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January 21, 2009 3:10 PM

The 'T-Mobile Dance' at London's Liverpool Street Station (January 15, 2009).

The ad was filmed by agency Saatchi & Saatchi using hidden cameras.

Public Reaction to the T-Mobile Dance.

T-Mobile Dance Rehearsal.

Brings to mind Improv Everywhere's 'Frozen Grand Central.'

posted by ericb (39 comments total)

Could you share with me more information about this "T-Mobile"?
posted by xmutex at 3:12 PM on January 21, 2009 [1 favorite]

BUY MORE CELLPHONES YOU FUCKING PLEBS
posted by boo_radley at 3:15 PM on January 21, 2009 [2 favorites]

T-Mobile: we'll steal and bastardize your culture if it means we can sell you some more cell phones :)

/puke
posted by pwally at 3:20 PM on January 21, 2009

Yuck.
posted by tristeza at 3:21 PM on January 21, 2009

This will almost certainly be condemned as OMG EVIL CORPORATE VIRAL VIDEO, but I think that's narrow minded. This is a fun, entertaining video that would not have happened without the corporate support of T-Mobile. Even more importantly, it acknowledges that it's an advertisement, from the beginning.

Advertising isn't going to go away. If that's a given, then I'd prefer my advertising to be forthright and entertaining. That's exactly what this video is.
posted by christonabike at 3:23 PM on January 21, 2009 [6 favorites]

It's lots of fun, but when the music finally stops you've got brain cancer.
posted by hermitosis at 3:47 PM on January 21, 2009 [1 favorite]

And for hilarious commentary on cell phone ads you can watch this
posted by Sargas at 3:49 PM on January 21, 2009

That was entertaining. It's like Where's Waldo trying to find the people stuck in the middle that are dancing anyway.
posted by WowLookStars at 3:53 PM on January 21, 2009

that would not have happened without the corporate support of T-Mobile

right, except for all those other flash mobs that have no corporate sponsors.
posted by pwally at 3:53 PM on January 21, 2009 [6 favorites]

Nice, but too artificial. I would have liked it better if they had danced like Matt from the Where The Hell is Matt? videos.
posted by stavrogin at 3:56 PM on January 21, 2009

I'm not sure I saw the announcement that it was advertising, christonabike.
posted by boo_radley at 3:58 PM on January 21, 2009

Doesn't make me want to switch to T-Mobile, but it is nice to see a corporation 1.) Not hard-sell in their commercial, and 2.) not take themselves too seriously.

Will it directly sell cellular telephones? Not likely. Will it make people think more charitably about the cell phone carrier in question. Perhaps. And when there's little difference between carriers, that may be what pushes someone to choose a certain brand.
posted by StrangeTikiGod at 4:04 PM on January 21, 2009

They should've had Jan Ullrich pump himself full of drugs and crazy-dance himself up the stairs after a bored-looking Armstrong.
posted by Dumsnill at 4:12 PM on January 21, 2009

> I'm not sure I saw the announcement that it was advertising, christonabike.

In the bottom left of the video, it says "advertisement" at the beginning and at various other instances throughout. The YouTube icon is for T-Mobile and the video info also acknowledges that it's an advertisement.
posted by christonabike at 4:28 PM on January 21, 2009

I mean in real life, in the train station.
posted by boo_radley at 4:33 PM on January 21, 2009

This is a fun, entertaining video that would not have happened without the corporate support of T-Mobile.

Except for the fact that groups like Improv Everywhere and other flashmobs have already done this a bunch of times - which is exactly where t-mobile's ad firm got the idea from.

Granted they couldn't afford to hire a hundred or two professionally choreographed dancers, but that's part of the real charm of a real flashmob - a genuine spontaneity, unrehearsed and organic.
posted by loquacious at 4:38 PM on January 21, 2009

This is a fun, entertaining video that would not have happened without the corporate support of T-Mobile.

Unless you take into account flash mobs that are creative and, like, good.
posted by cmoj at 4:41 PM on January 21, 2009

Oh hey they were mentioned.
posted by cmoj at 4:41 PM on January 21, 2009

Fuck off T-mobile and all other viral advertising for recuperating the flashmob idea for your crummy products.
posted by pianomover at 4:44 PM on January 21, 2009 [1 favorite]

i think saatchi and saatchi could have put this together without t-mobile's greedy little paws. they are kind of a powerhouse, you know.

isn't there a long history of commercials going off the deep end and making you wonder what the product has to do with it? doesn't make them special. and this kind of cultural cannibalism is too grotesque for my squirrelly ass, too.

they want the cache from the in-crowd who get it (or fucking made it) and the cash from the out-crowd who just think, "whoah! t-mobile's so cool..."

i used to be in advertising; now i do experimental theater. i don't feel slimy any more. hell, it's been two days since i bathed. who wants a hug?

p.s. putney swope. advertising in the age of obama before obama!
posted by artof.mulata at 4:48 PM on January 21, 2009

Wait, someone will wear my t-shirt?
posted by Bokononist at 5:01 PM on January 21, 2009 [1 favorite]

It was fairly well done, but it was clearly a co-opt, especially since Liverpool Station has been rickmobbed.

It is sort of oddly inverted from the actual point of a flashmob, which is a happening or participation rather than a performance.
posted by dhartung at 5:30 PM on January 21, 2009

Fuck off T-mobile and all other viral advertising for recuperating the flashmob idea for your crummy products.

Flash mobbing was created by Bill Wasik to make hipsters look like asses, as if they couldn't do that on their own.
posted by The White Hat at 5:43 PM on January 21, 2009 [1 favorite]

From an otherwise so-so movie, the beautiful Grand Central dance scene from The Fisherking.
posted by gwint at 5:54 PM on January 21, 2009

Flash mobbing was created by Bill Wasik to make hipsters look like asses, as if they couldn't do that on their own.

I stand corrected

So just fuck off T-mobile and while we're at it fuck off to people who want to make other people look like asses and those who delight in the people who do. Cue Hee Haw theme.
posted by pianomover at 5:56 PM on January 21, 2009

Fuck off T-mobile and all other viral advertising for recuperating the flashmob idea for your crummy products.


So just fuck off T-mobile and while we're at it fuck off to people who want to make other people look like asses and those who delight in the people who do. Cue Hee Haw theme.

Easy there, pardner! What, did T-Mobile overcharge you for a BrokenCyde ringtone?
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 6:35 PM on January 21, 2009

Well, I liked it.
posted by jimmythefish at 6:45 PM on January 21, 2009

Pepsi T
posted by jquinby at 7:01 PM on January 21, 2009

meh
posted by P.o.B. at 7:12 PM on January 21, 2009

This Cell Phone, It VIBRATES!?!
posted by BrodieShadeTree at 7:31 PM on January 21, 2009

I thought it was well done too.
posted by chunking express at 7:46 PM on January 21, 2009

Flash mobbing was created by Bill Wasik to make hipsters look like asses, as if they couldn't do that on their own.

Wasik actually says:
There's definitely a self-mockery in the piece insofar as I was mocking an impulse that I see in myself, and in my friends, and in a lot of people that are like me. I was sort of taking that impulse and turning it into a weird kind of performance art.
posted by dhartung at 12:31 AM on January 22, 2009

Advertising isn't going to go away. If that's a given,

It isn't, as far as I'm concerned, and if it takes a few years (or even decades) more of mocking and replaying Bill Hicks fragments, that's just fine with me.
posted by DreamerFi at 12:47 AM on January 22, 2009

Gwint - my thoughts were, like you, that this references the Fisher King pretty heavily.

You can see the elevator pitch pretty clearly on this one: it's "Praise you" crossed with "The Fisher King" - railway station + sudden dancing + bemused/amused looks + over in a minute = join my phone network.

And what's with it being reported in some places as a flash mob? The idea that an ad ageny-derived, corporate funded, choreographed public performance is a "flash mob" is just journalistic laziness/ignorance in my book.
posted by MuffinMan at 12:54 AM on January 22, 2009

I was going to respond, but the Virgin Media ad at the bottom of this page reminded me that I wasn't logged in.
posted by honest knave at 1:39 AM on January 22, 2009 [1 favorite]

there is hope for humanity yet.
posted by FidelDonson at 1:46 AM on January 22, 2009

Yeah all for the love of money.

The problem with so called 'atheism' is we all ways end up with some sort of religion, whether we like it or not, be it sport or consumerism.

This is a dance celebrating how quickly we can consume the earth's resources. Throw away your old mobile and buy a new one - god wants you to.

Having said that tho' I would not mind throwing away my boring closed source Samsung E900 and getting a shiny new open source Tmobile, but I have not got the bread.
posted by dollyknot at 4:49 AM on January 22, 2009

MetaFilter is too cool for school. And advertising.
posted by chunking express at 6:22 AM on January 22, 2009

If corporations and their contracted advertising firms want to throw their money and creative energies towards something that is objectively interesting or artistic, more power to them. Liquor and cigarette companies have been sponsoring legitimate music festivals for years. What's the difference?
posted by ericbop at 9:34 AM on January 22, 2009