Filed under: Marketing and advertising

One of the most brand recognizable names in the world of video games has to be Grand Theft Auto. With its most recent release, Grand Theft Auto 4, the video game maker Take-Two Interactive (NASDAQ: TTWO) is already dealing with controversy after the city of Chicago “jacked” ads that the company purchased to advertise its newest game release.

Since the first installment of Grand Theft Auto, the game has been one of most discussed video games on the market, largely due to its high level of violence. Video game junkies love it, while parents cringe at the thought of their kids playing the game. The game definitely deals with some seriously taboo subjects; car-jacking, prostitution, cop shootings, drive by shootings, and drunk driving to name a few. But is this really enough to justify the city of Chicago pulling paid ads for the game?

Leading up the current release of Grand Theft Auto 4, Take-Two paid Chicago a reported $300,000 to place ads for the video game on the sides of buses and transit displays for a six week period starting on April 22. After the local Chicago news questioned the city’s decision to run the ads, they were swiftly pulled. The report questioned the taste of the ads, given the violence that has escalated recently in the city.

OK, I’ll state this: the video game could be violent and questionable enough to justify the city not running the ads to start with, but after entering into a deal with the company to run the ads, I think it is questionable whether or not they should be granted to pull the ads. Should we believe that the city was unaware of the video game’s content before accepting the contract? If so, then shame on them. If they did understand the video games genre (which I have to assume they did), then shame on them for letting the media pressure them into pulling the ads.

I’m not going to defend the content that children see when playing Grand Theft Auto 4. Personally, I love playing the video game series, but would definitely think twice about letting a 12 or 13 year old child play it, but there’s one small thing here that you may have heard of before, called the freedom of speech. I have never personally been in Chicago (at least other than its airport), but if it is like most other big cities, I’ve to wonder if you can drive around the city and see billboard ads for strip clubs?

A swift Google search does indeed verify the city grants strip clubs, so I am 99% sure you can see those clubs advertised on billboards around the city. Are ads for video games really any worse? Where will the city draw the line?

In reaction to the ad jacking, Take-Two has taken Chicago to court, and is suing for its $300,000 to be returned, as well as for the ads to be replaced and run for the entirety of the contract it had with the city.

Despite the controversy, copies of the video have been flying off the shelves since its release last week, and the company expects to see first week sales of around $400 million. Fans stood in lines for hours and in some cases camped out overnight in order to get their first day copy of the new video game.

According to one fan, “This game has everything — sex, drugs, vehicles, money . . . anything you want.” For fans that’s great news; for worried parents, well, that’s another story.

So if you’ve played the new game, let us know what your thoughts are on the newest release in the blockbuster game series. And, what are your thoughts on the actions Chicago took in pulling the video game ads? Should they be forced to put them back up, or does the game’s content justify the ads being pulled from the transit system?

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Filed under: Industry, Consumer experience, Competitive strategy, Marketing and advertising, Private equity

So what do you do if your company produces mostly heavy, inefficient automobiles as gas soars past $4 a gallon? Some might state you should produce more efficient cars. But not Chrysler, which has instead opted to make gas cheaper, guaranteed!

Today, Chrysler CEO Bob Nardelli announced that anyone crazy enough to purchase a heavy, high-horsepower, low-mileage Chrysler product before May 31 will be able to buy gas for no more than $2.99 a gallon for three years. Just take your shiny new Aspen or PT Cruiser to the gas station and use your special gas card; Chrysler will pick up the cost over $2.99 a gallon.

Some critics are calling this plan a cheap gimmick. But there is no denying that Chrysler is at a disadvantage relative to General Motors (NYSE: GM) and Ford (NYSE: F) when it comes to offering new vehicles that get decent mileage. And it is light years behind the auto design leaders, Toyota (NYSE: TM) and Honda (NYSE: HMC). So it needs some kind of gimmick to help its dealers clear out the cobwebs that are swiftly forming on their lots.

In recent years, Chrysler has relied heavily on trucks and SUVs for sales, and its hot new automobiles like the Challenger are gas guzzlers. (Hey, your Hemi sure is fast! Sorry about the 11mpg!) Its lineup is in desperate need of an overhaul and products that offer decent mileage. But developing new vehicles is difficult and very pricey, and it’s not clear that Chrysler’s owner, Cerberus Capital Management, has the money to do it. The substitute — advertising and sales gimmicks, long favorites in Detroit — is cheap by comparison.

This promotion might work, at least for a few weeks. But it points to much bigger problem: Chrysler doesn’t have the goods to compete right now, and it’s not clear when it will, if ever.

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Filed under: General Electric (GE), Marketing and advertising

General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE)’s NBC Universal unit will charge $3 million per 30-second advertising spot in the 2009 Super Bowl, according to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required). Is it me, or does that strike anyone as particularly insane? The deal is this: I would be that many disinterested fans watch the Super Bowl just for the ads alone. The reason? These are the best of the best, attention-grabbing and inventive commercials.

So, why don’t ad agencies and PR flacks do this the rest of the year? The only Super Bowl ad that stuck in my mind this year was Tide’s ‘talking stain” ad, which probably cost a few dollars to produce and was enormously effective. The cost of the campaign was the cost of the ad, of course. All those other advertisers that spend millions on Super Bowl ads this year? Can’t remember one of them.

The price for a 2008 Super Bowl 30-second ad spot was $2.7 million, so NBC is upping the game here a bit. Is that ad inventory worth it? With media changing all the time, television is still a lucrative game, and smart advertisers are combining the internet and TV into complementary market platforms. Like the Tide commercial referenced above, the entire ad was designed to drive traffic to MyTalkingStain.com, not to your local supermarket to purchase the product. That’s smart marketing. If you spent $3 million for an ad, would you want the impact of the web to somehow be involved? I thought so — but not all ads do, apparently.

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Filed under: Products and services, Consumer experience, Internet, Marketing and advertising

Industrial progressive rock band Nine Inch Nails have made another album available to fans and listeners for free this morning. The Slip, the band’s first new album in two months, and third in the past year, was posted on a new website for fans to download free of charge. The move comes directly from front man Trent Reznor as a thank you to fans for their “continued and loyal support over the years.”

Billboard called the release “a surprise move” but given Reznor’s stance in the last year about the music industry and dislike of overpricing it isn’t all that surprising. It’s also not the first time he has released an album this way. In March, Ghosts I-IV was released almost identically as The Slip. The new album will also only initially be available from the band’s website, but will see a future “traditional” physical release on CD and vinyl. Ghosts I-IV was released on CD and other physical formats about a month after it was first released in early March.

I have to say once again (like so many of the other recent Internet only album releases) that this is another great thing for the music industry. Even though Reznor and NIN are essentially independent artists now without the backing of a major labor group, it does show that music does not have to be about making as much money as possible. At the end of the day though, neither Reznor nor NIN are probably going to suffer financially from the move, but that might just show us how much the music industry does not have to lose.

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