Verizon Banishes iPhone to Island of Misfit Toys
by John Paczkowski
Posted on November 9, 2009 at 8:47 AM PT
If AT&T took offense at Verizon’s “There’s a Map for That” ad campaign, wait until the carrier gets a load of its rival’s newest ad spots. Unfazed by AT&T’s litigious reply to its first effort, Verizon (VZ) rolled out a trio of new anti-AT&T ads over the weekend and they are brutal in their criticism of the carrier’s 3G network coverage.
All of the new commercials are Christmas-themed and all feature Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone, though they are careful to leave it unscathed by Verizon’s criticism of AT&T (T). The standout among the three, this re-creation of the “Island of Misfit Toys” scene from the 1964 Rankin/Bass stop-motion animated Christmas television special, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” Note that the conceit of the ad is that iPhone has been banished to the Island of Misfit Toys not because of its quality but because of of AT&T’s 3G network.
A pretty brilliant escalation of Verizon’s marketing battle with AT&T and one that suggests through its deference to the iPhone that there may be more to these Verizon iPhone rumors than previously thought.
Below, Verizon’s other two ads.
Comments
The best part of this is it came out today that Verizon Droid has only 256 megabytes of space for application installs, which truly makes it a misfit toy when there are individual iPhone apps 3x that size.
Posted by Fred Hamranhansenhansen at November 9th, 2009 at 8:01 pmyeah! the iToy and its 99,9999 iFart apps do belong in the Island of Misfit Toys. Oh yeah, gotta close that iFart app just to listen to another iFart app. What you’ll never hear: 99,999 iFart apps all going at the same time…because the iDon’t..don’t…multitask!!! hahaha!!
Posted by Tim Jones at November 10th, 2009 at 1:20 amHello people….this is Verizon sticking a foot in their mouth!! what ‘genius’ advertising fool didn’t think this one through? Most will perceive this as iphone/AT&T being the better product “winner” overall because we all know that the MISFIT TOYS are the one’s all the kids really wanted when they watched the movie because they are not the same as every other toy!! They are unique, different…the toys had heart, emotion and that’s why we rooted for them and for Santa to pick them up and send them to all the good deserving boys and girls…we really wanted a misfit toy, DUH
Posted by yongdev carmello at November 11th, 2009 at 12:26 am