Kodak plans to rock the digital world

January 1, 2007 8:56 PM

and there's nothing you can do about it, Bucko! (I think its a parody). As someone who came from Rochester, I bet this gets heavy circulation there, the company being the center of attention through all the fat and lean years ....... (actually the company DOES alredy have kick ass digital products, but this is funny)
posted by celerystick (35 comments total)

pretty damn funny, thanks!
posted by jonson at 9:03 PM on January 1, 2007

Wow. That was great.
posted by roll truck roll at 9:12 PM on January 1, 2007

not bad atall, especially if it's on the level.
posted by nj_subgenius at 9:16 PM on January 1, 2007

that was actually funny - cool.
posted by vronsky at 9:17 PM on January 1, 2007

Navaho codebreaker?
posted by sourwookie at 9:21 PM on January 1, 2007

I really liked "turn down your minidisks and put down your Newtons."
posted by sourwookie at 9:22 PM on January 1, 2007

That was awesome. That guy's an actor, or a comic or something, not a Kodak employee, right? Right? Or he must really tear up the company talent shows.
posted by grobstein at 9:25 PM on January 1, 2007

...and for that matter, what's the real story behind this? I don't really buy the explanation on Youtube. It seems to me more like an attempt to do edgy viral marketing, kind of like shaveeverywhere.
posted by roll truck roll at 9:28 PM on January 1, 2007

booyah!
posted by mazola at 9:30 PM on January 1, 2007

Wow. That must be the best ad I've seen all year....wait...nevermind.
posted by christopher.taylor at 9:31 PM on January 1, 2007

The Peter Finch fan in me wanted to hate it. But I didn't.
posted by dobbs at 9:50 PM on January 1, 2007

Looks like the kind of thing that gets shown at company all-hands meetings.
posted by smackfu at 10:07 PM on January 1, 2007

I tend to agree, roll truck roll... seems like "edgy" (pandering?) viral marketing, complete with obligatory Spinal Tap reference & scripted anti-corporate wackiness. I mean, it's funny enough but in essence it's still just a marketing advertisement. Isn't it? Am I missing something?

Maybe I worked in advertising too long. I'm so jaded.
posted by miss lynnster at 10:15 PM on January 1, 2007

It is marketing and advertisement, Kodak's not trying to hide that at all. Whether it is an internal turned external ad or an attempt at viral advertising (see the Rolling Rock beer ape) doesn't matter since it's honest about what it is and what the company wants to use it for.

It's just a really well done ad. It made me excited about Kodak's future, it made me forgive them for Advantix, and it made me love the ad, none of which I should have done.
posted by Science! at 10:20 PM on January 1, 2007

Shatner, evidently, had prior commitments.
posted by bicyclefish at 10:21 PM on January 1, 2007

We're talking metaknowledge!
posted by Holy foxy moxie batman! at 10:37 PM on January 1, 2007

Pepsi Blue Rinse
posted by hal9k at 10:40 PM on January 1, 2007

I think maybe it just flashed me back to one too many corporate annual meetings, complete with creative "We're cutting edge, not a big corporation! You are one of the luckiest people on Earth to work here! We're changing the world, so be excited & ignore how little we pay you!" movies. That said, as previously noted, I may have simply developed into a hardened, jaded woman. :)

Ahhh but seriously... if only I could post the movies I sat through during my 12 HOURS of orientation at Disney University. I'd SO love to read the comments. (And no, I'm not kidding. I'm still trying to get the mouse-ear shaped computer chip implant out of my head.)
posted by miss lynnster at 10:40 PM on January 1, 2007

We're not playing grab-ass anymore.
posted by chillmost at 11:07 PM on January 1, 2007

Metafilter: We're not playing grab-ass anymore.
posted by roll truck roll at 11:25 PM on January 1, 2007

miss lynster - you worked in marketing and got paid little? I think you were doing it wrong... being paid a fucking fortune is the primary benefit of being a hideous marketing drone.
posted by jonson at 12:04 AM on January 2, 2007

In theory, yes, jonson. But not when you're a work-for-hire art director in Los Angeles. And especially not if you are a Disney castmember. (In other words, you're completely right... I was doing it wrong.)
posted by miss lynnster at 12:09 AM on January 2, 2007

Hey, fuck you for making me watch half of this ad. If you actually thought it was a parody of pro-product sentiment, you are like some kind of saucer-eyed rube who has not looked at internets or televisions before.
posted by damehex at 12:19 AM on January 2, 2007

They're enhancing the color of the grass and the blue of the sky. Kodak knows the world that you want and they're going to give you pictures of it. Sure! Kodak moments are what we're after, Big Brother, not any kind of reality. (Anyone remember Paul Simon's "Kodachrome"?) But, really, this sounds like IBM still claiming to be the greatest of computer companies circa 1990. Now, where's the Polaroid commercial?
posted by CCBC at 1:35 AM on January 2, 2007

Parody or not, the idea of integrating GPS into a camera is a very good one. I'll such products are already out there, but I don't own one.
posted by Tube at 1:40 AM on January 2, 2007

Somebody there is paying attention to Kodak's recent less-than-finest moments. Reaching back to the instant photography debacle or disk film would have been cruel.

I liked the Apple namedrop. I even remember playing with the Quicktake.
posted by ardgedee at 1:41 AM on January 2, 2007

Watching this has made me realise just how clueless to advertising I have become... I genuinely thought it had to be a parody. To what end, I have no idea, but it just carried across that way. Kudos to them, they've gone way beyond my radar.

On the other hand, the possibilities of viral marketing are beginning to terrify me.
posted by Acey at 4:32 AM on January 2, 2007

Kodak moments are what we're after, Big Brother, not any kind of reality. (Anyone remember Paul Simon's "Kodachrome"?)

Until just this moment, I had thought that song really was about how great kodachrome film is.
posted by StickyCarpet at 5:28 AM on January 2, 2007

jonson: you worked in marketing and got paid little? I think you were doing it wrong...

As far as I've ever been able to see, nobody in marketing except principals/partners and hotshit freelancers makes jack shit (with occasional exceptions notable mostly for their exceptionalness).

Wait, you're probably talking about marketing in-house. Probably those guys make some bread. That's why they get laid off so the company can outsource their job to small local firms and freelancers. (And yes, this is what Kodak does.) As far as I could see in my time in Kodak and from knowing a lot of advertising/marketing people who do business with them, FWIW, "marketing" sits on the payscale somewhere below straight sales and above finance.

(Hmm... I should pass this around the office... somebody here probably knows who did this...)
posted by lodurr at 5:45 AM on January 2, 2007

(oh, and, cue obligatory Bill Hicks jerk-off reference. Wouldn't be mefi without it.)
posted by lodurr at 5:47 AM on January 2, 2007

CCBC: But, really, this sounds like IBM still claiming to be the greatest of computer companies circa 1990.

The really ironic thing is that they actually were. And are. At least, if by "greatest", you mean "most important."

Kodak, by contrast, stopped being that important relative to their industry sometime in the early 90s. And will never that important again, regardless of how they leverage their patent portfolio. ("Hey, let's patent that -- TOO LATE!")
posted by lodurr at 6:14 AM on January 2, 2007

Sharing, GPS, color-enhancement, etc.

So Kodak's going to develop a hi-res Blackberry??
posted by surplus at 6:53 AM on January 2, 2007

Apropos of nothing, CCBC, I was belting out that song driving home from work last week...thanks for the reminder.
posted by pax digita at 7:32 AM on January 2, 2007

You know, if Kodak had just been smart enough to buy into Flickr about the time they relabeled Ofoto, they wouldn't have to be doing the cutesy viral stuff.

I wonder how much Target and Qoop are making off of Flickr.
posted by dw at 8:34 AM on January 2, 2007

One of my compatriots came through with the background. It was produced by one of our local competitors. (Though they probably wouldn't admit to considering us competition.) (Then again, they don't have the cohones to produce a home page that doesn't rely on flash and popup windows in 2006.)
posted by lodurr at 4:54 AM on January 5, 2007