Messenger Cafe: Serving 1998's Leftovers Today

Why on earth did this show up in our Hotmail inbox? We understand it's part of a "fun campaign" that the Borg over in Redmond have developed to illustrate how far they've come in understanding the human concept of "fun." Apparently fun has to do with games, so they've included that. Games and GoPets. Even a "self-proclaimed Windows Geek" isn't falling for it:

Personally, I find this kind of marketing “campaigns” corny and stupid and really doesn’t make me feel very good about using Messenger. I understand that the Messenger Team is going after a different demographic than me and who I am but seriously -- my 14-year-old sister wouldn’t find this crap “cool” whatsoever. I think the Messenger Team needs to ditch efforts like this and try to make Messenger feel “cool” again.

Are you *seeing* the cafe imagery? We can't because our eyes melted in their sockets at first glance. What we don't understand is, the Borg knows how old we are; we left our pre-teens behind in the last century. Why would a company that wants to keep people convinced it's relevant essentially spam its user base indiscriminately? To quote commenter Picturepan2 on another blog: "我觉得silverlight 应该还没有达到足够的普及。"

Okay, one last thing: there's also an area where you can chat with Real Life Moms on Messenger. If there are photos involved, this at least has potential real life internet implications, as explored in this Urban Dictionary entry on the MILF acronym.

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By MvB in News on August 24, 2007 10:15 AM

Comments [rss]

kasa

I don't think this is aimed at young people at all, but at the middle-aged. These graphics look strikingly similar to the crap peddled to my mom's generation in the form of the Hoyle game packs, etc. And I get the feeling it may be successful with that demographic.

Katelyn

My ELEVEN year old sister would groan at this. What's truly frightening to me though is the scary wax face on the "girl" at the "computer monitor." (The girl looks like an alien and the monitor looks like a microfiche viewer from the womb of the public library...) If your artists can't draw, better to just use text.

Troy Morris

As I am in marketing, I understand how difficult it is to make things look "hip" and "cool" when they're not hip nor cool.

I've come to the conclusion to not try. It's way easier to be like "Hey, you can chat to people and play tic-tac-toe."

MvB

@2: Sure, when you spell it out like that, it seems so obvious anyone could have thought of it!

guest

I totally agree with PicturePan2:

I think silverlight should also not sufficient to achieve universal.

Universal should achieved Flex sufficient, Silverlight monopoly encourage, I think.

Clint

I'm glad you addressed this--what a hideous, silly, pointless campaign. Messenger is used for its immediacy, its instant connection to others. Why would anyone accustomed to such speed want to waste time having "fun" instead of just using Messenger itself? Strange.