We're very excited to be a part of the new branding program for MSNBC.com. We're bringing a cool, large group, audience interactive technology that was orginally developed at CMU. You can see some video I shot at a CMU event a few years back, but we won't using that content. Although, I have to admit, when people play that game at our Lab, they usually have a pretty good time with it! We'll post more once the games been launched.
MSNBC.COM'S FIRST BRAND CAMPAIGN ANGLES to get newshounds to interact with its vast content hub by means of an interactive game and screensaver, along with an unusual in-cinema effort that deploys a new technology.
"We want people to engage with the brand and the idea," said Marty Cooke, chief creative officer, SS K. "The game is kind of fun because it's like the old Tetris game where the bricks are falling and you have to catch them." When readers click on a brick, they are connected to a real-time headline and news story on MSNBC.com.
"The idea of linking the banner ads to the real time news is really cool; you see the stories manifest out of the bricks," Cooke said. The agency enlisted Fuel to create the online RSS game, while the in-cinema game was created by Brand Experience Lab. Boston-based Beam crafted the screensaver and online ads.
The in-cinema game will debut in May in three theaters in L.A., Philadelphia, and White Plains, N.Y., and uses a never-before-used technology called Magic Mirror developed at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.
The audience looks at the screen and tries to catch the bricks. In order to catch the bricks it must lean to the left or the right to move the game paddle. The paddle responds in real-time to the collective motion of the audience. The camera sees the audience and controls the motion of the paddle.
Link: MediaPost Publications - Online, In-Cinema Games Play Into MSNBC.com Brand Campaign - 04/03/2007.
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