 pm

Dell used to say they took the margin out of TVs. That's why they got in the TV business in the first place. To hammer the price out of the product and see if there was margin at the bottom. Dell is no longer in the TV business. Not to say they won't sell you any TV you might want, they just stopped paying the Koreans to put the DELL logo on the clone's black bezel.

So what's happening in TV's today? What's it gonna take for me be breakdown and finally pay for a new TV? Here's a little scanner art from today's tv ads.

montage: televisions everywhere, how low can tv prices go?

and, no, I don't really want one

Let's see: the SuperBowl has come and gone, and I'd have to say I was pretty amazed by my neighbors flat panel high-def Sony Bravia. I hadn't watched a full game in real HD. Wow, I could see the drops of sweat hitting the turf, I kid you not. And maybe that was why I loved the Who's performance more than many "meh sayers" out there. It was an amazing television moment. I skipped the Ritas all together, I was so stoked.

Okay, so that's done. And now it's Winter Olympics time, maybe the luge would be that much better on pixel-sharpened plazma goodness. And maybe I just don't care that much about TV. I think I've flogged that one to death about now. But still…

What I don't want is Spongebob's annoying screams coming out of a massive television of any kind. I don't really need to see "Dude, What Would Happen" in HD-TV. And as for the luge, well downhill skiing would be cool, but I doubt if I'm going to make the schedule to see it.

So one form of TV is moving close to the $10 per diagonal inch.

Then there's Plasma. And finally there are projectors.

At the moment I don't want any of them. The cheapo LCD tv that replaced my traditional tube Hitachi is just fine for cartoons and random shows.

For the big events, I can think of about 5 of them in a year, I'd rather be watching with friends anyway. So I'll put out the call to join them in front of their plasma. I'll bring drinks and queso. That's social television, it's better than HD television or flat panel television any day of the week.

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/big-tv

Afterthought: now playing RockBand on a big screen would be awesome.

Tags: 1080p, big tv, cheapo tv, dell tv, drinks and queso, Dude, flat panel tv, hd television, hd-tv, in real HD, lcd projector, lcd tv, meh sayer, pixel-sharpened plazma goodness, plasma tv, race to the bottom, refresh rate, sony bravia, superbowl 2010, take the margin out of tv, television, the trouble with tv, traditional tube tv, tv business, What Would Happen, winter olympics, winter olympics 2010

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Feb 08 2010

Super|%ADVERTISING%|Bowl -The Football Was Good, the Ads… What do you remember?

Category: social media — jmacofearth @ 10:50 pm

I remembered three commercials when asked this afternoon what I liked. (I liked my boy from Westlake High, Drew Brees, winning the big dance!) Ad Age has all of them and I have take screen shots of the standouts: the good, the mediocre and the terrible.

I missed any buzz about the "consumer generated" ads. But you can see they ain't consumer-generated. They are ad firm-generated. No way Doritos was going to air crappy ads for the kind of money they were paying. And the news of Pepsi not advertising this year… so what!

The whale in the back of the car. (I couldn't have told you who it was for.) When the driver shouts, "It's in my mouth!" All bets are off as to where this one is going.

The Doritos samurai.

The baby day traders – girlfriend.

Honorable mentions:

Baby day traders – first class.

Audi's "Green Police" spoof:

Doritos, "Put it back!"

Hilarious concept. For what again? Nuts and popcorn? Odd enough!

Grand Finalé! (When chatting with another marketing maven we both gave Google's love ad best in show!)

Could'a, Would'a, Should'a (These were the opposite of forgettable. Sort of like, wha? You spent that much money on that?)

I love Chevy Chase, and the Vacation reprise, but if Austin's HomeAway took it's best shot with, "half the price of a hotel," I was disappointed in the ad and the value proposition.

Focus on the Family – toned down the rhetoric and nobody cared either way. (A huge chunck of cash wasted. They could've done a lot more good sending the million+ to Haitian families.)

The woman with a bad attitude makes her bathtub siren song for Motorola, for a phone that looks like a brick, nice! Moto has fallen from grace and a leadership position in mobile.

Funny, but what the heck is it about. Humor is a hard ad sell. If you can't recall what the ad was for so you can buy the product when you are in the store… well, the ad failed. This one is funny for what exactly?