These Aren’t The DROIDs You’re Looking For
Manolo Almagro, Q Division Managing Partner
Seems like everyone (and their mother) is experimenting with some sort of interaction on Times Square LED Spectaculars. The usual suspects – The Reuters and the NASDAQ signs are set to be the center of attention next month when Verizon takes over these two screens to promote the launch of the new DROID phone. The event runs November 6th-20th, and then again on Nov 27th and 28th.
Motorola's DROID Phone
The event is called “DROID does Times Square” – this time around the gimmick is a voice controlled interaction, to simulate google’s nifty little voice search feature (only available only on Android phones)
People will be able to call the signs via toll free number and initiate a search for anything, movies, stores, places to eat – basically what ever they want – the search results will then be presented on the signs as push-pins on Google Maps. After you’ve had your fun, a text message is sent back to the caller with the closest Verizon store – selling the DROID phone. They’ve also set up an remote way to interact with the sign, just dial the toll-free number and watch the fun via a webcam viewable from this site (which, by the way – at the time of this post is showing a nice 404 error message).
I’m holding out judgement until after the event, so many questions like, what happens when everyone starts calling in at the same time? Who gets control of the signs? How long do you have control? I wonder what happens when people ask the sign to show where all the T-mobile stores are…(thanks Verizon) even better, what would happen if some mischievous person uttered the words peep show. Let’s hope the event designers are running a pretty good moderation filter on this one.
Special thanks to Warren at S+T for sending me this press release.
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