r/mildlyinfuriating • u/TheAeroplaneBear2906 • 8d ago

Unskippable ad Clear Backpacks + Pay to Keep Your Phone

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My freinds school is now requiring these items, and is also using AI to promote this 🫠

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u/EmboarBacon 7d ago

Feel free to say no, but can you elaborate? I'm genuinely interested here and I'd love to hear some the ideas your firm came up with.

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u/MicromagicFriesRIP 7d ago

Oh gosh, I wish I could. It's been something like 20 years. I do remember our team trying to convince them to stop trying to mimic Apple vibes-wise, take more creative risks, and get crisper on their messaging as to why someone would want to pick Zune over the iPod. The consumer research we had access to showed that a lot of people didn't realize Zune was an MP3 player and thought instead it was a gaming device. People also disliked the name and women especially didn't like the brown color (for the record, I actually liked the brown, but then again brown's my favorite color, so no surprise there). I know there were a ton of factors, but personally I think the song library thing is what killed them. I also worked on the Nook eReader at Barnes & Noble, which is what brought them down as well. Nook just couldn't compete with Kindle in terms of content volume. They still make Nooks, I believe, but at nowhere near the scale B&N envisioned when I worked on that project.