Manly Droid Strikes Back: New Ads Dismiss iPhone

04.12.2009
Verizon Wireless' attack on the iPhone has devolved into chest-beating, with a ad that vaguely slams Apple's "beauty" and any phone that's a "tiara-wearing, digitally clueless beauty pageant queen."

The ad is full of little quips like that: "It's not a princess, it's a robot. A phone that trades hairdo for can-do." Though the iPhoneiPhone isn't directly mentioned, there appears to be a white phone that kind of looks like it. Alles zu iPhone auf CIO.de

I'm lamenting the days when Droid ads actually mentioned some features. This commercial is all about image, and the message is clear: Guys, this phone is for you.

The ad essentially admits that the Droid isn't pretty. And that's true. The phone is a plain, rectangular block that's bigger and heavier than the iPhone and, to quote Computerworld's Matt Hamblen, geared towards "guys, especially."

Not to say that appreciating beauty is a gender thing, but there's a certain testosterone in lines like "racehorse duct-taped to a SCUD missile fast" and "does dig through the Web like a circular saw through a ripe banana." An earlier Droid ad showed stealth bombers blasting the phone into the rural countryside like meteorites.

That angle appears to be paying off. According to a mid-November snapshot of brand loyalty by YouGov Brand Index, loyalty to Motorola spiked among men ages 18 and up after the Droid launched.

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